malp

Can anyone confirm if the floating dry dock on the GU at Denham still in business? And if so can anyone confirm the current contact phone number?

Is this your boat you are thinking of overplating, or just general curiosity? Are you talking about overplating a whole boat, that is, dropping it on a new base plate and overplating the sides up to either the waterline or the top rubbing strake? Or just overplating the footings area? Speaking as a retired boatbuilder, overplating a whole boat is not a sensible idea. If it was done the way I have seen it done at a yard that shall be nameless you'd be in effect building a hull that has no attached stiffening, has plates only welded from one side, and joined to the existing hull by a single fillet weld at the top, with no reliable way of testing for water tightness. Depending on the size and profile of the base hull you could make it wide enough to jam to easily in some narrow locks. Then you'd probably have issues with underwater skin fittings, and the skin tank if your engine is cooled that way. You'd be adding possibly several tons to the weight and would need to remove ballast. If to do that you have to partially strip out anyway to lift flooring you might as well strip out up to the gunn'l and do the job properly. That said I have seen footings overplated on a Josher hull that was to become a trip boat. This was done under Board of Trade supervision, but the surveyor insisted that each plate had a pattern of 20-30mm holes cut, through each of which it was welded to the underlying hull. The boat in question was stripped out at the time.

Pete, thanks for the update, I ought to look at Jim Shead's site more carefully. I recall the names Buckle and Button, but not where they fit in the timeline. I'm fairly sure that apart from the Rugby boats, and my shells, they bought all the others from Colecraft until Trevor started building for them on site.

What a coincidence - I have been wondering what happened to the boats I built for Brummagem Boats, and up pops this thread! To amplify Pete Harrison's post, I built just one of the Brumtug shells, No 3. The others I'm pretty sure were built by Colecraft. Four new new boats were added to the private boats to start the fleet, and they came from Rugby Boatbuilders. I then built the next five cruiser shells that went into the fleet. They were, in order, Belle (40'), Bourne (42'), Beau and Beau Brummel (both 50') and Britannic (62'). After that they bought shells in, probably from Colecraft, until they started building in a polytunnel on the other side of the yard. Trevor Preece I think was the fabricator at first. Mal Pearson

Mazer, just spotted your OP. I started work at Swan Line in 1974 so it is just possible I actually help build your boat. I don't recall the name, but that may have changed anyway. If it is one of the GRP tops it will be close to the last before they went over to all steel shells. I can't remember much about the interiors either, but I do know I spent the following winter stripping the floors out of 4 hire boats, which were shuttering ply laid straight on top of the brick ballast, and so had rotted extensively as a result. New floors were laid with a small air gap. If you got in touch with Jeff I hope he was able to help. He was the manager when I went there.

Perhaps from Jim Shead in that case... ? Mal Pearson. malcolmpearson.co.uk

Hi Pete, Interesting that you remember all of these. I decided recently to compile a register of my boats to publish on the web, but your mention of LIEF as being built in 1984 at Sherborne Street I think is wrong as I have no record of that build, in fact I have no record of a 47' boat at all. Oddly, it is also mentioned on Jim Shead's site, Mal Pearson. malcolmpearson.co.uk

I recall that the the original cabin paint scheme had one side painted solid blue and the other side solid brown, if I remember correctly, and I rather think that the original owner chose the name as a word play on this colour scheme.