West Eleven Dinghy

[Bobb3]

Very occasionally the West Eleven Dinghy has been mentioned on this site, I was hoping to enlist the help of members who may have sailed one of these dinghies in the past in a bid to put together an informational website on this boat at http://west-eleven-dinghy.siterubix.com/

The site will focus on the boat and cruising as it makes a great cruising dinghy. I do however understand that there are still one or two racing in Mirror fleets at club level in some places.

I recently purchased one of these 1970's GRP dinghies No. 1356. but was unable to find any information through the normal google or other searches so thought someone should put together whatever is found into one place. So I have started.

I made a similar request for information on the dinghy cruising association site, and with members help have found some material, but it is still a very slim package. I am aware that many people started sailing in a Mirror dinghy, the West Eleven is a Mirror clone which at first glance could be mistaken for a Mirror, but has less decking and was made of GRP when I believe all Mirrors were of ply. It is 5" longer than a Mirror, but sports the same red sails.

So if you have any information at all on the West Eleven Dinghy, no matter how small I would be very please to receive it. You can add comments directly on the site at http://west-eleven-dinghy.siterubix.com/ or email at west.eleven.contact@gmail.com absolutely anything is welcome including pictures of your boat if you still have one.

Thank you in anticipation.

 

[Seajet]

Hi Bobb3,

I've only just seen your post, sorry.

I have an original Shepherds West Eleven brochure if that's any interest; it's only one double sided glossy page with black & white photo's, black text with ' West Eleven ' in bold green.

The boat in the main photo is 1602.

From the way it's presented, Shepherds certainly seem to have considered themselves main dealers or even makers.

I'll have a go at scanning it to you now at the e-mail address given.

Andy

 

[Bobb3]

Andy,

Many thanks for the scan of the 1970's brochure of the West Eleven dinghy it has proved to be very useful and has added tremendously to the information I am collecting about the Dinghy, a link below takes you to todays post on the subject

http://west-eleven-dinghy.siterubix.com/about-the-west-11/west-eleven-brochure/

If anyone has any further information that can help fill the gaps in the history of this great little Mirror dinghy clone I would love to hear from them either through the website or email, as far as I can tell there is no other information about this boat on the internet other than a few enquiries by owners or would be owners: the contact email is: West.eleven.contact@gmail.com

Bob

 

[hannahman]

Wow that's a blast from the past!

My parents bought my brothers and I one c1980/81. We had a Mirror, but it was in need of a fair amount of work, so the West Eleven appealed as a ready alternative.
We bought ours through Shepherds. I'm pretty sure they must have had a stand at the Boat Show, which is most likely how we came across them.
Ours was yellow, with brown gunwhale cappings, and white interior. Pretty sure the sails were white.

When the dinghy arrived, my dad discovered some gel damage on the hull, so he phoned Shepherds to let them know, and they said they'd deliver a new hull and collect the original. Well we were out on the day they came to replace the dinghy, but we got back to find two on the lawn! So they never bothered collecting the original one! Fab, we had many happy years with one as a sailing dinghy, and the other as a tender!

If I can find any photos, I will contact you as requested. I recall we had (maybe still have) the brochure. I think it was the same as the one shown, but if I do come across it, and it is different, I'll scan it and forward it to you.

Doug

 

[Bobb3]

Doug,

Thanks for the reply, any information, pictures or brochures will be appreciated. I still have gaping holes in the history of this dinghy so anything that can help fill these would be great. The information I received from Andy (above) described the only original colour scheme available at that time, as the same as my boat of blue and white. I wonder if the 1980's model was an updated version, it might solve the question about the difference between the type one and two which remains outstanding.

The information I have so far can be found at http://west-eleven-dinghy.siterubix.com/

Bob

 

[dunedin]

Great site.

We bought an old West Eleven when the kids were young as a pottering about boat. Like hannahman, ours was a (very faded) yellow with white sails (not red as suggested in your original post). Also as the brochure indicates, only an inch or so longer than the genuine Mirror.
It was a very practical boat with almost zero maintenance (after an initial refurb). It is a clear Mirror design rip-off - don't know how they got away with it. The extra size was almost as if the GRP mould had been taken off the outside of a wooden Mirror.
The changed deck layout at the front gave a lot more space. We cruised round the Gulf de Morbihan with 5 people, food and kids gear plus a seagull outboard on - try that in a Mirror.
But it was also very heavy - and tended to absorb water in the hull. It was very heavy lifting onto the car roof - and broke one roof rack until reinforced it.

