Cutty Sark

[seaandland]

Just heard on BBC news that it has been ruined by fire, maybe arson.

[blackrose]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/6675381.stm

 

Sounds like someone's been arson about...

[tony collins]

Just heard on BBC news that it has been ruined by fire, maybe arson.

 

Such a sad bit of news. Did you see that one of the TV stations had received an e-mail from one viewer to the effect of : "good riddance to a bit of rotting wood"!

 

My view is that some of the money raided from the lottery to pay for the runaway cost of the 2012 Olympics should be diverted to help pay for the repairs. Luckily much of the superstructure and rigging had been removed for restoration. She has been attracting people to Greenwich for sixty years. The complete loss of a ship of this importance would have a very adverse effect on the people of that area involved in tourism as well as a loss to the nation. The fastest sailing boat of her size, a very real demonstration of the skills possessed at that time by the shipbuilders of Dumbarton.

 

 

Tony

Edited May 21, 2007 by tony collins

[Webchem]

Such a sad bit of news. Did you see that one of the TV stations had received an e-mail from one viewer to the effect of : "good riddance to a bit of rotting wood"!

 

My view is that some of the money raided from the lottery to pay for the runaway cost of the 2012 Olympics should be diverted to help pay for the repairs. Luckily much of the superstructure and rigging had been removed for restoration. She has been attracting people to Greenwich for sixty years. The complete loss of a ship of this importance would have a very adverse effect on the people of that area involved in tourism as well as a loss to the nation. The fastest sailing boat of her size, a very real demonstration of the skills possessed at that time by the shipbuilders of Dumbarton.

Tony

 

Hear Hear.

 

This is a real piece of history - whatever you feel about the cock ups the British made around the world, she is a beautiful boat and MUST be restored! Do we still have the skills?

[DHutch]

That's pretty awful is it was though.

- Ive only been round once when i was about 6, but i still remember it ridiculously clearly, and it is a shame to think that anyone would deliberately do that.

 

 

Daniel

[fuzzyduck]

<snip for brevity>

she is a beautiful boat and MUST be restored! Do we still have the skills?

 

Carl might have a few days spare.

 

Crying shame this.

[carlt]

Carl might have a few days spare.

 

Crying shame this.

Unfortunately my time (if I had any) would be given to the Clipper which doesn't have the £25 million slush fund. There are certainly the skills still around though there is no shortage of boat builders and restorers about. Not many of them bother with narrow boats though (understandable really).

[Sue1946]

quote by Tony Collins: My view is that some of the money raided from the lottery to pay for the runaway cost of the 2012 Olympics should be diverted to help pay for the repairs. unquote

 

I agree that lottery money is badly mis-used, and that this is the kind of heritage that should be preserved by their funding.

I also have severe misgivings about the whole 2012 Olympic venture.

I landed at Heathrow from Australia on Sunday at 7.00am. Arrived home (approx 30 miles as the boat might sail in a straight line!!) at midday!! I shared my thought of '... and we are going to host the Olympics in 5 years?? haha' with various co-passengers/queuers of several nationalities.

I wonder if the baggage handling capacity and Customs and Immigration depts will have enough desks and staff to man them, and that BR Sunday engineering may JUST be finished by the time of the most prestigious sporting event of most readers' lifetime?

I could go on, but imagine you know where I'm coming from?

(apologies - grammar! know from where I am coming!! ha again!)

[King Learie]

Some of my earliest memories was being taken to see the Cutty Sark, I was really into sailing ships as a nipper and I remember the reek of tar that blacked the hull. I don't remember going on board which I think was due to the entrance price and parents of modest means but they did make up for it with the Woolwich Ferry and the tunnel and observatary on the hill.

 

TV News this morning showed the yard at Chatham full of masts, spars, rigging etc, awaiting offsite restoration, the cast iron hull is a little warped but must be repairable even for just cosmetic purposes. Now while the current restoration was going on they were faced with a massive 6.5 million shortfall after recieving 15 m from the lottery. What they have now is a far greater restoration project but this must be balanced up against the many millions of free advertising that this fire has brought. They know this, and are busy capitalising on the advantage with a new fundraising website for all those millions of people who had never heard of the Cutty Sark before (except off a whiskey bottle!) so as long as they don't bollocks up this heaven sent opportunity I think the 'ol' girl' will grace her dock again some years in the future.

 

Now the police are investigating the matter as arson.....mmmmm?

 

King Learie - Avast thar me hearties!

[Billw]

It is amazing that so much should be spent on the Cutty Sark, whilst the City of Adelaide rots in Irvine, and will probably be broken up within the year.

See DETAILS HERE

[carlt]

It is amazing that so much should be spent on the Cutty Sark, whilst the City of Adelaide rots in Irvine, and will probably be broken up within the year.

See DETAILS HERE

Hi Bill

If you look at the other Cutty Sark thread you'll see I made the same point but also linked to a news story that appeared more hopeful.

 

Unfortunately I notice today that the article is dated 2003.

[gaggle]

see this brush said the street cleaner 22 yrs old it is , i have only had to change the head six times and the handle ten times .it is still in good nick.

this boat is not exactly ancient is it , one of the pensioners on the new version of the who song is only 50 yrs younger.

Edited May 22, 2007 by gaggle

[carlt]

see this brush said the street cleaner 22 yrs old it is , i have only had to change the head six times and the handle ten times .it is still in good nick.

this boat is not exactly ancient is it , one of the pensioners on the new version of the who song is only 50 yrs younger.

