The Dix 43 center cockpit on launch day

This was of course a big day, in many ways the day before was an even bigger day as the keel was fitted to the boat, would the 14 x 20mm keel studs line up with the holes in the boat? Would the 4 fuel tank pipes fit, lots of questions.

Thats John Holmes standing on the aft deck of the boat, John is a good friend and was crew on our trip
to Salvador,Bahia, Brasil on another boat I took over some years back. John took over the job of propping the boat up for me the day before once it was on its keel, thanks John!

Picture taken by RH McBride using a Pentax film camera. Click on the image for a larger view.

The hull of this yacht was constructed mainly by one person in a six week time span period.

Plans are available from www.dixdesign.com we can supply a bulkhead kit set. The coach roof was a custom design for this boat.

Roy 

1953 Aile class yacht under restoration in Mauritius

Not all of the time do we know what end use materials we supply are to be used for.

I asked a customer on Mauritius island what the 9mm thick okoume marine plys were for?

This boat is now sixty (60) years old, it looks to be very fast?

Here you go !

A 1953 ‘’Aile’’Class boat being restored !!

Cheers

Pipo

Designer: Iarl Linblöm (Finland)

LOA: 7 m 10

LWL: 5 m 90

Beam: 1 m 58

Draft: 1 m 04

Hull weight: 450 kg exc. rig

Ballast keel: 200 kg

Sail area (upwind) : 18.7m2

Spinnaker: 27m2

The Aile is a one-design keelboat, built originally by the Finnish Abö yard. It was adopted by the Parisian yacht club, Cercle Nautique de Chatou (now the Yacht Club Ile de France – YCIF) in 1936, when the club's previous one-design keelboat racer proved to be unsuitable for the new waters to which the club had moved.

The club committee had originally intended to adopt the Star class, and to import as many as 100, but on discovering that a rival Parisian yacht club, the Cercle de la Voile de Paris, already had the French monopoly on this design, as well as the sole rights to organise regattas for it, they moved swiftly to look for an alternative.

Owe 25 fast sail boat

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2011/08/new-design-we-can-offer.html

This came to us in 2011, the design has been covered by a number of publications, one being Wooden Boat magazine.

Kit wise the boat will be the building jig, bulkheads, deck and cockpit skins, the hull is strip planked so you can source your own timber for that.

Roy

Note, the designer contacted me with some news today, I will update the blog in the morning.

The first boat will start construction later this year, we will post build pictures as they are available. A polar graph of expected performance is available right now.

 

Southern Tiger gets a rebuild in Hout Bay Harbour.

Here in the Western Cape timber built trawlers and fishing boats are a part of our wonderful heritage, they last decades and of course do need repairs in the off season.

Not your average work shop.

The wood is Keruin which I used to stock for such rebuilds, it takes steaming very well and comes quite flexible then.

The team looks to be about five strong, needed to handle such bends in this very heavy and strong timber.

Freddy, a past customer, is the chief carpenter and a top man at his trade.

He told me the other day that this is hard work but he can still do it.

Good man!

 

 

 

Note the correct pink undercoat, always the best way to protect such timber if your not going to use epoxy.

 

Roy

Custom Rudder and Foil manufacture

Seen here is a new rudder to an Irwin 54 which lost the lower rudder pintal off Cape Point, That bent the rudder shaft where it exits the boat.

 Hout Bay was not that far away and they managed to enter the bay. It was blowing a good fifty knots at the time, Jean phoned the NSRI, station 8 Sea Rescue and they went out and brought the yacht into the saftey of Hout Bay Harbour.

The boat was a member of the then ARC World fleet, it was a few days before the trade closed for the Christmas break, we got the materials into stock and worked over the period and got the boat back into the water in time for the restart of the rally.

A new shaft and lower pintal were made locally, an engineer fitted the gear and rudder, plus quite a lot of  upgrades were made around the area where the rudder shaft entered the boat.

