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Okay heres a interesting question... Since it's all custom build now for the classic's
Anybody have a idea of how many Sweet 16's built to date, too how many 16 twin seat built.
I would be curious to the numbers over the past 50 years now of somewhat production..
? anybody... i would be surprised if its more then a 1500 ... total..?
Interesting yes but difficult to answer. Let's see if I can put it in a nutshell, most of this we have documented on our website.
The Lake George Donzi Classic Club we have all the classic models listed and are still building historical databases and registries on all models
The 16 Footer's
some things to keep in mind.
The "sweet 16 " is not 50 yrs old the name was given to the boat in 1990 when OMC brought the 16 back into production after 10 yrs of absence in the model line up.
they put a decal on the side "sweet 16" this boat is different from the 16 that was made prior to 1980 that model is the SkiSporter and is left hand helm.
the sweet 16 is produced by OMC and also AMH , AMH drops the decal and the name sweet 16 and just calls it a classic until they drop it from production in 2000
and bring it back for a year or too later in the 2000's
AMH comes up with the 2+2 seating in the mid 1990's after 2000 ish they only make 2+2 models and call them classic until they re-introduce the "Sweet 16" in 2007 ish I think then it is dropped from the line shortly after then not to far from then all classic go custom
The HIN format also changes from a running count to yearly total so you would need to find the last boat made in each of the years when they used that format to find the total.
OMC made some classic in Goshen IN. at the Chris Craft factory so those boats have different HINs and those build records might not exist , both Donzi and Chris Craft have had ownerships changes since then.
I have been trying to put this all together in a nice neat package for the 50th and should have our website updated shortly, sort of a "THIS IS YOUR LIFE" for the 16
hope that helps it may pay to look at your HIN and see where you are in all of this
you can see the "sweet 16" in script just ahead of the decals
you can also see OMC had not a clue how the decals should go but it was 10 years and two owners since a 16 had rolled off the factory floor
gotta love how OMC forced themselves onto the Donzi Crest
Don't forget that Shepherd Boats also built the Donzi Ski Sporter from 1965 to 1969.
I have not been able to ascertain how many hulls this represents.
All good info thanks.. I will have to check my hull number... I had no idea the classic was so broken up in production runs.... and i have seen a few boats with the logos reversed and always wondered that , they all seem to have omc drives with that reverse decal .. just looks wrong....)
I think i just need a bigger garage and start collecting .
A interesting thing about my boat , apparently its first owner had a larger boat 126 foot. And my boat lived on that boat for the first few years of her life.. My eye rings are turned to the eye hole faces forward. Must have been a lift rig thing.
I have never seen another with the eyelets like this.