Was replaced by a proper modern GRP Mirror - much lighter and easier to lift, but the design with flat panels is not really suited to GRP and the GRP Mirror was much more fragile.

 

[Bobb3]

Dunedin

As far as I can make out there was a fairly lengthy legal battle in the 70's / 80's, as you say it is a blatant mirror copy, I agree in many ways it is an improvement on the mirror, although I would expect the mirror purists to disagree loudly with that view.

I have a feeling that the outcome of the court case may have brought about the demise of the west eleven, although as yet I have little evidence of that other than one small reference to the case being heard.

Bob

 

[Seajet]

Bob,

that's interesting, so there was a court case then.

Even as a youngster I wondered how they got away with such a copy and thinking of what we know now about Maxwell ( none of it good ! ) they were brave to try it, but by the standards of the time it seems to have been a mild success, answering a requirement.

 

[hannahman]

Doug,

Thanks for the reply, any information, pictures or brochures will be appreciated. I still have gaping holes in the history of this dinghy so anything that can help fill these would be great. The information I received from Andy (above) described the only original colour scheme available at that time, as the same as my boat of blue and white. I wonder if the 1980's model was an updated version, it might solve the question about the difference between the type one and two which remains outstanding.

The information I have so far can be found at http://west-eleven-dinghy.siterubix.com/

Bob

Cheers Bob,

At the time (1980 ish) I thought the West Eleven was new to the market, so it was a surprise to discover, all these years later, that they had been around for some time before then.
I notice in your earlier version the spars, gunwales and thwarts are all wooden. By the time our version came along, all wood had been done away with, with the spars being black alloy as I recall, the thwarts being GRP, and the gunwale capping being brown plastic.

Interesting to hear dunedin's comments. I wonder whether they were only available in yellow by that time? I recall the Boatshow one we saw was yellow, and I don't recall seeing any other colours around.

As Seajet mentions, I'm pretty sure Shepherds were both manufactures and distributors. I never saw any other company names associated with them.

Doug

 

[WestieOwner]

Sorry, I’m coming in very late on this thread. Did that info site ever go live (or perhaps it was live but later closed down)? When I try to follow the link my phone says it can’t find the server.

 

[Seajet]

WestieOwner,

well I'm still here with the West Eleven brochure you're welcome to a scan of - when I learn to drive my new scanner, if you'd like a copy PM me with your e-mail.

I remember seeing West Elevens when new at Shepherds, Bowness on Windermere.

Andy

 

[WestieOwner]

Thanks. I got in touch with Bob via the email address he posted, and he sent me a scan of the brochure.

 

[Razor1955]

I am even later to this thread, but I can supply some much-needed information.

The West Eleven was definitely inspired by the Mirror dinghy but at the time they were in production there was no alternative GRP version - and GRP was the "in thing"

The dinghy was designed by my cousin Geoffrey R Sutton who at the time was Managing Director and owner of Weston Electric Units Ltd., Station Road, Foulridge, Colne, Lancashire, a company which had been formed by his father Richard. My own father was Works Manager there until his death in 1986. The company were high-precision, machinist sub-contractors to the aircraft industry, making components for British Aerospace and Rolls Royce Aero Engines, for both military and commercial aircraft. Geoffrey was also a keen sailor and had a holiday property on Windermere where Shepherds had built a small sailing day cruiser for him.
He had the idea of building a GRP dinghy to much the same formula as the Mirror, but slightly longer, as has been mentioned and with some compound curvature to the hull section which was not possible with ply construction. They built a plug from which moulds were made, at a time when the aircraft business was in the doldrums, as a means of maintaining employment for the workforce and income for the company.

The dinghies were initially built in a tiny factory unit situated at Catfold Farm, Foulridge, approximately 500 yards from the main engineering factory, and the premises were inspected and certified by Lloyds I seem to recall.

As soon as the dinghy hit the market there was indeed a legal challenge raised by Jack Holt and Barry Bucknell, the joint designers of the Mirror. When it went to court it was noted that the West bore a striking resemblance to the Mirror, but my cousin successfully argued:

1. The the lines of the West Eleven could not be accurately reproduced in sheet plywood and that the finished dinghy was dimensionally different from the Mirror.

