Am I alone in feeling tempted?

slowboat

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I've been watching a guy maintain his wooden boat at our boatyard and it is definitely not for me. If I ever buy a wooden boat, I have told my kids to put me in an institution :p
Let’s hope you keep it to yourself. Don’t be one of those trying to spoil someone else’s enjoyment by constantly telling him, just because it’s not your thing.
 

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Let’s hope you keep it to yourself. Don’t be one of those trying to spoil someone else’s enjoyment by constantly telling him, just because it’s not your thing.
If its anything like me who has also sworn myself off being a wooden boat owner, I look upon them with awe and admiration, I doff my cap to them, throw encouragement and praise their way at every opportunity. I marvel at everything about wooden boats and their servants. But lock me up if I ever stray to the classified section of Classic Boat.
 

38mess

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I had a wooden boat once, it was around 28 foot long, lovely thing, longkeeler and all that. I loved sailing it, it used to get some admiring comments in the yacht club, but boy did it take some upkeep.
I was lucky, at the club was an old timer who looked after it for me in turn for me letting him use it.
 

dancrane

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Sorry, Scruff, I missed your post, don't know why. That Bowman is very lovely, and her wonderful accommodation is like a guide to why I wouldn't buy any yacht built more recently, even if I could afford one.

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But she reminds me of the slightly smaller Bowman 46 which I admired a lot at Shamrock Quay, a few years back. Lots of voices here said her construction method (which had been innovative) was a reason to steer clear, with potential problems that radically reduced what I would have expected to be her value.

I don't know if the 50fter here shares that construction method, and to be honest she's asking vastly more than I'm likely to spend on a yacht. But thanks!

Don’t be one of those trying to spoil someone else’s enjoyment by constantly telling him, just because it’s not your thing.

Good point. I find GRP enough trouble, but I'm rewarded when my bits of work succeed. It's a bore if people tell me it isn't worth the effort, because I believe they're right, but it never stops me wanting to try.

There's a caveat in that my boat is useable even if the jobs I try to do, go undone. If a chap spends years slowly scratching at a big wooden project under a flapping tarp, I'd be sorry he couldn't see it wasn't worth his time and effort, but hope I wouldn't tell him because I'm sure he wouldn't need telling, same as I don't.
 

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If a chap spends years slowly scratching at a big wooden project under a flapping tarp, I'd be sorry he couldn't see it wasn't worth his time and effort, but hope I wouldn't tell him because I'm sure he wouldn't need telling, same as I don't.
With some people you eventually have to conclude they don't want to go sailing. I had a project boat for too long in a yard and it was 2 steps forward and 1 back every time I did anything. The frustration of not being on the water built until I held my nose and cut my losses. Its a very difficult decision, no one wants to be defeated. But time waits for no man and if its not happening the only logical thing is to accept defeat and learn from the mistake. Unless a person doesn't really want to go sailing.
 

Wansworth

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Back in the early 1960 a single man was toiling at rebuilding a Brigham trawler ,moored up in a mud berth in Littlehampton,it’s name “viligance” was a massive gaff ketch and he had it sailing to my knowledge in 1973 when I saw him antifoul ing on the piles in the harbour.Even if a project is all embracing your life in the end you have something to show for your time whilst many just have time past
 

dancrane

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I think that's fair comment. It's great to read of chaps with vision, ability, determination and resources, applying themselves to astonishing restoration jobs, but somebody like me would arrive each day with a gradually diminishing dream of what the old boat might have been, and might again become, until one day I'd aim the adze at my own head.
 

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I think that's fair comment. It's great to read of chaps with vision, ability, determination and resources, applying themselves to astonishing restoration jobs, but somebody like me would arrive each day with a gradually diminishing dream of what the old boat might have been, and might again become, until one day I'd aim the adze at my own head.
That level of wisdom and self awareness is what sets us apart from Homer Simpson.
 

reeac

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What got me was the extraordinarily low specific power ouput of those engines ....around 10 bhp per litre for something built in the 1960s. No wonder that they were said to be so frugal with fuel.
 

srm

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Regarding restoration projects: way back in the early 70's when I was young and even more foolish I bought a fishing boat that was being decommisioned in Shetland. At around 50ft (I never measured her) she was a small Scottish Zulu launched around 1914 without an engine. The fine hull lines aft meant that when a six cylinder Gardner was eventually installed the engine room was almost in the bows, ahead of the fish hold with a very long prop shaft.
My idea was to take her back to sail, only with a gaff ketch rig rather than the probable original rig of dipping lug main and standing lug mizzen. I used her for a couple of years deploying oceanographic instruments during the survey and building of the port of Sullom Voe. Fortunately, I realised that the conversion project was beyond my abilities and motivation, (everything was so damned big) and offered her for sale. Much to my surprise and relief she found a new owner, for the same price that I had paid, who took her down to the Solent and converted her to a yacht. When last heard of she was in Gibraltar and called "Spray of the Isles"
Proceeds from the sale went towards a GRP Trintella 29 which at that stage in my sailing career was much more appropriate and took us on quite a few adventures including a long cruise on the west coast of Norway.
I realy admire beautifully restored wood boats, but know they are well beyond my motivation; as was a 42ft steel yacht that I sailed hard for nine years as she slowly rusted away from the inside and was sold for scrap value. Her new owner took her back to a bare hull inside and replated where necessary then grit blasted and painted inside and out. He then lost interest and looking at google earth she is still where I last saw her, slowly rusting away again, in Orkney.
 

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He then lost interest and looking at google earth she is still where I last saw her, slowly rusting away again, in Orkney.
a 21st century way to track an age old mistake. I now think the only way to do it is as I've seen a few people do: Park it in your garden. Crane it over the house if needed. My motivation killer was having to load up what tools I thought I'd need for the day, knowing damn well I'd forget something, pack a lunch, and then having to drive there, and back again, and unload. It adds so much time. When I sold it the guy just bought a big trailer for a few thousand and drove off with it to somewhere by his house that was free to park it. Said he'd sell the trailer when he'd done. I didn't have the space anyway but that is the only way to do it. I can imagine that being a pleasure.
 

Gary Fox

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What got me was the extraordinarily low specific power ouput of those engines ....around 10 bhp per litre for something built in the 1960s. No wonder that they were said to be so frugal with fuel.
They are very well made and last for millenia, the bhp/litre ratio is irrelevant in a suitable application; nobody has made a Gardner powered motorbike for example... They are straightforward to service and repair, all the parts are available and there is a century of wisdom behind them. Mine's 70 years old and starts on the button.
 

Gary Fox

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Back in the early 1960 a single man was toiling at rebuilding a Brigham trawler ,moored up in a mud berth in Littlehampton,it’s name “viligance” was a massive gaff ketch and he had it sailing to my knowledge in 1973 when I saw him antifoul ing on the piles in the harbour.Even if a project is all embracing your life in the end you have something to show for your time whilst many just have time past
She's an immaculate coded charter vessel working out of Brixham, so it paid off..
 

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srm

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What got me was the extraordinarily low specific power ouput of those engines ....around 10 bhp per litre for something built in the 1960s. No wonder that they were said to be so frugal with fuel.
When I was working in Shetland in the 70's the Gardner seemed to be the standard engine amongst the smaller fishing vessels, along with a reduction gearbox that was operated by a wheel on the starboard side of the wheelhouse and swung a big prop. I think my engine was rated around 60HP, but as one old salt pointed out, much bigger horses than in the physically smaller 60HP BMC diesel he was installing. Perhaps not accurate physics, but it made a point.
 
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