T.D. Vinette owners

So I only have 1 post or so, but bought a trawler this past year (July, 2018) and cannot find many/any owners of this brand. I have done all of the obligatory online searches and even contacted the company directly ( no response so far...) ...
Are there any owners on this forum?
Tough to find much of anything about them... are they that rare for the pleasure boat?
Purpose was to find a great loop boat and we found it! I searched for years for a boat that would check off my 'requirements' and such, and ended up finding our boat (Klondike) almost in our back yard.
Part of the plan is to stop by Escanaba Michigan on our journey for a personal tour of her birth place, but as I said I cannot find much info or even an owner forum.
Anyone out there with experience of this brand?

Welcome aboard. Good luck with your new baby. Can’t say I have heard of that brand but so what. Have fun and post more photos please.

Congrats on your boat .. she is great looking boat ...enjoy

Congratulations on the new boat! Did some searching on the company and found very little. It looks like they are or were based out of Escanaba, Michigan. It might be worth contacting the city / town to see if they had more information on the builder.

Ted

See bottom of post, Maybe still open?

The link below says they are closed:
(Not PDF page 64, document page 64)
http://www.glmri.org/research/completedstudies/Tab3.pdf

Seems they started in 1947:
https://newspaperarchive.com/escanaba-daily-press-feb-13-1955-p-8/

Interesting story on another vessel built by them:
https://shepherdexpress.com/news/wh...waukee-s-hardest-working-boat-harbor-seagull/

My brother-in-law's family owned the "Lazy Lou". Wintered in Green Bay and summers in Sturgeon Bay. The back end looked like yours...36' aft cabin? Single four cylinder Cummins, built in the mid-60s, pretty shear line, nice ride. In fact it's that boat that got my wife and me interested in boating. I think it was recently sold. The only issue they ever had with it was pitting on the prop shaft (which never had an anode in the time I saw it out of the water). I'm quite sure they had it replaced at the Vinette yard maybe 5-6 years ago. I spoke with T.D. s son in that time frame as I was considering a twin Westerbeke configuration that had come on the market. He seemed to know the details of every trawler style boat that they'd ever constructed. They were building barges at the time.

Vinette shut down several years ago from a previous search I did. The real estate may still be in the same business. If you search enough you will eventually run into a name of a guy who ran it on the early 2000s.

Theee is one Vinette here in Chicago and last year was at Montrose Harbor. If you DM me your email addy, I will forward it to the owner.

There was another named Periploi that was sold a year and a half ago in Michigan and I was told that it is still in the hard. If you google Vinette periploi I think you can find the old Curtis stokes broker pdf.

There is one 36 for sale privately up in Wisconsin that I saw posted on Facebook- which may be Rufus’ family (I think the posters name was Jeff K on FB) good to see it was sold and it was only 35k earlier in the summer.

That’s about what I know- I fell in love with Periploi but went nowhere with it. Since it was a Great Lakes company I guess I always kept my ear open about them to remember this minutiae

It is/was listed as a 37' aft cabin. It has a single Detroit diesel. It is a great boat to me and a lot different than the sailboats we have had! This summer was my first on a power boat, and learning to dock and mechanical operations is taking some time. I got comfortable coming/going from our slip, but learned I had to back all the way out of the fairway when departing from the dock, as I couldn't make the turn without my transom and dinghy hitting the pier.
I posted about some battery issues soon after purchase and now have the books to read during winter.
Still looking for anyone else who may have owned one, as the posts/info I have seen in reply are the same as I have found. Previous owner worked at WM, so I do have some confidence he knew a little bit and was maintaining the systems (I know I shouldn't assume) but overall in great shape.
In research I also found pics of this boat from 2 owners ago, and a lot of shade/ fly bridge fabric has been added since then.

Rufus said:

My brother-in-law's family owned the "Lazy Lou". Wintered in Green Bay and summers in Sturgeon Bay. The back end looked like yours...36' aft cabin? Single four cylinder Cummins, built in the mid-60s, pretty shear line, nice ride. In fact it's that boat that got my wife and me interested in boating. I think it was recently sold. The only issue they ever had with it was pitting on the prop shaft (which never had an anode in the time I saw it out of the water). I'm quite sure they had it replaced at the Vinette yard maybe 5-6 years ago. I spoke with T.D. s son in that time frame as I was considering a twin Westerbeke configuration that had come on the market. He seemed to know the details of every trawler style boat that they'd ever constructed. They were building barges at the time.

Click to expand...

Rufus- I think this boat is back for sale- or still on sale. Facebook Trawlers for Sale. Do you recall the exact engine? People posting the boat .....don’t seem to know

Sorry, I don't know the exact engine model, but I remember looking through a Cummins operator's manual, which was on board. It was for a four cylinder 120 HP??.... I remember the exhaust was very loud from behind the boat..used to wonder if it had a muffler....maybe it was actually a Detroit...hmmm.

