It’s all going on in Cornwall; read all about it here and here. My thanks to the Boat Building Academy for leading me to this one!
Tag: boat building
BBA students build strip-planked Humber yawl to George Holmes’ Cassy design
Photos by Jenny Steer and Andy Blundy
Boat Building Academy student Derek Thompson built a strip-planked George Holmes-designed Humber yawl with help from fellow students Christian Skeels and Ryan Johnson.
On retiring, Derek and his wife moved to live by the sea at Seaton, Devon. He previously worked as an IT engineer and as a ski instructor, and had lived variously at Barrow in Furness, where he grew up, Australia, USA, and Hemel Hempstead.
Holmes’ Cassy was originally drawn up in 1883, and Derek’s aim was to recreate it using modern building methods, and the boat he built, named Mikassy, is sheathed with glass cloth and epoxy resin, and planked in Western red cedar with yellow cedar decking.
The name Mikassy is a nod to the original Holmes design called Cassy, and also to Mikasa Street in Barrow-in-Furness, where Derek was born.
Rather than a single centre-plate, Mikassy has two bilge plates in order to allow Derek to sleep on board if he wishes. To see a photo diary of Mikassy’s build, click here.
Christian, who also worked on the pilchard larker built during the same course, is a member of the Humber Yawl Club, which has a number of boats similar to Mikassy.
On of the youngest students on the course last year, Ryan came to the BBA after working in the motor industry in ; after working on Mikassy and several other student boats, he finally built his own West Greenland kayak – of which more in a later post!
BBA students build a Wolstenholme-designed motor launch
Boat Building Academy students Phil Ambler and Mark Ashman built a cold-moulded Andrew Wolstenholme-designed open motor launch, which first went into the water at the December student launch day.
The original design was altered only slightly by fitting a 10hp Nanni diesel engine rather than electric motor specified by the designer, and this meant the design of the boat had to be changed slightly. However, the photos show the boat’s interior still has an open, spacey sort of feel.
Phil came to the academy as a student following a lifetime of sailing and a career as a GP in Oxfordshire. He first visited the academy in 2006 when his son was thinking of joining the long course, but after his son decided instead to go to university and retirement came close, Phil came to feeling that he would himself enjoy the BBA’s 38-week course.
Phil and his wife are now trying to decide where they will settle down, but his requirements for a new house now include a big workshop…
Mark, who was Phil’s main partner during the build of the motor launch, worked in the pub industry for 13 years before attending at the BBA. In his case, Mark found out about the academy when his partner, a teacher, visited a student who was on work experience at Lyme. Mark then decided on a dramatic change in lifestyle: he sold the pub at Sherborne and relocate to the Dorset coast to start a new career.