Category: Small boats

Nick Smith, boatbuilder, at the Beale Park Boat Show

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Nick Smith, Boatbuilder

Nick Smith, Boatbuilder Nick Smith, Boatbuilder

Nick Smith clinker-built motor launch for sale at
the Beale Park Boat Show

Nick Smith, Boatbuilder

Work in progress  on another clinker motor launch
(with Bumble in the background)

Nick Smith, Boatbuilder Nick Smith, Boatbuilder

More pictures of the very sweet Bumble
small motor launch

I spotted three of Nick Smith’s motor launches at the Beale Park Boat Show– one was very elegant and for sale, one about a third of the way to being built, and one the very sweet little 12-footer Bumble, built by him in 1991 of mahogany on oak and on loan for the show from the owner, Jona Behrens.

The boats are all drawn to scale by Nick himself, who tells me that he then builds them by eye on the traditional ‘if it looks right then it is right’ principle. Well, they certainly look right in these photos.

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Anderson by sailing canoe and dinghy on Lake Wener

Click on the headline above before bookmarking. Click on the images below for larger, clearer pictures. For more photos from the R C Anderson’s Canoeing and Camping Adventures click here: http://intheboatshed.net/?s=anderson

Around Lake Wener, 1907: ‘The Bee, Bill’s boat, was a ten-foot sailing dinghy built by Marsh of Reading. For this cruise, she had bulkhead put in at the midship thwart, a bit of deck from the mast forward, and a Willesden canvas hood from this to the bulkhead. The Earwig was, as has been mentioned already, a home-made canoe, fourteen feet by three, watertight fore and aft, and with a well just under three feet long.’

Anderson Anderson Anderson

Anderson Anderson Anderson

Anderson Anderson Anderson

To be continued…

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A celebration of the Mirror

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http://intheboatshed.net/2007/07/16/a-celebration-of-the-mirror/

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Mirror

Mirror Mirror Mirror

Mirror Mirror

Bucknell sisters Margaret Palmer and Mary Ralph with
Andy Wyke; Mirror Dinghy building instructions; Mirror
on roof of Austin Mini; Barry Bucknell and sister sailing;
how we still think of the Mirror today

Copyrights: NMM; International Mirror Association; NMM &
Jack Holt; NMM; Turtle Photography

The Mirror is not everyone’s idea of a classic, but there’s no doubt that it has been a hugely influential design: it won huge numbers of people over to sailing as a pastime, and its influence on dinghy designers can still be seen today, not least because it was probably the first dinghy to be built using the stitch-and-glue technique; up to that time I gather only canoes had been built using the method.

And besides, like many people I have a certain slightly mixed-up affection for them: I built one with my father Brian Atkin when I was a kid, and more recently my partner Julie sails one.

The National Maritime Museum Cornwall recently received two very special visitors: the twin sisters of famous TV DIY expert and Mirror dinghy designer, Barry Bucknell.

The twin 93-year old sisters saw the first Mirror dinghy ever built on show at the Museum, and an original publicity film used to launch the class, including footage of their brother.

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Designed by Bucknell, together with Jack Holt in 1962, the Mirror dinghy was named after the Daily Mirror newspaper and was promoted as an affordable boat. Costing just 63s 11d when it first came onto the market, it did more than any previous design to make Read the rest of this post: Continue reading “A celebration of the Mirror”