The yacht She, Brian Bradfields boat.

Brian had the yacht She as long as I can remember, the boats is an Alan Buchanan design which was carvel planked in solid teak. Not only was the hull teak, so was the decking ply that was under the laid teak decks, thats  not teak faced ply but solid veneer teak ply!

The late Brian Bradfield and at the re launch of yacht She at the RCYC on October 7th 2010. Bernard Dielbold was responsable for having the work done.

Please note, this picture and the cartoon below are both from the story about the TBA and as yet both are probably unpublished on the internet. The hard bound books with 37 pages, many in colour, in an A4 size format, cost just R120 each (U$14.00) and all monies collected  go to the local NSRI.

Roy

Dudley Dix cartoon

This is a classic cartoon and one that can only now be found in the story of the TBA (hardcover, a few left)

Sadly the TBA was disbanded last year, Dudley set up his design office in Virginia,USA, some nine years back and is still doing what he does best, design good sail boats!

The cartoon was done by a man who used the handle Shorter, better known to all of us as MileS McGrevy, he was also named as The Jazz Gorilla and could often be seen and heard playing his saxophone at the V&A Waterfront. Last sighted near Spain in 2012!

Roy

Shearwater 39, a new arrrival

This was mid afternoon yesterday and just as the wind had started to blow, given they had left Dassen Island and in fog that morning, to arrive at Hout Bay and in thirty knots of SE breeze was a bit strange?

 

Yacht Windward, a Shearwater 39 by Dudley Dix was in her element yesterday, the owner told me they just deep reefed the main and went hard onto the wind, no problems at all with a Shearwater 39!

 

 

Windward is imaculate, the varnish on the wood trims is really nice and the boat looks near new.

 

Sadley the GRP moulds were lost (one half was damaged) so if you want a similar boat its only possible to build in wood/epoxy, either in cold moulded ply or strip plank, we can supply the bulkheads CNC cut and the rest of the materials as a kit.

 

Roy

 

 

We have email again?

A partial service only.

It came back on late today, there are no new mails at all, so they have been lost to cyber space?

So if anyone sent me a mail in the past two weeks and saw it bounce, this is why and I never got to read your mail, please resend if its still of IMPortance?

Note: only one of our email addresses is working use roy at (@)ckdboats.com  move the at and brackets please.

The link from the website at www.ckdboats.com to me is one that is not working right now.

Regards

Roy

Dripless shaft seals?

Do they work? was one question I asked the sales person from John Crane Co. I think I got the standard sales line.  Well they fit them on submarines, was his reply.

In use some thrirteen years and it has never given any bother untill recently. I found the black rubber half on the right needed re setting. This is done by undoing the two security clamps on the right (there is third as back up) Then sliding the seal closer to its mate, now the seal is dripless when static but does leak a tiny amount when the shaft is in gear, I assume it needs to bed in again?

 

Easy to install and works a treat, a protective cover sits above the seal, the seal assembly is in its own secure space and  never seen unless the boat is cleaned inside or slipped for an antifoul paint job.

 

In case of emergency there is a way to seal the rear rubber seal to the shaft.

The red band is a safety device which will clamp to the 35mm shaft and stop water entering the boat, the shaft needs to be locked then, a pair of Mole Vice Grips will do that job well.

 

Note, the faces are water cooled and a supply needs to be constant, there is an air bleed and water supply, plus the water enters via the outer shaft bearing water cooling slots. When the boat is commisioned or removed from the water, it is required to open the sealing faces and allow some sea water to feed into the seal, then thats it, nothing more required.

 

Recomended!

 

Roy

 

 

 

Professional Boatbuilder magazine

Some kind person left a number of magazines in the cockpit the other day, what a find!

The only person I could think of who would buy these magazines was Peter Jacobs, founder of the Whisper Boat Building School but he left for Thailand two weeks back.

 

Click on the pictures to see more detail and check the clamps on this set of laminates!

 

It turned out that they were indeed Peters but he had left them with another who then donated them to myself, many thanks!

 

Roy

 

Still no emails!

The move to a new server has not as yet prooved at all sucessfull. We have not had mails for about two weeks now and as of today the server seems not able to sort things out.

The Hotmail account I opened failed to work as well, so for now please contact me at

jean.mcb (at) hotmail.com (change the at for @ )

Roy
 

B&G Network T2 12 Volt hydraulic ram for sale wanted

I am still looking for a T2 B&G self steering ram, that or a similar size and possibly
by a company like Lecomble & Schmitt  who also make good quality rams.

Found on the internet but also in the UK with an 8kg weight the postage will be high?

This is what I need to match specifications wise.

Anyone got one to sell?

Email me at jean.mcb (at) hotmail.com  (replace the(at) for @ )

Roy

Loss of any connections

Folks, the new server seems to have probelms, this has caused us to loose both email and our website connections. We are told friday or Saturday may be a possible day for the service to resume?

If thats not bad enough, the new Hotmail address will not let me log in either!

So if anyone has been sending mails to me for the past week, I have not yet seen them.

Normal service will be resumed eventually?

We can still take orders on 27-21-7903859, which is also our fax line as well.

Roy

Killer Whales off Llandudno in South Africa?

Heading North, Llandudno is part of a larger coast line and before Camps Bay and Cape Town proper.

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2012/09/an-antartic-white-bird-sighted-in.html

I have posted rare species seen close to our waters and shoreline before, the white Antartic bird and the Leopard Seal being two of them.

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2012/08/a-seal-on-hout-bay-marina.html

The year we saw the whales was 1979, either February or March, it was a Sunday and I was with my wife Jean, daughter Lorna and a number of others on a steel yacht around 55 feet long. I think we had the mainsail up and the engine was powering us in the direction of Sandy Bay.