Note: the cut out in the rudder allows the rudder to be swung to either side and dropped.

We now have the CNC cut files to the Irwin 54 rudder and can fabricate to order. Shipping world wide should not be a problem.

Roy

Taylors 30L paraffin stove in Cape Town

This should be on offer by next month and here in Hout Bay, Cape Town.

(now here, August 7th 2013)

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2012/08/taylors-30-l-paraiffin-stove-for-sale.html

The Taylors 30L stove comes complete with a remote 1.5 (about 8 litres?)gallon fuel tank and 1.5 mtr supply line.

The stove has been collected by our courier, it will be with us this week,
Once its here I will sort out the required new burners and sell it on for the owner.

We have contacted Taylors in the UK and asked for prices on new burners and a service kit, once the couriers have delivered the stove and parts are here, the refurb will be done.

How about that!

http://www.taylorsheatersandcookers.co.uk/index.html

When new, lets see how close this good condition stove we will restore will come to the one in this picture.

Due to the size of the stove and its tank, this would suit a new owner who already has a boat here, or one that was passing through, it will of course also suit a camper or cottage some place off the Eskom power grid ( that's most of us in winter?)

For those who are in South Africa, we can send the refurbished stove to you by courier for around R400, the cost to the stove will worked out when we have the cost to the spares required to service it.

Roy

Island deliveries of kits and materials

With another order of okoume  marine plys to BS 1088 due to ship to a customer in Mauritius, it reminded me of some of the other islands we have shipped to from Cape Town.

The Marshall Islands, which was materials to refurbish a French made yacht around 40ft long. Johnston Athol, a Didi 38 kit, which included the mast, sails and engine, Honolulu, a Didi 26, come to mind. We also filled an order to Wilbur Smith when we traded as Commercial Lumber cc, was he building a house on an island in the Seycheles, I believe so.

Johnston Athol, this is as far away from Cape Town as its possible to find land, almost dead center and opposite Cape Town on the globe!

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2009/03/didi-38-kit-to-south-pacific.html
The fact is that with a global view of the map South Africa is central to the world, we are well connected with shippers and their agents world wide.

The Didi 38 kit being built on Johnston Athol, note the Yanmar engine, we shipped that also.


Plus its no more expensive to ship from Cape Town to California by sea than to move the same order from the east coast to the west cost of the USA by road.

Your order does not have to be for yacht and boats, we can normally source most materials, construction types also.

Roy

This is the latest island order shipment, it was collected today and will next be fumigated before being shipped to Mauritius, the top and bottom plys are pine exterior, the rest is okoume marine plys to BS 1088 standard.

Before we made boat kits they built the HMS Warrior

Yes and by a hundred & fifty years and more!

News in from George Dore, he is an expat from the UK but lives here in the cape also.
I have posted a picture of my own that I took when in Portsmouth myself, this shot is far better and the boat looks as if she had recently been slipped and painted?

Roy

Hi,

    a friend living in London sent me this excellent photo of HMS Warrior taken at Portsmouth.She never fired a shot in anger. 

Regards,

Warrior the first RN armour-plated, iron-hulled warship was built in 1860 had a two-cylinder trunk steam engine,  that drove a single propeller using steam provided by 10 rectangular boilers.During Warrior's sea trials on 1 April 1868  she had a speed of 26.08 km/h; under steam alone.The ship carried 867 tons of coal, enough to steam  3,900 km at 20 km/h.

Click on the picture for a larger view.

The ironclad was ship rigged and had a sail area of 4,497 m2. Warrior reached 24 km/h under sail alone. Her 26 ton propeller was designed to be hoisted up into the stern of the ship to reduce drag while under sail, the largest hoisting propeller ever made, it required 600 men to raise it into the stern. To further reduce drag, both of her funnels were telescopic and could be lowered. Under sail and steam together, the ship once reached 32.4 km/h, against the tide whilst running from Portsmouth to Plymouth.