If the old sign in a brokers window and a thumbnail photo in a monthly brochure isn’t working for you – contact the Wooden Boat Bureau – there are 2 simple differences between the Wooden Boat Bureau and other boat brokers:
1. We actually sell classic boats.
2. We have a list of buyers wanting to buy a classic wooden boat
So woodys if you are trading up or trading down/out of the market and have a woody in good condition – drop us a line at waitematawoodys@gmail.com for a confidential chat.
(Sorry for the brazen commercial message today, but my wife tells me we need a bigger boat)
WHAT IS GOING ON WITH THE A-CLASS CLASSIC RACE FLEET – EGOTISM, ARROGANCE OR JUST INCOMPETENCE ?
You may have missed my comments at the bottom of Mondays WW story, and over the last 48 hours it has emerged that in the last two weeks we have had three serious incidents involving three different A-Class classic yachts, I have detailed descriptions of each incident, but I’ll stay out of the technicalities. Questions of the day – is there a review underway of these incidents? who takes responsibility for the circumstances surrounding the incidents i.e. race starts and finishes? Are there health and safety procedures in place for the ‘worst case scenario’?.
Even if you put any blame to one side, 3 incidents in 2 weeks………………… something is amiss. Me thinks it is time for a fire side skippers chat on rules and good manners.
INCIDENT ONE – Mahurangi Weekend – Sunday Morning – A Class yacht (under power) collides with classic launch – I understand no apology from yacht
INCIDENT TWO – CYA Race Mahurangi > Auckland – Sunday Morning – A Class gaff yacht T-bones another vessel at the start – Other vessel on starboard – near sinking
INCIDENT THREE – CYA Round Rangitoto Yacht Race – A Class gaff yacht collides with finish boat (classic launch) – Again no apology, just laughing
The CYA has its major annual sailing regatta coming up next week – if you’re out and about in your boat- might be a good idea to fender up 😉
22-02-2021 Input From Robin Kenyon
Re Racing at the MCC regatta: I think safety at Mahurangi was greatly improved this year by having the A class racing the outer loop first, therefore greatly reducing the time spent racing in the confines of the estuary and other racers/spectators. My big plea to the organisers would be for the MCC to affiliate themselves to Yachting New Zealand. Then the racing could be held under the more familiar (to racing and coastal sailors) Racing Rules of Sailing. This would remove a large degree of uncertainty that exists when racing at Mahurangi and help prevent a future accident in waiting. Every other race that the A class does uses these rules, not the COLREGS (except on passage races outside the hours of daylight, I believe). I appreciate that this incurs a cost to the MCC but surely the levy to YNZ is just what has to be done. The vast majority of other clubs in the country pay it. I have raced regattas in countries all over the world and this is the only one that I have been to that uses COLREGS for daytime racing. Uncertainty could breed the attitude amongst some that might just blag their way through a fleet rather than abiding to the very clear and proven racing rules of sailing. Stating that their will be no protests must only add to these competitors feeling untouchable. Whilst this is only one aspect covered by the comments above (and thankfully there were no serious accidents at this years regatta yacht race) I think it has some relevance to the bigger picture. I must have done about 10 Mahurangi regattas, all racing on the A class. The heated on the water interactions for this race are often worse than any other race in our calendar. Which is a shame for a fun event and a true highlight of the season. It doesn’t need to be that way and using the Racing Rules of Sailing can go a long way to address this. The COLREGS were never written with sailboat racing in mind. That is what the Racing Rules of Sailing are for. When skippering an A class around the harbour the skippers have enough on their plate without having the rethink the rule book.
22-02-2021 Update ex the CYA Feb Newsletter – lets hope they read this, tucked away at the bottom of the newsletter 🙂
Saturday was a first (in a long time) on the classic launch scene – we had a launch race around Rangitoto (+ Motutapu) , now a race is not that unusual , but female skippers only (helms person) is – the winning skipper on Kumi would have failed a chromosome test but the race committee (Jason Prew) was swayed by the skippers attire 🙂
The post race BBQ at Islington Bay proved more popular than the race and 11 woodys dropped anchor in the bay for the BBQ. We all tend to forget about this location, great sunsets and easy anchorage. Cool video of My Girl sliding back down the harbour at dusk. On route I caught the tail-end charlies in the yacht fleet who also raced around the island – photos below.
