Popular Boats Ltd, Information required

kindalingers

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I have reciently perchased center cockpit 4 berth cabin cruiser,sold to me as a Fantasy 20,made by Popular Boats Ltd,20.0ft long,6.1 beam,it came with no paper work,and I have looked all over the place but can't find any makers name or other identifying marks.
I have googled Popoular Boats Ltd,but with that name I did not get very far,so any information on them, or any one who deals with them would be apreciated
 
Thanks

Thanks Miket,they are the same boat as mine,like you I have not heard of Traveller marine ,but they seem to have a few on the broads,so its a good place to start looking,I feel a new post comming on,Information required on Fantasy 20 made by Traveller Marine.............thanks once again,Kidalingers
 
Fantasy 20, by Popular Boats Ltd

Hi

I bought a Fantasy 20, last September, so far so good. Are they now 'Collectable' as no one seems to know anything much about them...

Marcia:)
 
My father bought a new Fantasy 20 from Popular Boats in the early 70's. If my memory is not playing tricks on me, the company was on Vespasian Road in Southampton or thereabouts. The boat was on display at the 1972 Southampton Boat Show and we took delivery in the spring of 73. We used her for many years as a canal cruiser before selling her in the late 80's and subsequently upgrading to a steel narrowboat

They certainly seemed to be a rare boat. I can only remember seeing one other on the canal system, but there was one moored by Cobden Bridge in Southampton for some years and one on the river Dee at Chester in the 90's

I think Popular Boats went bust after a few years, but the moulds were purchased by another company who continued to build the boats to a somewhat higher specification.
 
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PS

Our boat sprang a leak at one point, and had to be repaired. This entailed cutting a hand-sized hole in the floor of the rear cabin. If your boat has got a hole like this, you may well have our old boat.
 
fantasy 20

Hi there,, i have a hand sized hole cut out of the floor in the aft cabin just in front of where the battery sits, so she may well be your old boat, i will take some pics of her for you when i get the chance, waiting for the weather to improve a bit, then i will finish working on her and hopefully get her launched :-) all the best, Fitzy
 
Looking forward to seeing them. There were a few other mods that my father did that may or may not have survived the years, including teak plank effect vinyl flooring in the cockpit and on the rear sundeck and inserting hinged sections into the side taff rails.

Would be great to find out that our old boat was still around.

Cheers

Tim
 
Thanks

Thankyou for posting these ,,I will post some photos of the boat sometime today, sorry about the delay, i,ve been over busy lately, the price list is something else,ha...shows you how things have changed.

Tony :-)
 
and another Fantasy 20

Hi,

Not sure how I post pics on here - but I have a Fantasy 20 - Had it for 3 years now and its going well with no problems at all. We only have a 15hp Honda on ours, which is sufficient to trundle it along at River speeds but it would be a different boat with a bigger engine.

I've wanted to look around some others because over the years they seem to have bits added and taken away - The odd strange bracket here and pop stud there, with no real reason for it.

If I can work out how to do some pics :confused: I'll post them up ok. We are in Kent by the way.
 
Pics of fantasy 20

picture.php
 
I am still working on the front cabin, i will take some better ones soon, but you can see there is a hole cut out in the aft cabin floor.

Tony :-)

Hi Tony,

Thanks for the pictures - really great to see inside a F20 again. The shape and position of your hole does not look like the hole in our old boat, so I guess is probably isn't. Thanks again for taking the trouble to post the pictures.

Tim
 
Hi there, shes a nice lookin boat, like the blue cabin and the name "cozy" :-) It would be nice to see more pics,,I will post more soon too,, I think they can take up to a 70hp, and with the shape of the hull which i quite like ,i think she would get up on plane quite easily, but then again for the river i think 15 or 20hp is enough because of the restrictions,ha!!.. It looks nice there what river would that be??

Tony F
 
It looks nice there what river would that be??

Tony F


Hi Tony,

Taken a few weeks ago on the River Medway (non tidal) - Very nice there but the Environment Agency do rather take a fancy to shutting off swathes of it with little or no notice for works they should have carried out in the Winter!

The boat is a pretty good design don't you think?. I'll bet they can go like the clappers with a 70hp on.
Regards
Ian
 
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