A nautical fanatic has turned a once sunken boat into a road legal, drivable car. Mark Ray designed and built his dream motor after his wife Robyn bet him that he could not do it. Robyn, had been diagnosed with breast cancer and felt that Mark needed a project to take his mind from being her full time carer. He spent over $7,500 on merging a GMC Jimmy with a sunken and recovered Sea Ray Bow Rider. After stripping the boat of its motor, out drive and interior – including the floor – he built it into the car that had been taken apart and left with only its chassis, seats and motor.
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MotorTranscript
00:00You have a boat, you have a car and you have a convertible. So it's all three in one.
00:14Mark Ray from Atlanta, Georgia always loved boats. But it was only after his wife set
00:19him a challenge that he decided to create a boat car.
00:22The boat car started about three years ago. My wife had breast cancer and after her surgery
00:28I was taking care of her and she came in the bedroom and said to me, why don't you build
00:32a boat car? And I had no idea, what's a boat car? So I looked at it, I researched it and
00:37she said, I bet you can't do it. And in a year I built it and I won the bet and I kept
00:42the boat car.
00:45Mark was given a recovered 18.5 Sea Ray Bow Rider boat for free, which was stripped of
00:50its motor, out drive and interior. He bought a GMC Jimmy, which was cut apart and the boat
00:57was installed on top. It was then down to Mark to add the finishing touches and he
01:02couldn't resist the nautical theme.
01:04People ask me frequently, how do you get in my boat car? I go, you get in the back of
01:08the ladder. They go, but where's the door? I go, this is a boat, it's not a car. So we've
01:14been asked that so many times, I ended up putting on door handles. These are fake door
01:19handles. You climb up the ladder and you're in. I even have a handy dandy propeller. Doesn't
01:25do much, but it sure does look good. Fishing rod holders. And of course Scully, he looks
01:32out for everybody getting in and out of the boat.
01:35The boat car is fitted with the Jimmy's original engine to give it some oomph on the open road.
01:41This is the expanded metal where air comes through to keep the engine cool into the radiator.
01:46This is my engine area and I have it covered with diamond plate. The boat car does move
01:51along pretty fast. It's got a 4.3 V6. Won't burn rubber, but it does run good.
01:56To make it street legal, the vehicle had to be fitted with head and tail lights, indicators,
02:02a horn, seat belts and mirrors.
02:04Practicality, it's fun, but it's not real practical.
02:09Mark's creation has won trophies and plaques at car shows, but it also stops traffic when
02:14he takes it for a spin on the school run.
02:17People are crazy. I'm driving and all of a sudden I hear the cars honking and people
02:22waving and my daughter and I have seen people videotape and run right off into the shoulder.
02:26It always puts a smile on someone's face.
02:29It's a very novel idea. I'd have to take it for a spin to see how it really floats.
02:33It's awesome. It's an eye catcher for sure.
02:36Would you drive it?
02:37Oh, in a heartbeat.
02:38And it also floats Mark's family's boat.
02:41It's brought a lot of comic relief to my mom's cancer treatments and everything.
02:45People look at the boat car and go crazy and she laughs about it.
02:51Mark spent $10,000 and one year building the boat car.
02:55He's been offered $30,000 for it, but he's determined to keep his pride and joy in the family.
03:01I'm not trading it and I'm not selling it.
03:03I had one guy offer me jewellery and I told him, if you keep your jewellery, I'm keeping the boat car.
03:08It's going to be passed down to the kids.