Another one for the train spotters amongst us. Who can ID this launch? a cue it is a CYA boat.
Sunday Quiz
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Author Archives: Alan Houghton - waitematawoodys.com founder
Aumoe Enjoying the Waitemata
Have just uncovered a cache of photos showing Aumoe out & about enjoying the Waitemata.
Mapu
MAPU
Story & photos by Mark Lane
Built in 1914 by Lane Motor Boat Company for TM Lane and Sons who were timber millers in Totara North, 30′ x 7′.6″ She was taken north to Whangaroa. She was a classic flat decker and I am not sure with what she was origonally powered with other than it was an air cooled motor.
My grandfather Clarence Lane (son of Thomas Major Lane) who was instrumental in setting up the Lane Motor Boat Company) went away on his honeymoon on Mapu in 1916 She was originaly built as a pleasure and workboat where her role primarily towing logs out of the local rivers and towing barges a role she filled over the next 30-40 year.
In 1939 she came back to Auckland to be repowered with a Scrips marine conversion of a Hercules truck motor producing 110hp. This made her the fastest boat on the whangaroa harbour pulling around 22-24 knots
During the war she acted as the supply boat for the local gun emplacement at the heads of the Whangaroa Harbour and also towed for them targets between the heads and Stephenson Island. My father Trevor Lane (son of Clarence) used her for crayfishing around this time as well. She was re-fastened in 1950.
By the 1960,s she was primarly a pleasure boat used by my father and his brother and their families for fishing picnicing etc. In the 1970 she was repowered with a Fordson deisel but by the mid 1980s she was largely unused and stored intially in a boatshed on the Lane and Sons property and subsequently in the tide in the “barge shed” where her seams having opened so much the tide came in and out of her.
In the late 1990,s Lane and Sons was being wound up and I brought her in an as is where is state. Thus I am the 4th generation of my family to own her….
Trevor Ford (son of Sam Ford and a retired boatbuilder from the Lane Motor Boat Company) assessed her and undertook to rebuild her. He showed me a hand-drawn picture of Mapu with a cabin and dodger and then proceeded to rebuild and repower her. The project took him over three years in a barn on his property in the Bombay hills.
She was repowered with a Nanni convesion of a Kubota deisel (50 hp)
She was relaunched in 2003. She heads north in summer to Whangaroa her “home” for then retrns to Auckland at the beginning of winter and is berthd in Pine Harbour Marina. She competed in the 2008 Rudder Cup race around sail rock and came second in her division.
Cruising speed is 8.2 knots and full speed about 9.7-10.4knots depending on the cleanliness of her hull!!!.
I suspect the owner of Raindance will acknowledge she is pretty quick for her size and power.. (edited – the owner of Raindance hopes the CYA launch handicapper reads waitematawoodys 🙂 )
Endeavour
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Relax – I’m not turning into a royalist, its just that the recent postings have sparked a few memories about photos of classic’s & royal visits. HMRY Britannia escorted by MV Endeavour, skippered by Borrie Beachman, leaving the Waitemata for Mt. Maunganui 9 or 10 February 1963. The clinker dinghy being towed is still in the family & the owner needs to start on her restoration 🙂
A little bit of chop on the Waitemata that day, young Queenie would not have liked that.
Isma
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ISMA
The boat above is Isma owned by Charles W Ravenhall – pictured in the Orakei Basin with Upland Road in the background – obviously in the days prior to the the basin being enclosed.
The proportions & scale on this little launch are just about perfect. I just amazes me how in later years all this wonder design talent was cast aside & ‘sheds’ we built over so many of our vessells.
Note: Charles Ravenhall also owned Silver Spray.
I wonder where they are all heading?
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Looks like a bit of a day out, maybe welcoming someone or thing e.g. fleet?
I can ID Aumoe & is that Tasman closest to the camera?
