AristoCraft Boats: Go Fast, Stay Young

In the summer of 2008, a fun and fast boat line, AristoCraft, was featured in ACBS Rudder. Initially constructed of plywood, when fiberglass came on the scene, AristoCraft made the bold move to completely switch production. 

There is really nothing to distinguish this farmhouse from any along the road in Alpharetta, Georgia, until you see the mailbox. An old, gold, Johnson outboard engine doing letter service is the first clue that something out of the ordinary may be happening here. Beyond the farmhouse stand three, large, non-descript steel buildings. As the door to the furthest structure rolls up and lights flicker on, the first impression is, “Good Lord, someone has stood this thing up and poured it full of boats.” Then order begins to emerge. A pathway. Your eye travels back through space and time, down rows of mahogany and painted decks, green and blue windshields, knife-like bows straining forward on their stands. The colors, the shapes, the sheer audacious styling…The fun! This isn’t just an AristoCraft museum. It’s a funhouse of AristoCraft boats. And it’s here that over the past two decades, Bill Turner has been assembling all the pieces of their legendary history. You could say it was also his history, since it was Bill’s father that started it all. 

Talk to anyone who knows about AristoCraft and you’re guaranteed to hear the word “fun” used at least twice in the first sentence. Just ask Claude Turner himself. At ninety-one, the man who created AristoCraft boats can look back and enthusiastically exclaim, “I had a hell of a lot of fun…I had more fun than anyone!” 

AristoCraft founder, Claude Turner, at 1960s boat show

One of a Kind

Claude is a true original; a pioneer in the design and building of both plywood and fiberglass boats. Instantly recognizable, his boats are like no others. His vision of the “go fast, feel young” boats of the late 1940s and 1950s matured and survived the difficult transition to the new materials and demands of the fiberglass era. In those rollercoaster days, the boating industry was filled with seat-of-your-pants guys; men who succeeded or failed mainly through the sheer force of their personalities. It was a time perfectly suited for someone like Claude Turner who both created and captured a market by being out ahead of the curve, knowing you can either lead the change—or follow, work twice as hard, and still wind up in the scrap pile.

During the early years, production took place in a shop Claude describes as “a dirty affair,” where he developed a method of varnishing his boats upside down, resulting in a dust- free, mirror-like finish that baffled other manufacturers. Ten years later, The Atlanta Boat Company as AristoCraft was officially called, moved to a huge new facility—a masterpiece of organization—where every operation had been thoroughly analyzed and choreographed for maximum efficiency and minimum movement. Boats were assembled and finished on customized dollies that inched their way through sixteen stations around an 80’ by 300’ room, propelled by a massive 730’ chain.  

He developed his planing hull in 1947 and began building a series of 12- to 14-ft. racing hydros, his Racing Smoo, and then two long-lived boats, the Typhoon and the Torpedo, which really ignited the boating industry. “Everything had to look like a jet back then; if it didn’t look like a jet it wouldn’t sell,” Claude explained. 

In the late ‘50s came the Avalon and then “America’s most distinctive boat,” the Matador, larger boats built to handle the ever-larger outboard engines. These were all plywood monocoque constructed crafts with one unique design difference. No frames. AristoCrafts have always relied solely on their stringers and their shells for structural integrity. The savings in production costs were substantial, which was to be an enormous competitive advantage in their drive to survive. At first, dealers were afraid, but Claude assured them, “Try ‘em; if it breaks up, I’ll give you another one.” Never once did he have to make good on that promise. 

Installing windshields and trim on the “15-minute boat” line.

AristoCraft made virtually everything that went into their boats. Windshields, bowrails, even their own seamless cushions. A fortuitous pairing was made with the New Orleans-based Higgins Company for custom plywood. At first, Higgins was dismissive of what they thought was a small-fry order. “I’m gonna order a carload…That woke them up!” said Claude. The result was a made-to-order 8 ft. sheet of mahogany plywood, a little over a quarter-inch thick, constructed of three equal plys. “That plywood saved the day—you couldn’t have bent around the box with other plywood. You could splice it, join it; it wasn’t just veneer, there was room to sand…and it never separated.’ With their own scarfing machine they created 24 ft. sheets, out of which they cut all their panels. Buying their materials in bulk allowed cost savings most of their competitors of the curve, knowing you can either lead the change—or follow, work twice as hard, and still wind up in the scrap pile. 

The drive for efficiency and high-production left little room for error. But the ever- resourceful workers had a solution which, fortunately, only came to light many years after the company had ceased to exist. When the line was falling hopelessly behind, an employee would sometimes stick a wrench into the chain, shearing a pin at the motor, which brought the operation to a halt. By the time the repair was made, everyone was caught back up. 

And then everything changed. 

The (FIBer)GLass Is Half Full 

“That fiberglass was like the Internet. Everybody wanted that fiberglass. Once it got in, well, you can’t buck the trend,” Claude recalled about those revolutionary times. “I would have loved to stayed in wood—we just got to where we were getting good.” But change was in the air, and AristoCraft gambled boldly to stay out in front. They continued to build wood boats while Claude was figuring things out. Then, over a six-month period in 1959, the company accomplished the nearly impossible task of retooling their entire operation while still maintaining production. Wood was gone forever …they switched the entire operation to fiberglass.                 

Assuming he was just another curious dealer, Turner visited Lone Star, Glasspar, and other southern boat builders where he saw workers mixing their batches in pots, putting in the catalyst, stirring it, then scrambling to work quickly. The inherent waste and inefficiency called for a different solution. Claude’s was to design a centralized two-barrel system with a walking-beam pump that delivered equal parts of the mixture through separate pipes to various places in the plant. Then two lines were dropped to feed the guns he’d developed to mix and spray the chemicals for the hand lay-up operation. “That saved us more damn time. There was no wasted resin.” Constantly experimenting, he worked out the other problems of this new, highly technical process. 

Success or failure sometimes rides on a single choice. AristoCraft made the transition to the fiberglass era by wagering their future on one, just one, model of boat. This was unheard of. While most other boat builders were producing up to ten models, Turner struck out in a different direction. In hindsight, it was a brilliant move…

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