Hi All, fist time poster here I have been looking to purchase my first boat and have come across a 48 Cheoy Lee Sport fisher here in Australia and I am looking for any feedback from the community as to the performance of the boat. In searching the inter-webs there is very little information on the boat (possibly due to it being built before the internet existed ) however there is references to its design by Tom Fexas. I have been able to find information about the Midnight Lace model (that brought me to this forum) however I believe the 48 sport fisher built by Cheoy Lee is a different design. All the reports I have read on the Fexas designed boats are of high praise to a talented designer, however anything on this particular design seems to be hard to find. I found an article from the magazine “Motor boating 1979” where Doug Schryver reviewed the hull and commented that the numbers show it to be “very fuel efficient”, could this still be relevant in 2015? Thank you in advance for any advice and feedback from this community. It's greatly appreciated.
Paraphrased from PowerBoat Guide: this was Cheoy Lee's first sport fisher, manufactured from 1980-1986. They call it a good performer with the 892 Detroits.
I don't know about the 48', but a friend of mine ran one for many years around 58' and they seemed to like it, aside from the Cheoy Lee wiring.....I believe every wire was orange!!! and only had numbers at each terminating end......
I ran sea trials and sold a 48' with Caterpillar 3406 power. It's a solid rig -built like a tank really, like a lot of early 80's boats. This particular boat was over propped but it did get up on plane without trim tabs at sea trial. I agree the weak points would be wiring ...and deck hardware. The fuel tanks had been replaced. I can't speak to fuel efficiency except to say that with original motors, by today's standards I would expect it to not be very fuel efficient.