Looking for info about my chris cat
 

I've got this info from chris craft "The boat was originally contracted by Jim Ross of RAM Marine Associates of Thornwood, NY but the buyers name was changed to
Phillip E. Melillo."

Does anyone got some history about this 3 seater race cat?
Any pics?
Wins?

Thanks

Jocke
Team name?
Etc

Your boat was raced, mostly in the Northeast racing circuit, by Phil Melillo along with the legendary Billy Don Pruitt (in a couple of races). I believe it was called "Airborne". The Chris Cat replaced Phil Melillo's black inboard Triton hull of the same name. That Chris Cat was fast and very competitive. It was also a later model and benefited from Pruitt's personal involvement as production manager.

T2x

Thanks for the info! :)
What benefits? And what where the different with this later model compared to the others?
Bring me all info you can! :D

Early CHris Cats were built on the assembly line and had very inconsistent laminating. Later Dick Genth put Pruitt in charge of the Cat layup area. Billy Don and George Linder teamed up to fix that problem and the later hulls were much sturdier without any added weight.

Phil Melillo is still around and has had a string of pleasure boats. Billy Don, sadly, passed away some years ago. The Chris Cat mold was taken from a modified Shadow Cat, which George Linder and I created back in 1979-80.

T2x

That's the boat that got me started in this crazy hobby. We (Total Marine) sponsored that boat for Phil Melillo and Jim Ross. We were a Chris Craft dealer at the time (I was still in school). Don Pruitt came up from Chris Craft headquarters in Florida to throttle the boat. It ran in 3 or 4 races in the 1984 season, and won at least one of them. It was very competitive. Jim Ross built some durable high-horsepower small blocks for her (she ran in the Modified class). She was rigged with the new Mercruiser #IV speedmaster drives on stand-off boxes.

Hanging around with these guys got me hooked! A few years later we built our Chris-Cat Pro-Stock boat that we ran until 1997. If memory serves me correctly, the old "Airborne" was sold and later became "Tropic Heat" out of New Jersey, where it raced for many years.

Good luck with it . She was a really cool boat!

Tom Caruso
Total Marine

Happy New Year Tom.......

To you to, Rich!

Lots of initials.
 

Lots of initials,,, T2x, TGC,, I feel left out,, Happy new year Tom.:drink:

Philip

Thanks for all the info guys! :)
I've emailed Billy at npba and he sent me what pictures he got of it and he Will also send me 2 video clips :)
It is real fun to hear that it was a competitive boat with some legends that have raced it, when i bought this boat just thought i was just another boat..
The boat is now in Sweden.

This is boat is a 1984 modell but is it still a later modell? :)

It was built after Pruitt got involved....it is one of the good ones.

I remember the boat being a 1984 model, and know that it was a balsa cored version. The later boats were Divinycell cored. I recall it being a tad on the "heavy" side and the plan was to replace it with a 1985 hull with Divinycell coring, which Chris-Craft thought would be more reliable and lighter, but the plans to replace it fell through after the boat was sold.

Tom

Hey Tom. You don't happen to have any pics of the Duckin' Out on file? I (really my parents) have a ton of pics (paper) sitting around somewhere. That was a great looking boat for back in the day!

I'll have to check. I think I might have your dad's file somewhere in the attic. You're right, that boat really was great looking! Chris-Craft did the custom color (blue) for your dad, and then we had it airbrushed in the New York Colisseum right before the start of the New York Boat Show in 1985.

Say "Hi" to your dad for me.

Tom

Will do...heading up to our cabin for the weekend to get some snowmobiling in with him. I'll mention it to him. Come to think of it, most of the old pics are probably up there...a lot of the "archives" got move up there when they downsized a couple of years ago...I see if I can remember to take a look.

-Chris

Sorry to High-jack but one quick question, does T2x or anyone else on this thread know where "el Gato Grande" is, it was own by an exec of Chris Craft that went to work for Wellcraft about 1984. Nice boat (blk and silver) it had 2-715hp gale banks twin turbos.
at 100mph it made those intercoastal telephone poles look like picket fence going by.

Sorry.. I have no idea.