Fuel System

The fuel tank for the Muscateer mounts under the front of the body.  Two carriage bolts held the fuel tank centrally located between the headlights.The filler cap sits front left.

A 4 gallon "BoaTank" with a float style gauge/cap assembly was used.  We looked on the web for information on the Manufacturer, Bettcher Manufacturing of Cleveland Ohio, but found little on this type of fuel tank and gauge.

Our gauge is a bit worse for wear, unfortunately the glass cover is broken.

A rubber pad held the tank tight against the fiberglass shell to avoid rattling.  And the float unit is very corroded and in marginal condition.  Hopefully some Evaporust can clean it up well enough to reuse.

The tank mounted to the body with two carriage bolts and a piece of plumbing pipe strap.  Industrial, but effective.

The fuel line ran down the right side of the hull, pop-riveted into place with small plastic clips to retain the fuel hose in place.  Oddly, some pop-rivets were steel, some aluminum.  Possibly past owner repairs.

The "Black Box"

As removed, the unit has no visible markings or numbers.  It is quite "industrial" in its manufacture, as the plate steel obviously made fabrication and assembly easier and lower cost than a cast housing.  Lotsa bolts holding it together!

A post on a forum noted that the Muscat Corporation used this type of transmission on "early" Muscateers.  Not sure how to define early vs. late, or even when this unit was built.  As #2146 one could assume it is actually the 2,146th one built.  Or maybe they started at #1,000 in year one, or 2,000 in year two, and the sequence of builds did not match the actual serial number.

Right hand drives and propeller cam/drive pulleys

Right hand front, control input shafts

Left hand front, control input shafts

The two joysticks lever the "input shafts" and when hand turning the clutch with the levers forward or back the drive outputs engage.  So the transmission spins freely, a good sign, but until we get a bit more time to test no telling if it is fully functional or not.

Left hand rear, secondary clutch (frozen)

The clutch retaining bolt came out quite easily, as have most of the bolted connections.  However the clutch will not come off the shaft, and there is are no taps or a central hub to get a puller on to remove the item.  It has been sprayed with PB Blaster and we'll let it sit for a while and see if the magic juice can help free the clutch from the shaft.


Front view

 The throttle cable is free and the control lever easily moves the cable in the sheath.


Rear view



The disassembly continues...

In order to refurbish our Muscat Corporation Muscateer, dubbed "Britney", we decided to strip the hull/shell completely.  We fabricated a cart to roll it around on during the restoration.

The Black Box in-situ

This allowed the Black Box transmission to be hoisted out (it is heavy) and the shell rolled out from under the transmission.

The Muscateer on its trolley

Hoisting the "Black Box"

Once the transmission was hoisted, we rolled the shell out of the way, and lowered the Black Box onto two pieces of 1" pipe.  This allowed us to easily roll the box out of the way, and move the shell back into the small work shed we are using.

Now all that is left in the shell are the axle sprockets, two rear tensioners, the limited wiring, and the control cables for the propeller engage and rudder control.

Left rear drive sprocket and chain tensioner

Left front drive sprocket

Right rear drive sprocket and tensioner

The "bathtub"

Next step, finally stripping of wiring and other miscellaneous items to get down to the bare hull. 

Then its determining the plans for providing a new engine and tires....