Active Cats

[Phil M]

Originally Posted by littlenige

Can anyone tell me what these brackets were, located around the location of the motors?? Some kind of strengthening maybe?? I never noticed them before, but these shots are from the AJ ROberts Active cat and the Blue Max Active. Did they all have these??

Could be Engine Cradle mounts in addition to Stringers - also could be Battery box brackets too -

PHIL

[Chris Sunkin]

Originally Posted by littlenige

Can anyone tell me what these brackets were, located around the location of the motors?? Some kind of strengthening maybe?? I never noticed them before, but these shots are from the AJ ROberts Active cat and the Blue Max Active. Did they all have these??

They were reinforcement plates for the outboard engine mount bolts. Ross built the earlier Express cats with those as well.

[h2oboater]

They are the motor mounts, All the Active cat's had them. I deriged the 1982 World Champion [Couger] for Bob Kehrig replaced the deck with a pleasure version. Bob used it for years as his pleasure boat [Motor City Magic] In late 1985 we riged, and raced the new Motor City Magic till 1988. When Bob sold and it became [Bad To The Bone] Later Pet Heldago painted it up like his old [Amercain Dream] now with the added beaks to make it legal for open class. Unfortunately around 91 at the worlds in Key West the boat sank and the driver was killed, last I saw of it was in the Keys apart an for sale.

[fast fun 2]

Originally Posted by littlenige

And does anybody know how many were built??
I can remember the following but presumably there were more?
Systems
AJ Roberts
Wolverine
Panasonic
Blue Max
Benihana
Motor City Magic
Hublot (broke apart in Needles Trophy race in England).


Anyobdy know if they were all different or if one became another under new ownership etc.....Thanks.

The Tollman boat? Or was that a cougar?

[h2oboater]

The boat [M-588 Cougar] was the first 33' Active built glass cat,,that ran well, black hull with green trim, I believe it was a Cougar design. The very first Active cat was called [Active] ran in sport class, a one of design,, that didn't work to well.
Tollman's boat I believe was a alum cougar built boat.

[littlenige]

I think there were two Toleman cats - one wooden cat with central cockpit and motor mounts - didn´t work at all well (later seen as an orange outboard powered pleasure boat - for Michel Meynard??). The other was the 38´ aluminium cougar - later stretched to around 50´ for the Round Britain Race and installed with quad diesel motors.

I thought when posting the Motor City Magic pic that the hull looked slightly smaller than the other boats - makes sense now. Thanks for all the info gents.

[littlenige]

Poole Harbour prior to Needles Trophy race.

[h2oboater]

I bought this Active 33' cat in the mid 90's from Pet Smith original owner of [Wolverine] this was his pleasure cat,what was cool about it, under that white repaint their was a complete Wolverine teal paint job to match his 37' race boat. For some reason he had it repainted in a hurry?? the only teal color that's left are the strips on the seats. The cat has Kamma drives on it that Betty Cook gave Pet to install. I found this pic's under the the Ocean Express link, I sold the cat around 1997. This cat was too much boat for him, he pulled the motors and sold her to some one in Canada last I heard. Looks like some one put her back together??

[ViciousOne]

I remember when Dave Z. and Andy from Jomar spun that boat out that boat was hard to handle with those Kaama drives, I put a tunnel back in one of those 32' Actives when I first went out on my own it was a kevlar built boat .
I put 16" boxes in front of the # 2 speedies it had on it it made a world of difference in the handling.
The boat I repaired was Bud Dretmun's(Owner of Active marine,Active homes,Active tool & die) personal boat the last I saw of it she was at Cumberland marine for sale as a couger! They only built 3 or 4 of pleasure 32's that is the hull that started the well known 39' Express.

Spark

[h2oboater]

Spark your right about handling, But those drive's had a great supercharger sound. You had to drive that boat sober and never take your hands off the wheel & throttles.
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