Hondo

I ordered this boat from Hondo in the summer of 1969 and it was delivered at end of that year. Irv only made 6, some say 7 of these. I don't know what number this was only that there was at least one before it.I saw that and had to have one. They weren't even made at Hondo, he farmed the deck out to Ski Marine. Who as I found out years later had a couple of Firemen build them in their spare time.Ordered in Chrome Yellow with a Mahogany deck. As delivered it had dual glass tanks, cav plate.Add Casselli Steel strut, ruder and fin. The hole for prop shaft was drilled for 9 degree v-drive.Hondo was in No. Hollywood at that time and so was my shop.All the installation hardware was machined in my shop from prime aluminum. (Looking at it now I can't believe I made that engine plate on an old 1/2 hp Bridgeport.)Finishline cav plate hardware, cable steering. All bolted together with Joe Factor 12 point SS bolts.Casale 9 degree V-drive with eccentric coupler on K-monel shaft. A 11.5 x 15 2 blade steel prop.A 21 percent overdrive for the blown engine and 9% for the Weber carbed one.A 1350 driveshaft with steel cover.As originally raced with the unblown gas 427 and 9% gear boat ran right at 100 mph.Then in '71 with the 440 blown gas engine the thing ran about 115 until I had Ray Casselli set the cav plate and make a couple of starts with it. Then it ran 124 MPH. I have never changed that adjustment since then. Who could do better than 007?Truth be known runs over 120 scared me. So I went off and did something safe like racing Formula Atlantic cars.The Boat sat inthe shop for a few years except I set it up for skiing with a 454 and seats, wet exhaust.It got used at most twice a year sometimes none. Somewhere around 1990 I broke some main bearing bolts. Damn factory short block. I built a MK IV block 516 inch. We skied with it a few times until '94.That was sort of it and this time it sat outside and got wet.One side rail rotted and spots on the deck appered. The engine also got wet and I thought I'd better freshen it up. Specs follow.Turns out I can't get along with wood. I'm an engineer,machinist and engine builder. So I didn't do the best job on the wood. Actually the woodwork isn't bad it's the epoxy work. It's on to thick and needs to be sanded down and polished. If I never see another piece of sandpaper it will be to soon.So that's where I stopped. All the mechanical has been renewed I have some seats fitted but they don't really fit the theme. The Russell SS tanks have been cleaned and all the hoses redone. The AN fuel and oil lines are new or checked out fine. The water hoses were done in silicone with barb fittings. The Neovane water pump has new impeller. There is a Jones Mech tach and SW gauges, The throttle pedal is a Sanger with Morse cable. The trailer was also built in my shop and was built very low so we could tow fast. You can't do that anymore but back then we did. The tires have 20 miles on them. There are pressure type grease fitting on the wheel bearings. It still has a black plate.Engine specs:MK IV Bow tie block, Bored to 4.530 decked to .010 All race mods and oil passages drilled. Ground inside and out. 4340 forged crank. 4340 rods with 7/16 ARP bolts. Manley forged pistons with small domes, JE rings. ARP main studs and all balanced. The HV blueprinted oil pump draws from a custom Aviaid 10 qt oil pan with built in scuppers and baffles. A Milodon remote oil cooler with HP1 filter AN lines both water and oil. A Comp Cams solid roller cam and lifters driven br double roller chain. Degree to 107 ICL. Crower made the custom pushrods to the length I needed to get geometry right.The Crower SS roller rockers are on ARP studs. The Dart 320 heads are CNC ported and hand blended. There are 2.30 in and 1.9 EX SS valves. Comp cams roller springs and Crane retainers. Dart guides. ARP head studs with 12 Pt nuts and hard washers. The timing cover has a reinforcing plate for the Neovane and I machined things so that's used for the camshaft end play.The Tunnel Ram intake mounts two 625 CFM AFB carbs. I built a progressive linkage using Enderle parts. There are spark arresters. The fuel system is from the two tanks via #8 AN lines to a selector valve then a 130 GPH electric pump up to an inline filter then a Holley pressure regulator. Then #6 hard lines to carbs.The exhaust are Patterson double wall SS water jacketed headers. These cost over $10,000 new.On top of that I modified them with welded on water manifolds to eliminate the hoses.While I no longer have my own dyno I used to and I know what this combination will make. That is over 700 HP at 6800. Back in '71 that's all we could get from the 468 blown engine. On a good day.Now using the same gear and prop you're looking at 125 MPH boat. If you have never driven a flat bottom at speed this shouldn't be your first try.Bottom line is if you want to do the paint (I have a gallon) and finish the epoxy the boat will be done.If finished to show like it will be worth 50K Just to build this engine with the exhaust, oil, fuel systems is over 30K.I'm not hard to find, I'm the owner of Latham Supercharger, Richard PaulI've got some more pictures I'll post later