An ex HBYC flag officer, Tony Page, was the skipper that day, Simone Notman will have been aboard too. We saw movement in the water off the starboard side of the boat and not that far off either.

We soon saw it was an Orca or killer whale with a calf, Tony sensibly turned the helm to port steering away and headed back to what he saw as safer waters.

Lorna was at her Camps Primary School the next day, monday being the day the pupils were invited to say what they had seen or had done over the weekend?  Lorna told of the sighting of killer whales, the teacher decided this was impossible in our waters and told her so.

What that teacher did not know is that I had a home super 8 cine camera with me and filmed the whole event!

Note, the pictures I have used are not from the cine film I took.

http://www.whalesbc.com/orca_killer_whales.html

The killer whale (Orcinus orca), also referred to as the orca whale or orca, and less commonly as the blackfish, is a toothed whale belonging to the oceanic dolphin family. Killer whales are found in all oceans, from the frigid Arctic and Antarctic regions to tropical seas. Killer whales as a species have a diverse diet, although individual populations often specialize in particular types of prey. Some feed exclusively on fish, while others hunt marine mammals such as sea lions, seals, walruses, and even large whales. Killer whales are regarded as apex predators, lacking natural predators.

Thanks to Wikipedia for the info above.

I still have that reel of Super 8 film does anyone know how I can convert it to a CD?
There is another with me dressed in Sudan's national costume and with a turban on my head, riding a Camel but thats another story!

Roy

Roys Hotmail account

Hello folks, I have been using Jeans own Hotmail account to send replies and quotes to customers while the normal email server is down.

So that you can connect with me direct I have now opened my own Hotmail account.

Use this when the normal email address does not work?

 ckdboatscc at hotmail.com

Please remove the at and add in @ to use the above address!

Please send a mail or two to try if it works?

The hotmail account refused to open the next day, so for now please use this one.

Email me at jean.mcb (at) hotmail.com (replace the(at) for @ )

Roy

Email server is down

We have no emails today, the server has been changed and some glitches have seen that we can neither send or receive emails right now.

You can I hope, hold on a while or phone on 27 21 790-3859, thats a fax line too.

Roy

www.ckdboats.com

The 1995 BOC yacht race, HBYC or RCYC as hosts?

In my previous blog on this subject, I left out the specific cash sum of money asked for by the RCYC up front on purpose, I was not at the meeting when the money was asked for, at first it was a rumour, then a published fact.

http://ckdboats.blogspot.com/2013/02/the-hbyc-hosts-boc-sailing-race.html

This blog is about the reason that Mark Schrader, who was  then working for the  BOC group, asked the HBYC to come up with an offer on what they could do for the race should the HBYC be successfull in their bid.

Click on the scanned copy so that you can read it better.

There are two sides to the tale, I now have the archive file from the HBYC which includes a collection of news prints. The fact was that the RCYC asked up front for a donation of R65,000 (some say R60,000) as a payment to fund the event in Cape Town and the RCYC Small Craft Basin.

The BOC group had already moved the start of the race in the USA for similar reasons and now were considering other South African ports over Cape Town for the same reason.

Mark is toasting John Martin's attempt to secure a sponser for the next event.

Both of Cape Towns daily newspapers carried the story, it was an event of  great importance to those involved.
Many did not know what a battle royal was going between each club, for sure the HBYC was holding an upper hand for a great deal of time.

In the end it was the RCYC who won the prize.

Shame!

 Hout Bay from the Chapmans Peak Driveway.

Its now 2013 and Cape Town has had the Volvo Ocean Race for a number of years now.

Those boats are too large to fit in the Small Craft basin in the Cape Town Harbour and in the past hve been berthed at the V&A Waterfront. The news now is that as Cape Town refused to pay for the 2014 fleet to visit here, so we will not see them at all in the next race.

They do two stops in Brasil, then next Dubai, who will pay lots to host them I understand? Brasil is of course cash rich and wants to promote both the next Olympics and also the next Fifa World Cup series, both events will be held in Rio de Janerio.

Times change.

Roy

Cape Henry 21 boat roll over jig

This was taken from the Dudley Dix blog, its a customer of Dudley who had made up a clever turning jig to roll his hull over with.

Today's post is a good follow-on to my post of yesterday about building boats in exotic places. It is also in South America but in Brazil rather than Colombia.

Today I received a link from Eugênio Herkenhoff in Vitoria, Brazil. He has been building a Cape Henry 21 for awhile and sending me occasional feedback and photos of his progress. Eugênio is a professional builder but this video shows that he is very different from the professional boatbuilders you will find in most other places.

Eugênio has a very small workshop and it is in a very built-up part of the city. I have seen workshops like this in Rio de Janeiro as well, so they must be common in Brazil. All sorts of businesses operate out of these small facilities, supplying custom woodwork, metalwork, plumbing, electrical etc. But there is only so much that can be done inside the building. In the video at Voiles et Voiliers magazine it is described as "a boat in the streets". That is where Eugênio builds his boats. The video is narrated in French but you can get the gist of it without understanding the language.

The graphics were done by the boat builder, very well done I must say.

Roy

Jig-Saw joints

For years we have supplied larger panels such as bulkheads, with a three stepped scarph, they are then glued and positioned with a two small dowel pegs, which when fitted ensure a pefect joint.

Dudley Dix @ www.dixdesign.com is now also introducing the jig-saw joint as well.

Click on the image for a larger view.

The joint requires very little work and also ensures your joints are perfect.

Dudley now offers this system on large and small boats, the Didi 40cr and DS15 being two such designs.


How nice is that!

Roy