Harold Kidd Update:
I reckon this is just before the start of the NZPBA opening race on 24/11/1934, a cruising race to Awaroa Bay. Boats were assemble off the NZPBA clubhouse at Mechanics Bay at 1430. Entrants were MARO, AHUAREKA, ELVIRA, DEFENDER, AUMOE, VIVEEN, CRUSADER, RAUMATI, LADY JOYCE, Surf and post entries. I see CRUSADER and AUMOE. I think the nearest of the bunch of three at left could be RAUMATI
Rongo
RONGO (II)
The above images of this rather grand & large launch have me stumped as to its identity, I’m sure its easy but today my mind is a blank. Photo says c.1930
30/05 – appears the collective brains trust agree on Rongo – thanks team 🙂
Harold Kidd Update
I’m certain it’s RONGO (II) when owned by W. Cecil Leys in 1930. She was built as GLADYS II by Bailey & Lowe in 1919 for Chas. Court of Stanley Bay and fitted with a 150hp Sterling Model FM 6 cylinder engine. Court sold her in 1930 to Leys who had her lengthened 10 feet and renamed her RONGO. Leys owned her until 1942 when she went into NAPS as Z20. Subsequent owners included R W Butcher (1942-44), Joe Moodabe (of the Civic Theatre) (1944-47), W J Henry (1947-49), W A (Wilkie) Wilkinson (1949) W A Kenny of Picton (1964) by which time she had a 1955 Gardner 5cylinder diesel. She came back north but went to pieces at Algies Bay in July 2007.
Update 2
1. Rongo went into NAPS with a Chrysler fitted around 1938, so they probably left that in throughout hostilities as ex-USN Chryslers (and GM/Graymarine 71 series) were standard issue, for parts rationalisation.
2. Walter Bailey designed her and Bailey & Lowe built her. I would have thought that she was manifestly Bailey & Lowe, not Lanes (although I do accept that all launches do default to Lanes in the case of doubt [and I won’t repeat my conceit that Garth built them all by himself at the risk of being flamed again by Alan]).
3. Mike Moodabe never owned her. It was his brother Joe, and then only briefly, from when she came out of NAPS in 1944 until 1947.
2. Walter Bailey designed her and Bailey & Lowe built her. I would have thought that she was manifestly Bailey & Lowe, not Lanes (although I do accept that all launches do default to Lanes in the case of doubt [and I won’t repeat my conceit that Garth built them all by himself at the risk of being flamed again by Alan]).
3. Mike Moodabe never owned her. It was his brother Joe, and then only briefly, from when she came out of NAPS in 1944 until 1947.
PS [sackcloth and ashes] a bit of misinformation I created myself…..I have now found the reference to Chas. Court selling GLADYS II to Sir W. Cecil Leys .. ….it was in October 1927, a lot earlier than I had thought. It was hard to pick out which of the references were to RONGO (I) and which to RONGO (II) (OMG here we go again!).
The 35ft RONGO (I) is very interesting. She was built as MOLLIE for Capt Somerville by T M Lane & Sons (really) in December 1911 equipped with an 18hp 4 cylinder Scripps. Capt. Somerville sold her to Percy Colebrook around late 1913. Colebrook sold her to Leys in August 1919 while he was having the second MOLLIE (later ALCESTIS/RAIONA) built by Joe Slattery. Leys had her extensively modified (cabintop raised, lengthened by 3ft etc) and renamed her RONGO. The work was done by Lanes who fitted a big 100hp Scripps in 1926 for which they were the agents.
When he bought GLADYS II and renamed her RONGO II in 1927 he sold RONGO I to J T Julian of Remuera. Julian retained the name RONGO and sold her to C W H Ronaldson in 1938. I lose track of her after 1940 but will work out what happened to her one day…undoubtedly a postwar re-name.
It’s all a bit convoluted……………
When he bought GLADYS II and renamed her RONGO II in 1927 he sold RONGO I to J T Julian of Remuera. Julian retained the name RONGO and sold her to C W H Ronaldson in 1938. I lose track of her after 1940 but will work out what happened to her one day…undoubtedly a postwar re-name.
It’s all a bit convoluted……………
Update 3
Sorry to bang on about the RONGO tribe but I have found that it was Chas. Bailey who modified MOLLIE (I) for Cecil Leys in 1919 into RONGO (I). Lanes had their hands full with LUANA. At that time there were 5 big (45ft+) launches being built around the Waitemata; Collings & Bell with MARGUERITE (later LADY UNA), Joe Slattery with MOLLIE (II) (later ALCESTIS/RAIONA), Bailey & Lowe with ATATU and GLADYS II (later RONGO II) and Lanes with LUANA. The huge postwar demand was hard to satisfy but Chas. Bailey didn’t attract any orders for big launches for some reason.
Update from Baden Pascoe:
(refers to colour photo in slide show)
This is how she looked when I saw her. In my files I found she was a NAPS vessel, no Z20, 1/7/42 -27/12/43.
She had a 6L2 installed the same engine Joan had fitted. Conrad Robinson still has this engine at Warkworth. One good thing about NAPS, your boat came back with a very nice engine. At this time she belonged to R.W. Butcher of Auckland. The man in the white hat is dad, he could not get over the length of her and was concerned that she was hogging while they lifted her. He supervised the blocking of her keel once she was slipped. Very nice boat, shame she got wrecked. Very Lanes looking though!!
