Well, I have not been to the survey yet. I have been to the plant for 3 or 4 years in a row now. I have bought the to some Butt ugly TC24, when the best thing the C-Dory plant had going for it, Jeff Messmer was in the house, and listened, I had input on some of the things on the TC255. Both are sweet boats. Both are differant boats. Dusty let go of a fine vessel that I charished, spent hours, weeks on at a time. Some of my fellow soldiers gave it the "redeployment" name of "The Decompresion Chamber" as they would often show up at my boat, still in the desert BDUs, dust on their boots and all. We'd spend a night or two on FreeByrd prior to them moving on to family and the world. Why did I sell her. I wonder many days....but, at the time, I was about to take a saws-all to her, bring the roof line forward as to make a reverse angle true pilot house forward section. That would have screwed up many a great night sleeping in the big ol berth, gazing up into the stars thru the "ugly" slanted windows. They were worth their money in gold on those nights, and I miss them. Today, if I had the opportunity to do it again, there would be two TC boats. The TC24 with basically the same set up, other than the roof line coming forward, and the TC 255 would have a true hull extension rather than the Armstrong brackets, and, ....taller sponsons, but that would have cost more money, and differant hull molds as I understand it.
Money. Wow. Now, here is my input for the direction Scot and his current crew are taking C-Dory. We have enough Bayliner/SeaRay/Blow-n-Go boats. Give us back our neat little boats, with wood in there we can drill into, mount our cabenits, add our drawers, mount our beverage holders, break...and fix with a piece of the white board stuff.... and have usable storage space. Yes...they cost more....at the time of purchase. The true cost of a boat is realized once sold. Yes, two of the three C-Dory boats I sold....held their value real nice. But, now, with the (CD22...the bread and butter of the C-Dory lineage)...current blow and go, can't change it on the go form seats and all...and the prices not going up about 5-6% each year... I see our wonderful nich boat going the ways of the other boat lines mentioned above. Who wants something that looks like everyone else in the show. Not me.
Now, I have no idea what the survey looks like, but my previous emails/conversaitons/calls to Scot, Tom, Jeff when he was still in the house, and others.... paint a pretty clear picture I think. If the goal is to become another blow-n-go and sell out because you can pump out a bunch of boats that sell quickly at the boat shows....well, I guess they are going down that road. If they want what got them to the dance,.... I think they can no longer hear the music.
At the same time, I still love my old hull #14 of 14 C-Dory 18' Angler. She is special. He has some linage. She is tuff, and nothing looks like or works like her in todays boat shows, ....at least not the Seattle, Miami, Atlanta, Pensacola, Nashville, Louisville, ...shows. ...this year. They are all still welcome in my home.
I truly hope to see many of my C-Brats in the near future....and if not, at least at the Hawthorne in the Jan/Feb timeframe in 08. They are now for sure what make this boat what it is..... along with this site too of course.
Thanks Administrators!
Byrdman