2. That the patent referred to by Barry Bucknell was specific to the stitch-tape-glue construction and had no application or bearing on the construction of the West Eleven.

It was therefore ruled that there was no direct infringement of the Mirror design and the case was dismissed, but a concession was agreed that the inner moulding would be altered to give greater distinction between the Mirror and the West Eleven, Thus was born the West Eleven Mark 2, where the foredeck was replaced by an open cockpit with a cross beam carrying a mast step. The hull outer moulding remained the same however.

Around this time, the aircraft industry was recovering from it's troubles and as business returned to normal production was handed over to Shepherds who continued to make West dinghies for a time. There was a small flotilla of them at the Ullswater Sailing School for several years but I have no idea if any of these survive or if the moulds still exist. In any event, true GRP Mirror dinghies arrived on the scene which made the West Eleven a little redundant.

The original manufacturers continued for many years as a hugely successful precision engineering business, and after the passing of Geoffrey Sutton it continued in the family and run by his sons, until they sold the company to Senior Engineering around 10 years ago, where the factory was moved to Earby, West Yorkshire and is still in operation.

My personal West Eleven connection is that I purchased a Mark 1 around 1980 followed by another - and then another. Quite by chance I ended up with two dinghies that had consecutive sail numbers (1361/1362 - or thereabouts) and there was the Mark 1 and two Mark 2s. I sold all the dinghies when moving house in the late 1990s to a now-defunct Nationwide Boat Sales near Chesterfield - so they are still probably out there somewhere.

I hope this information has been useful to owners and to those building a history of the dinghy. They are very handy boats, probably a little heavier than a GRP Mirror but in the right hands a little faster compared with a Mirror of the same era.

Very nice to see people still using them and wanting to know the history.

 

[Razor1955]

As a further note, I should say that although many West dinghies may be using Mirror sails, the West Eleven originally had its own suit of Jeckells sails which had a slightly different area than the Mirror. Unfortunately I don't remember the fine details.

 

[Seajet]

Razor1955,

thanks very much, very interesting info.

Andy

 

[WestieOwner]

Razor1955

Thanks for all that. It makes sense of a situation that was really rather foggy previously. I'd never even heard of the boat until a friend offered me the one he was using (belonging to a friend of his, now sadly deceased).

 

[WestieOwner]

On the subject of colour, my Westie is white hull with pale blue interior, teak gunwale capping, centrecase and main thwart, and black anodised aluminium mast, of which the masthead and foot are pine plugs, varnished since I've had her. The sails are white, though my dad gave me a red Mirror jib for her, which is marginally smaller than the white one in every dimension. The chap I got it from had broken the original GRP mast thwart, so she now sports a spendid varnished oak custom-built replacement. I took all the varnish back to bare wood and she has varnished up beautifully.

The sailing qualities are pretty much the same as a mirror. Mine has toestraps fitted, although I note that the original brochure claimed the boat didn't need them. I think the main reason was that it's so uncomfortable hanging over the side on them, with such a narrow gunwale.

I'm going to have to replace the ancient tube self-bailer which leaks so much I've had to tape it over on the outside. I think a basic small chute bailer will do the trick. If anyone has wisdom on the subject, I'd be glad to read of it.

 

[Steve59]

I have just got a West 11and pleased I found this forum with all the interesting information. I thought the West 11was a direct copy of a mirror and was about to purchase a mirror flat cover. The fact they are 5" longer means its not likely to fit. Does anyone know if there is a cover to buy for a West 11.

 

[Seajet]

Apart from giving the cover makers the dimensions and seeing what they've got, maybe a Miracle or Solo cover might do ?

Both are pram bowed and I seem to recall a bit over 12' so it should fit, if needing some extra tie downs.

This is thinking of the bargain, plastic end of the covers market.

Unless you have a good reason for a flat cover, a boom up one will drain rain off a lot better, or consider a hoop or something so pools of water don't form - a friend who walks his dog by the shoreside finds the pools in boat covers are ideal for bathing the mud off his little dog !

 

[WestieOwner]

The cover of my West11 was made by a firm in Crosby, Merseyside. I also know that Tim Harper of Southport makes what look like excellent covers that are well thought of locally. When mine is replaced not more than a year or two from now, I plan to go to him for the new one. It’ll probably cost more than the boat is worth, but preservation of an asset is worthwhile expenditure.