Is the boat in these photos the one on Facebook (I don't do Facebook)? If so and if it's still owned by my sister's mother-in-law ("Lazy Lou") I'm not surprised there's limited knowledge of the boat. Lou's husband, the original owner, died 25-30 years ago and Lou kept the boat for the kids to use....she had an "unobtainium" slip at the city dock in Fish Creek and a dirt cheap (outside) storage spot at the Green Bay Yacht club. She must be in her 90's now. Her son and a son-in-law did a great job of keeping up with exterior paint and interior stuff...the two main users slaved over that boat for weeks every year. But my sister's spouse passed away about ten years ago, so it would have fallen to the son-in-law to maintain. That's arguably the prettiest boat to come out of Vinette's yard...prettiest 36-37 trunk cabin anywhere....that shear line is drop dead gorgeous...

If this is the boat, I have some additional photos. By the way, the boat was running at about 9-10 knots (not quite flat out) in the attached photo...we were messing around with establishing a speed/power plot using our boat as the pace vehicle. They normally poked along at 6-7 knots.

I really like that ol' boat. Lots of memories. My sister's husband's ashes were scattered over the waters of "Death's Door" passage at the top of Door County from the deck of the Lazy Lou. Sounds morbid, but Jim would have laughed his ass off....

She’s still alive and has I think a friend helping her sell. They say the engine is a 180 hp but I swear last year they said it was a 225. Ive got a bunch of questions like thruster, generator, ac/heat that they are going to get back to me on. For some reason, I like Vinette s I guess it’s the saltiness of her lines. Just not sure I’d want to take on a steel hull

Gmarr said:

She’s still alive and has I think a friend helping her sell. They say the engine is a 180 hp but I swear last year they said it was a 225. Ive got a bunch of questions like thruster, generator, ac/heat that they are going to get back to me on. For some reason, I like Vinette s I guess it’s the saltiness of her lines. Just not sure I’d want to take on a steel hull

Click to expand...

One of her sons-in-law is/was part owner in a big marine store in Green Bay...think it was Mr. Outboard's. It's probably him.

Yes, the manual I looked at was for a 180. When I knew the boat...no GPS, no radar, no depth finder, no AC, no genset, propane fridge, hand pump toilet, no thruster, cable steering. The teak on the rails was pretty far gone...they let it age...hull had a few creases that the black paint accented, but nothing significant. I remember briefly looking into the engine area and the inside of the hull looked excellent...no evidence of rust from that short look (with a flashlight). The interior of the boat was pretty much "Home Depot".

This was a local putt around boat...Fish Creek to Chambers Island or Washington Island mostly. Farthest it had been for at least a decade was the 2006 trip to Fayette they took with us as their escort. Think they took it to Manistique the year after that. Basic but good solid bones. I might have some photos of the bottom if not lost in recent hard drive crash. Anyway, no corrosion that I recall other than that prop shaft...which they (Lou) had replaced by the Vinette yard. It would be sad to see it moved to the ravages of a salt water environment...especially if the owner doesn't have the means or the interest in maintaining it (great loopers on a budget come to mind). What's the asking price?

Still not much info on these boats it seems.
Nice you have great memories of the boat; we're getting ready to do the loop (leaving in @70 days and counting), and plan to drop by Escanaba, Michigan to visit the 'birthplace' of our Vinette...I promise to take care of the steel hull/ everything while we go through the salt water! We do have a Detroit V653, not sure if this was made same.

I took that second photo of Jim waving goodbye as we departed Fayette for the North Channel. That's my brother standing on the dock. The picture brought a tear to everyone's eye at Jim's funeral service. I was told it now hangs in the boat. If you believe in spirits, Jim's is on that boat. Memories indeed.

There is a TD Vinette for sale on YW with a steel hull.
https://www.yachtworld.com/boats/1974/custom-thomas-dale-vinette-3465667/?refSource=enhanced listing

Hey folks! I'm a TD Vinette owner as well. Ours is a 1979 37' Trawler (steel) with a 120 hp British Leyland truck motor. As the story goes, it was built by a gentleman that worked at TD Vinette as a boat builder. He and his wife wanted a boat for the loop, so they commissioned it to coincide with his retirement. They enjoyed it for quite a while (don't know much about them but would love to) and then sold it to a couple in Toronto. They had it until the guy I bought it from, Jay from Palatka, FL, went up to Canada and brought her down the east coast. So far we've taken it 95% of the way around the loop, starting in Jacksonville and now in St. Pete. We love our Vinette.

Sorry for such a late response. I purchased a 37' Vinette Trawler in 2006. My wife and I have enjoyed cruising Lake Superior and the Great Lakes over the last 16 years. 15,000 miles and we love the" Iron Lady". initially commissioned in 1964 in Escanaba MI. A great boat with a 115 hp Westerbeke engine and a great flybridge.