Chris-Craft. More than 100 years of recreational boating

by Bob Wonders on 8 Apr 2011 I doubt there’s a better-known boating name worldwide than the venerable Chris-Craft.

Certainly I don’t know of a current company that can date its ancestry back to the 19th century, back to 1874 when Christopher Columbus Smith started building wooden boats on the lakes outside Michigan.

Over the decades since, Chris-Craft Boats have had a few owners, including the late (and lamented?) Outboard Marine Corporation (OMC), but now under the strong leadership of partners Stephen Julius and Steve Heese, the company is firing on all cylinders.

Australia has been a solid market for the marque and I can recall seeing Chris-Craft boats on Sydney Harbour when I was a mere ‘tadpole’, that’s back in the early to mid fifties.

These days, a Sydney dealership, Premier Marine, situated directly on the harbour waterfront at Rose Bay, does an excellent job is promoting the historic marque.

Chris-Craft produces a broad range of models, from the smallest, the 20’ (6.09-metres) Silver Bullet to its largest craft the 36’ (10.97 metres) Corsair.

Essentially, that means the company can offer boats for cruising, water skiing and fishing, with designs incorporating runabouts, cuddy cabins and bow riders.

During the recent Miami International Boat Show, various bodies from the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA), Boating Writers International, Marine Marketers of America and numerous boating publications handed out awards to the vessels and/or products they felt rated being termed ‘the best.’

I was particularly interested to note that one Chris-Craft boat was honoured by a specialist boating publication as its #1 for the year, that craft being the Chris-Craft Corsair 28.

The reason for my interest stemmed simply from the act that the Corsair has long been my favourite Chris-Craft model.

There are five models in the Corsair series, 22’, 25’, 28’ 33’ and 36’ (6.70, 7.62, 8.53, 10.05 and 10.97-metres) and quite frankly I’d be happy to own any one of them.

Nevertheless, let’s take a look at the Corsair 28 which so impressed some people in the US.

It’s a big and beefy 28-footer, capable of handling (with ease) single or dual engine installation.

Standard power is a pair of 5.7-litre Volvo Penta engines and they give this good-looking boat a top speed in the region of 60mph (96.5km/hr) at around 5000rpm.

Throttle back to half that, 2500rpm, and the Corsair still lopes easily along at a still brisk 25mph (40km/hr).

What really impresses me about the Chris-Craft models is the quite meticulous attention paid to what many might consider minor details.

Within the forward cabin, for instance, there’s even a carbon monoxide detector, while other features rated as optional extras by many lesser builders include automatic bilge pump and bilge blowers, a fully gel coated bilge area, pop-up stainless steel mooring cleats and anti-siphon valves and electric sending unit for the fuel tank.

Chris-Craft even supplies a custom embroidered pennant and flag kit!

Again, unlike many of its competitors, Chris-Craft offers an eye-catching array of hull colours; the Corsair 28 can have a pristine white hull or ‘Palm Beach Yellow’, ‘Midnight Blue’, ‘Willow Green’, ‘Steel Blue’, ‘Café Taupe’ or ‘Riviera (seems to me I’ve heard that name before) Red’.

The big cockpit is beautifully fitted out, with helm and companion seating and a full width rear lounge.

Nice touches include dash light dimmers, custom mahogany steering wheel, tilt steering (Teleflex and electronic controls standard with dual engine installations), in-dash LCD depth finder, a 12 volt accessory outlet, drink holders, compass and a Kenwood AM/FM stereo CD system with sub woofer, tweeters and four speakers with an in-dash remote control unit.

That definitely rates as attention to detail in my book.

There is also courtesy lighting placed within the cockpit, together with removable carpet, a lockable glove box, ski storage locker, stainless steel grab rails and powered engine hatch cover.

The cockpit is, of course, self draining and the vessel meets the required standards imposed by the American Boat and Yacht Council (ABYC) and the United States Coast Guard.

While the relatively open design indicates the Corsair 28 is a day boat, there is accommodation in the cabin with a double or twin berths and a portable head.

I would certainly see an overnight stay on board the Corsair 28 as a happy occasion for all involved.

Of course, having ‘waxed lyrical’ at how well-equipped this boat is, it would be remiss of me not to mention that Chris-Craft offer a comprehensive array of optional extras.

These range from canvas and sun pad packages, Raymarine electronics and selectable exhaust to a cockpit refrigerator and safety package that includes a fire extinguisher system.

With Chris-Craft what you want is there when you want it.

This is definitely a breed of boat that wins my heart and mind, no doubt about that.

For further information contact Premier Marine, Rose Bay, Sydney, telephone (02) 9328-0999 or visit the website.