Aumoe
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Aumoe
The caption says ‘Deep Water Cove’.
Of interest is the special effects applied to b/w photos in the days before colour cameras.
12-07-2019 Input from Deb Green
The photo below is from Tom Wood (Deb’s uncle). Tom owned Aloha.
Wairangi
WAIRANGI
Story by Ken Ricketts
Designed by Wren Carey of Christchurch, as a pleasure craft for himself and his family. She was to be 17 meters long x 4.1 meters beam x 1.9 meter draft with 10 berths in 3 cabins. Her weight is estimated at 35 tons and she is perhaps a little different from other classic launches of that era in that she has a cruiser stern which, in a following sea is very, very comfortable.
Well known boat builder, Andy Millar, of Millar & Tunnage, in Dunedin, was selected by Carey to build her, – which they did, from heart kauri, and completed her in 1934. It is believed Wren Carey based her in Lyttelton, and mainly cruised Banks Peninsula, but there are photos, which show her in Picton, so Carey and his friends used her in the Marlborough Sounds, probably over the summer holidays. In those pre-war days.
Photos below show she sported 2 masts, the main mast, just in front of the wheelhouse, and the mizzen mast about over what is now the owners cabin, which is fairly well aft.
In those days the super structure stopped at the funnel, so access to the lower areas aft, would have been via an external hatchway, just aft of the funnel casing.
Her engine was Thornycroft, which must have been used as an auxiliary, with sail being used, when possible.
At the outbreak of WW2 she wascommandeered for use by the Lyttelton Harbour Board as an inspection vessel..
At the end of hostilities, she became surplus to requirements, and was handed back to Carey, who then sold her in 1948, to the Lyttelton Harbour Board, (LHB) (refer Russell Ward’s comment below), as their pilot boat, and small tug. The LHB removed the old petrol motor, and installed a brand new Gardner 6L3 marine diesel, which is still operating perfectly today. They had an engineer in the engine room, who manually shifted the gearbox into forward, neutral & astern, on instruction from the skipper on the helm, but today a Morse system is used at the helm, which goes from mechanical, to electrical, to hydraulic, via an ingenious conversion system. She cruises at about 7.5 knots and uses about 6 – 8 litres of diesel an hour. There are very few 115hp marine engines today, with this low consumption figure, and the 4 new fuel tanks installed recently, will hold around 3,500 litres of diesel, which makes her ideal for expedition work or long passages.
LHB also removed her sails and the mizzen mast, and installed a radar above the wheelhouse, where the mainsail on its boom would have swung.
So began her transformation from a motor sailer, to 100% launch.
It can safely be assumed that Wairangi, during time with the LHB, has rubbed up against virtually every passenger and cargo ship visiting Lyttelton, from 1948, to the late 1980’s, when she was sold to Lionel Jeffries, an Auckland businessman, who used her as a pleasure craft. He also extended the superstructure aft, from the funnel casing, to what is there today, using teak planking, to match the original wheelhouse upper works.
He sold her to Lew Ritchie, who used her as a dive and charter boat, out of Tutukaka, in Northland, for a few years, before putting her on the market, and finally selling it to Andrew Jackson, – a retired Auckland businessman, now living in Picton, who immediately started a large scale refit, and refurbishment of the vessel. Sadly, through years of neglect, it proved not possible to keep the exterior teak planks varnished, as many had split and needed filling, so they were painted over. To replace them would have been very costly..
Jackson was looking for an old, NZ built, classic launch, to undertake a couple of adventures abroad. At one stage, it looked like funding might appear, for an expedition, to search for the answer to what happened to Amelia Earhart, when she went missing in her epic 1937 round the world flight. A second plan, one which used her in Europe, in a 13 part television series, looked like it may eventuate, but the worldwide economic downturn, saw both projects shelved.
With her low fuel consumption and huge range she is ideal for expedition work, and long range cruising.
The vessel has been fully refurbished, to the point, where the Jacksons now live aboard her, in the new Picton marina.
She still has her original call sign of ZMTM.
She is now for sale, contact – Andrew Jackson on 021347988.
New Zealand’s Finest Yacht – Rawhiti
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Click the link below to view the magnificent restoration of the Logan designed & built – Rawhiti, . Article is as it appeared in the UK Classic Boat magazine. Click bottom left or right side of ‘pages’ to turn. Also clicking on the page will enlarge it (to read text).
http://content.yudu.com/Library/A1vnw3/ClassicBoatFebruary2/resources/30.htm
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