Category: Restoration and repair

The steam launch Halcyon

Will Stirling of boat builders Stirling & Son of Tavistock sent over these photos of a steam launch named Halcyon, which the company repaired recently.

‘The owner tells me that she was built on the River Thames before the Second World War,’ wrote Will. ‘She is built of mahogany on oak and is in very good condition.’

For a bit of video of Halcyon steaming on the Tamar, click here.

By coincidence, Stirling and Son currently has another boat called Halcyon in the shed – though this one is a straight stemmed-cutter with a counter stern built in the late 19th century.

‘Work seems to come in flurries,’ says Will. ‘This has been an autumn of spars with a large new boom for a pilot cutter, a new mast for an Admiralty pinnace and the refurbishment of all of the spars for a 32ft gaff cutter.

‘I’ve also attached a photo of 12ft rowing dinghy number 22, which is now ready to be fitted out.’ See the shot below. Number 22! Stirlings have made a lot of dinghies to their beautiful design.

Stirling and Son traditional yacht building and wooden boat repair can be reached by phone at 01822 614259. The company’s website is at www.stirlingandson.co.uk.

Can anyone save a Watson class lifeboat?

The Frederick Kitchin in Cambridgeshire

THIS BOAT HAS NOW PASSED INTO NEW OWNERSHIP

A chap called Alan has got in tough to say that he is desperately trying to find a new home for an ex-RNLI Watson class lifeboat, built in about about 1908.

She’s listed as the Frederick Kitchin by the National Historic Ships, which has got a small but useful few items of history. It seems she was the first motor lifeboat stationed at Beaumaris on Anglesey, and may have been the first to have an engine fitted during building.

I’m told she has a good double-diagonal construction wooden hull of Honduras mahogany. Alan’s son bought the Frederick Kitchin aiming to restore her, but the Cambridgeshire marina where it is based is closing and it has proved impossible to find somewhere affordable to keep her – and the alternative seems to be the old boat’s destruction.

There’s a little more about her history here and here.

Contact Alan at ajc2647@aol.com if you can help!

Does anyone know the story of Interlude?

 

  

Eighty-year-old Interlude built by Hornby in 1938 to a design by A H Comben is now the property of Steve Whittle, who saved her from destruction two years ago and now plans to get her back as close to her original condition as possible, and to take her up to Lake Windermere.

Once she’s there he intends to take groups on trips round the lake and its beauty s pots, stopping at hotels for lunch – and all in a 1930s style.

It sounds like a good wheeze to me! Steve hopes that this work will fund Interlude’s upkeep and make sure she’s around for at least another 80 years.

From a comment by a G Newstead on this post, it seems Interlude was the subject of a write up in the boating magazines when she was built, due to her design and speed. There also this tantalising entry on the National Archives website.

In the meantime she’s at Taylor’s Boatyard in Chester (the final photo above shows her being craned into the Shropshire Union Canal), and Steve would very much like to gather some more information, as up to now he has had little success in learning about Interlude’s story.

If you have anything to add, please send it to me at gmatkin@gmail.com, and I’ll forward it to Steve.