Unlimited Hydroplanes History

[SayMikey]

Anyone seen these pics? Sad but better than outside rotting http://jimclark.smugmug.com/Hydroplanes/Paul-Shurlocks-photos-/10025610_vxQzG#686460346_JnugE

 

[Hydro Junkie]

True Mike, but as they sit now, they are just dry rotting slower. It would be nice to see many of those boats restored and running. I saw the 7474 hull in there, the 7207, 7325, 8255 and several others that I couldn't ID. Just getting the 7207, 7325 and 7474 on the water running at the same time would be fantastic, especially if they were restored to their original paint schemes, the 72 Notre Dame, 73 Pay N' Pak and 74 Valu Mart

 

[Bill Gibson]

Would love to see them ALL restored....my sentimental favorite of course would be the PAK! That old boat kinda started alot of new things...the wing, honeycomb construction, wider beam, lower profile...was the best turning boat of its time!

 

[Hydro Junkie]

Actually, the 73 Pak incorporated the low deckline, 48" picklefork and wide transom from the 70 Pak. When you compare the two boats, the 70 was just as fast and cornered just as well as the 73, proven in head to head competition over the three years of 73-75. The fact that the 70 was taken to Australia and won the Australian version of the Gold Cup three times has to say something about how advanced it was in it's day. If it had been built with a Merlin instead of twin Hemi's, who knows how far that boat would have gone

 

[Scalehydros]

If it had been built with a Merlin instead of twin Hemi's, who knows how far that boat would have gone

Perfect place for it in Australia with those Hemi's, wonder if it had the push button automatic like the Valiant Chrysler AP6 .

But seriously this is great information, anyone else have links or info, would love some photos of the 72 Madison

 

[Hydro Junkie]

If it had been built with a Merlin instead of twin Hemi's, who knows how far that boat would have gone

Perfect place for it in Australia with those Hemi's, wonder if it had the push button automatic like the Valiant Chrysler AP6 .

But seriously this is great information, anyone else have links or info, would love some photos of the 72 Madison

Actually, it only ran with the troublesome twin Hemi's in 1970. After the season ended, Jim Lucero swapped out the Hemi's for a front mounted Merlin and moved the cockpit to behind the Merlin instead of the cabover configuration it had when delivered from Ron Jones's shop. The boat improved during both the 71 and 72 seasons, after which it was sold to Bernie Little and became a Miss Budweiser. It was as a Budweiser that it ran head to head with the "winged" Pak, the former 72 Notre Dame and Value Mart/Weisfields.

Here are some pictures for you:

http://www.missmadison.com/photos/gallery12.jpg

http://www.missmadison.com/photos/gallery10.jpg

 

[Tom Kelly]

I think the 1980 Pay n Pak is in there as well. That would be hull 8025 as Stephens Spirit, I think.