This is a update from a previous post about our 1969 Chris Craft Commander 31. We purchased the boat from a broker in Michigan who handled everything including getting in touch with a shipper. The shipper picked up the boat and sent pictures of the boat on the trailer. He shipped the boat through the night and said when the sun came up he noticed the top of the boat was swaying and all the windows blew out. He blamed the guy that took off the flybridge, of course. Blame the other guy. The boat was shipped through New York state at night, not even sure if that is legal and pretty sure a 11.4 beam was over width. When the boat arrived it was a mess. This boat was pristine when we bought it, not a single scratch on her. The windows that blew out put scratches down her side. We were told to call our insurance company to make the claim, so we did. The boat was considered totaled. We would love to save her and have a new top put on but we would have to ship out of Vermont to do it and then any place we called were years out to repair. We could probably put a soft top on but we would lose another year and she would not be the boat we purchased. It took us 3 years to find this boat after we sold our 1966 Chris Craft 31, which we should not have done. We are retired and this was our dream boat to spend summers on. It has been a nightmare to say the least. The shipper will not own up to the damage at all. We are out $6,000 for shipping. Our broker contacted the sleezy boat transport company, they offered us $2500.00 and wanted us to sign an agreement that we would not continue to go after them legally. We did Not do that. We just got the settlement for the boat but lost between $12,000 between survey, prep, marine cost and we had to store the boat inside for the winter because it had no top. Statefarm has been great through this. They are going to subrogate the shipper and try to get us back what we lost in additional cost paid out for damages.
The Insurance company is giving us the boat but we do not have the time or place to repair her to the way we purchased her. The boat has 327Q engines with less than 500 hrs. The interior is beautiful, exterior is pristine ( has a couple of scratches from the window being blown out)
She just needs a top. The flybridge was not damaged. Not sure what she is worth now, would love some suggestions.
I feel bad for your situation.
Definitely stand your ground with the subergation against the shipping company as the boat was most certainly in their custody during the mishap. Regardless of whether the yard could have preped the boat better or not.
I'd love to see you save the boat you looked 3 years to find.
I'm sure your existing hard top is fixable . Im also certain you could pilfer one off a junk yard boat too Really it would come down to
Which way is more cost efficient and which way gets you boating the quickest.
Perhaps the best approach would be to have a simple convertible top and aft curtain made locally to you which could easily get you boating possibly even this season.
This would buy you time to hash out a plan of how to get a proper hard top repaired, salvaged or made. This would also give you the time it takes to schedule the work with a reputable repair shop.
@Sven Osgood there is a 1970 31 commander right now in lousinana for $1000 for the whole boat. Just like yours . There’s your parts boat :) cheers
I'm with Jeremy on this... stand your ground. It would be interesting and helpful with some additional pictures of the damage... it could help some of us with some additional suggestions for how to move forward if you are thinking of keeping it. I've removed and replaced the hardtop on my 42 Commander... yes, it's surely different, but not complicated. If it's perhaps just the glass with minimal damage to the framework (or hardtop), then you might have it easier than you think.