A question – if you’re a large A-Class gaffer (no names but its painted black) and you constantly finish at the back of the fleet, as you did again on Saturday, why would you sail so close to a mark that you hit it? The rules say you are out of the race for that – BUT what makes it worse is when the mark is a classic launch and it is the finish boat, and all the yacht crew do is laugh 😦 The invoice for repairs will be in the mail. Yachties wonder why launch owners do not put their hand up when asked to perform this task, I suspect they will struggle even more for ‘volunteers’ in the future 🙂
UPDATE– Combine the above with another A-Class yacht (no Prize for guessing which one it was) colliding (yacht in the wrong) with a very large classic launch at Mahurangi and the yacht skippers / crew post collision arrogance – the CYA maybe needs to have a wee chat re rules and manners. Just because your are a classic yacht you don’t get any special privileges 😉
Auckland Anniversary Day Regatta – Thank God For The Classics
Ok, I’m going to upset a few – but……. I ask the question – has the AAR passed its use by date?
I think the answer is yes, in its present format. If it wasn’t for the classic fleet i.e. old boats (tugs, work boats, classic launches and yachts) there wouldn’t be many boats on the harbour on anniversary day. Maybe time for a reset, now here’s a thought – merge the event with the Classic Yacht Association’s annual classic regatta.
The reality is changing lifestyles and if people are honest, the Bay of Islands – Sailing Week has robbed the AAR of most of the modern sailing fleet. They in fact claim to be “the biggest regatta of its kind in NZ and one of the Southern Hemisphere’s premier yachting events” – not that long ago the AAR made similar claims. And on top of this the continuing growth of the Mahurangi Regatta that attracts huge numbers of wooden boats from near and far.
The AAR has being a happening thing for over 180 years, it would be a shame for it to continue to die a slow death, now’s the time to ask the big questions and future proof its existence – as an aside a large chunk of the AAR people are linked / involved with the CYA so should not be too hard…………Now where’s my hat – I’m leaving the room 🙂
Video footage for the 2021 regatta below – if you’re only into classic launches fast forward to the 1:14 mark 🙂
Last Wednesday we saw the 1917 Joe Slattery classic launch – Pacific sliding back into the H2O after a 5 month refit (link to that story below). Over the weekend, owner Nathan Herbert took the 105 year old out to stretch her legs post the installations of a brand new 100hp FPT / Iveco N45A engine. The old Lister in her was a beast of an engine (1500kg v’s 450kg new engine) and mounted well forward, I would not be the only one to have commented previously that she had a certain “heading down hill” look to her – well as you can see in the top photo, she almost looks like she is about to pop up on the plane. Nathan says no, its just camera angle – but to the eye she sure looks smart.The installation project was not a simple – out with the old & bolt in the new procedure – you can see in the photos below it was a major, but the Nathan is an engineer (mouse in hand not spanner) so the attention to detail is certainly there 🙂 She always was a looker – but she is now a stunner – well done Mr Herbert, your forebears , same family ownership since new, would be very happy to see her today. I’m told that the inflatable will be replaced with her original clinker – currently being restored at The Slipway Milford yard 🙂
“If anyone is wondering- a few notes about the re-engining process:
-The new engine was barely smaller than the old one due to the Lister having had many remotely mounted parts eg. heat exchangers, oil tanks etc. -The engine beds had to be widened to accept the new motor -In stripping the bridge and for’d cabin out completely I found around 24 completely broken ribs- some in a row which were very dangerous. New red beech ribs were fitted by Jason Prew. These ribs would have written her off in a survey as is so often the case these days when you see $1 reserve classics. -The 4 cylinder engine vibrates much more at idle than the 6cyl Lister did with her large flywheel. The GPS does a dance as it shakes around. -The tanks were unexpectedly difficult to replace. after the old copper ones were stolen I had two 4mm aluminum 170L units fabricated which to install necessitated disassembly of the cockpit seating area with a new stern ‘bulkhead’ built and so on and so forth. -Steering is a little harder in a fresh/choppy seaway now but this may just be perception as I now have more power which I’m probably using where before I didn’t. -The bow no longer pushes water like a bulldozer, and in a slight chop actually has positive buoyancy to lift over waves instead of submarine through them. -Despite being beamier than other launches of her era, she is still as much of a pig when rolling at anchor. And please- enough with the comments about adding ballast- there is still a line of huge lead ‘AUSTRALIS’ ingots along each chine in the saloon which require two people to lift each ingot. The engine is not a lightweight, and there is over 100m of chain in the bow plus some pretty large anchors. -Speed: 11.5 knots in the photos, cruise has gone up from about 8 knots, to about 8.7 knots. Higher speeds get a bit noisy.”
