Gavin Atkin's weblog for the sort of people who like looking inside boat sheds. It's about old boats, traditional boats, boat building, restoration, the sea and the North Kent Coast
Magnificent. Bloody marvellous. Splendid. Ordinary, mortal words seem inadequate to describe LT472, a 77ft smack built at Lowestoft in 1921 and named Excelsior.
She’s said to be only fully sea-going sailing vessel in the National Historic Ships Core Collection that is available for the general public to sail. Read all about her here: www.excelsiortrust.co.uk .
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Tender tug Calshot with Olympic, sister ship to the Titanic
The Tender Tug Calshot Trust is seeking two 20ft ship’s lifeboats for the tender tug Calshot in time for an event marking the 100th anniversary of the day the liner Titanic left Southampton and set off on her maiden voyage.
Sadly, the Calshot’s original lifeboats were left in a yard by the former owners, with the result that they deteriorated to a point where they had to be scrapped.
The anniversary is on the 10th April 2012, and I gather television historian Dan Snow is scheduled to present a live television programme.
In addition to the two replacement lifeboats, the trust is also seeking information about whether any of the original Titanic lifeboats have survived, as it has learned that they were reallocated to other White Star liners following the ship’s famous and tragic sinking.
The Tender Tug Calshot Trust was set up in 1997 with the prime aim of restoring Calshot to the way she was in the 1930s.
She’s included in the National Historic Ships list of 200 vessels of pre-eminent national significance, and in fact she’s no ordinary tug. Built in Southampton by Thornycroft’s at Woolston, she was a tender as well as a tug, and was certified to carry 566 passengers in first and second class saloons: often the larger liners would anchor offshore as it was uneconomic to negotiate into the docks to transfer a few passengers, and Calshot would then ferry these passengers and small items of freight.
In her time, she also manoeuvred the world’s greatest ocean liners, including the Queen Mary, the Queen Elizabeth, the United States, the France and the Olympic, sister ship of the Titanic.
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Boat builder Jonathan Palmer has won a first prize in the traditional maritime skills in action section of a photographic competition sponsored by National Historic Ships and Classic Boat magazine.
Jon’s winning photograph (above) was taken in May at the Boat Building Academy workshops where he has been a student.
Titled Beer Lugger 2010, the photograph from the building of the new Beer boat Steadfast by students on Jon’s course. He caught the boat on camera as it was awaiting the frenzied process of hot nailing, in which copper nails are quickly hammered into freshly steamed timber ribs and riveted into place.
The prizes were awarded at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich – after the ceremony Jon apparently enjoyed a game of croquet and a very civilised afternoon tea. He says he will spend the prize money on tools for LP Boatworks, a company that he and fellow Boat Building Academy graduate Ben Larcombe have set up in Colyton, Devon. They plan to offer traditional and modern boat building, restoration and repairs.
Jon’s photo can also be seen in the November issue of Classic Boat or on the National Historic Ships website.
Readying the copper nails before hot nailing; the hot nailing process itself