ID THE ENGINE QUIZ – The correct answers were
MAKE & HP: Stearns MDR 125hp
AGENTS: H. O. Wiles
BOAT FITTED TO & WHEN: Romance II – 1925 No one got all the answers correct – but Jason Prew and Nathan Herbert were tied at 3 correct elements (but not the same) so its a tie – they can decide what bits of the prize pool they each want 🙂
YESTERDAY WAS A RECORD BREAKING DAY ON WW
As you can see from the graph below – Mondays story (the pink skyscraper) on Mahurangi weekend was off the charts – so many people here and around the world logging in to view. No doubt helped by it being winter in a lot of the countries and the ongoing CV-19 lock-downs – I use that old Fred Dagg line – “We Don’t Know How Lucky We Are”
WoW what a weekend – perfect weather, perfect location and as always stunning boats. We saw a record turn out for the classic wooden boat parade on Saturday morning – the crowd ashore at Sullivans was a little thin on the ground, but if we are honest, we do not do it for them – its all about us 🙂 , a little like going for a motorbike rumble. We need more events where we just ‘hang-out’ together.
The regatta’s main event – the yacht race appeared to be a big success, the A-Class Logan – Rawhiti, in the hands of her new owner – Peter Brookes, cleaned up all the major trophies. As has become the norm at Mahurangi races, the results process was a total balls up, it was very dark and late into the night before the final, final results were announced – fingers crossed its all kosher, last year it took days and numerous oops lets try that again announcements 🙂
The big band beach BBQ, was a hit, perfect on all fronts – weather, tide, the band, bbq’s and the people. Given the number of boats in Bon Accord Harbour, Kawau Island, most people headed there on Sunday. The Kawau Boating Boat was bursting at the seams but handed it well. I have split the photos into 4 galleries – Classic Wooden Boat Parade – Yacht Race – Beach BBQ – More (includes Kawau). If I missed your boat, you were somewhere I wasn’t, or in the wrong light , or your’e boats ugly (joking – sort off). Enjoy a peak at the weekend., click individual photos to enlarge. Next weekend I’m off to the Lake Rotoiti Classic and Wooden Boat Parade – its a biggie – they have 70+ entries
Late January > early February is always a big weekend on the yachting calendar – it is Auckland’s birthday and one of the lead events is the Anniversary Day Regatta – started way back in 1840 it is New Zealand’s oldest sporting event and in fact even pre-dates the America’s Cup by 11 years.
In recent years as competition of peoples leisure time has increased, the number of competitors has dipped, but the good news from a woody view point is the event has been propped up by the classic boating fleet and in recent years the inclusion of Tug/Work boat race and a classic launch, round the buoys drag race. If you are not away boating this long weekend, I would encourage you to visit the waterfront to catch some of the action – the Tug/Work boat race at 10am is a hoot. Best viewing spots found here https://regatta.org.nz/regatta-spectators/where-to-watch-the-regatta-action/ Timetable. https://regatta.org.nz/regatta-participants/schedule-of-regatta-events/
BIG WW STORY TOMORROW – 100+ PHOTOS FROM THE MAHURANGI REGATTA WEEKEND
Hello woodys, if you aren’t a float today, todays story is a gem – its all about what makes the classic wooden boating movement so special – Caleb Bird contacted me to advise that he had taken over the restoration of the yacht Rebecca (now back to being called Dolphin) from the Tino Rawa Trust. The 24′ Dolphin was built in 1902 by the Ewen brothers (Frank,Ernie & John) of Whangarei. Constructed of 2 skin kauri she was once owned and restored by the late Peter Smith, who also restored the stunning 1938 Sam Ford launch – Menai.
Todays photo gallery shows us what Caleb has been up to for the last 2 years i.e. stripping her out and getting the interior back to an amazing look. Well done Caleb, we need more of you 🙂
The first batch shows her ‘as found’ and later photos the work-in-process.
BALSONA Hobsonville Marina based woody – John Wicks sent in the above photo of the Oliver & Gilpin built launch – Balsona that has been undergoing a gradual rolling restoration for some years. John commented that before the Chain(saw) Gang take umbrage, in his eyes the under-construction flying bridge is going to look more fitting than the previous excrescence, when it’s finished. She is a big old woody and we would love to learn more about her.
CLASSIC WOODY LAUNCH PARADE – THIS SATURDAY @ MAHURANGI REGATTA
Each year the Saturday morning classic launch parade at the Mahurangi Regatta gets bigger and better, the format is simple – we meet off Scotts Landing at 10am and then head off in single file (alpha order) following CYA Launch Captain – Jason Prew’s launch – MY GIRL to Sullivans Bay to do two laps of a pre-laid (buoys) course, that sees us weaving between the anchored boats and the shore line.
This year again we will have Grant Cossey, a woody friendly shore based commentator that welcomes and backgrounds each boat as they motor past. This broadcast is heard both on-shore and across the bay. Now woodys entry to the parade is free, but it would really make things a lot easier and slicker if you helped out by letting Joyce at the CYA know some details on your boat eg Boat Name, Designer, Builder, Year Launch ,Owner (eg John Smith or Smith family) + any special items of interest about the boat (eg totally rebuilt in 1986) Send the above in a simple email to admin@classicyacht.org.nz AND DO IT TODAY PLEASE.
If you have any flags or bunting on-board – hoist them up. AND remember to wave when you go past RAINDANCE, I’ll be taking photos 🙂
We ran a story on the Owen Woolley designed and built launch – Korowai earlier in the week, then ping the inbox sends an alert and Angus Rogers has ‘found’ another photo – its a stunner – great angle, well done Mr Rogers.
Lastly we see Manuroa already at Te Kouma – doing what we would all like to do – just hanging out doing nothing. A previous owner of Manuroa believed it may have been built by Bailey & Lowe c.1912, is anyone able to confirm ?
Scotts Landing – photo ex Roger Mills
UPCOMING LONG WOODY WEEKEND
It is less than 2 weeks until Mahurangi weekend – the biggest on-the-water woody event in New Zealand – just check out Rogers Mills drone photo above to get an idea of the turn-out. Almost all of those dinghies are from a wooden boat anchored in the bay. The occasion is the regatta prize giving / BBQ on the Saturday night at Scotts Landing – all welcome, remember to bring a $20 note to buy a copy of the Mahurangi Cruising Club’s brilliant year book – its one of the best boating reads and great value.
On Saturday (30th) morning we have the classic launch parade – more details re times etc closer to the day but please make life easy for the organisers by emailing your name, boat name, and brief description your woody – design, age, length etc to admin@classicyacht.org.nz If you’re in Auckland on the Monday (1st) – as part of the Anniversary Day Regatta there will be a classic launch race. Entries for this are now open and you can enter at www.regatta.org.nz It is a handicapped race so everyone has a fair chance of winning some of the great regatta prizes