Sorry Gaggle, once again you've lost me.

 

The iron knees, floors and frames of both Cutty Sark and City of Adelaide are original. This is what gives them the shape and character. The planks on C of A are substantially original and were pretty salvagable before she was left in a bureaucratic limbo. Wooden boats were designed to have timber replaced does that mean we shouldn't maintain them but just let them rot away?

 

And what constitutes historically valuable in your eyes? Shall we melt down all the concordes, spitfires and lancasters because they're less than a thousand years old?

 

The Cutty Sark and The City of Adelaide have international maritime significance which is why they are both included in the NRHV core collection list (and the list of the 10 most important vessels in the country).

[Billw]

Once they are gone, they are gone. I agree that the Cutty Sark should be salvaged and restored, the money spent would probably only be squandered elsewhere.

It is worthy of note though that the City of Adelaide would probably be more original if restored, yet the chance to restore her may be lost within a year. 20 pence a head for the UK would do the job, I'm sure future generations would be grateful.

 

ps you could have restored it 20 times for the cost of the Scottish parliament building!

Edited May 22, 2007 by Billw

[NB Willawaw]

A large number of tea clippers of the 1850's and 1860's were lost at sea.

They were designed for speed and really were the greyhounds of the sailing ship era.

I seem to remember CS logged 21 Knots at one point.

Their narrow length:beam ratio and slim sterns often meant that they were overwhelmed by large seas

and quite a few ships of the ilk were pooped. Lahloo, Fiery Cross, Crusader, all lost.

I guess at 280ft long and 35ft beam, the ratio wasn't a lot different to a lot of narrowboats.

The passages of south east Asia were one of the narrowest channels that these ships had to race through

(Lombok, Sunda, etc) and if you look at the chart, they are littered with reefs and rocks with English names.

Many of them are the last resting places of these ships.

 

Of the top 20 fastest ships of the day, only a couple survived to dotage, the "witch" being one of them.

Her arch rival, Thermopylae, named after the famous battle, unusually was green instead of the normal black hull and was built in Aberdeen not on the Clyde.

She was scuttled deliberately around the time of the First World War.

 

Thermopylae had a cockerel shaped wind vane at the top of her mast to denote that she was "cock of the walk".

The Cutty Zark as the TV reporter yesterday kept referring to her as, had a shirt shaped wind vane after the

short shirt worn by the witch Nannie. Of course, it is this shirt which is really the Cutty Sark, where the name originates

from.

 

Ariel and Taeping raced each other from China with the first seasons cargo of tea, each vying to secure the highest price for their cargo . After some 80 days at sea, they finished in the London docks within hours of each other. I have the print of the two racing, on the bulkhead.

 

The American clipper, Flying Enterprise once came under full sail to within 100m of the entrance lock at Wapping, at which point,

the sails were backed and furled, so she could be warped into the lock chamber - thats some seamanship with a ship of that size.

 

Willawaw is named after the Williwaw, a seasonal North Pacific wind similar to the Mistral in the Med. For sailing ships carrying salmon and lumber from the west coast of North America to the far east, this wind could prove disasterous.

Edited May 22, 2007 by NB Willawaw

[carlt]

Once they are gone, they are gone. I agree that the Cutty Sark should be salvaged and restored, the money spent would probably only be squandered elsewhere.

It is worthy of note though that the City of Adelaide would probably be more original if restored, yet the chance to restore her may be lost within a year. 20 pence a head for the UK would do the job, I'm sure future generations would be grateful.

 

ps you could have restored it 20 times for the cost of the Scottish parliament building!

The irony of the City of Adelaide is that saving her may be the only way to save the Scottish Maritime Museum. The slippage costs will all but bankrupt the museum and they're not going to get any donations to fund the breaking up of a boat.

 

It's amazing that the huge interest in her all over the world cannot generate the funds to restore her and the torching of the Cutty Sark will, obviously, affect the charitable donations and grants for other maritime restoration projects.

[fuzzyduck]

isn't there a preservation society or similar appealing for funds, For the Carrick.

 

I know it's not much but I would donate every month.

[gaggle]

Sorry Gaggle, once again you've lost me.

 

carl it relates to previous point i made about restoration of things.

how much of an object can be left before restoring becomes replacing.

 

the brush is no longer the original brush at all , so how far can something deteriate before it is not restored but replaced.

if you had the money to completely change and renew every piece of timber on one of your boats for instance would it be a restored boat or would it be a new boat ,a replica of the boat you once had.

[carlt]

carl it relates to previous point i made about restoration of things.

how much of an object can be left before restoring becomes replacing.

 

the brush is no longer the original brush at all , so how far can something deteriate before it is not restored but replaced.

if you had the money to completely change and renew every piece of timber on one of your boats for instance would it be a restored boat or would it be a new boat ,a replica of the boat you once had.

When Lucy is finished she will be a replica, using all the original iron work and all but two of the original wooden knees.

When Usk is finished she will be a restoration with about 70% of the original woodwork and returning to the natural maintenence cycle of a wooden boat.

 

Cutty Sark will be a replica, especially if her iron framing was damaged in the fire. Worth £25million (before the fire)? not sure but definitely not at the expense of so many other boat projects. You could restore every narrow boat on the NHVR list for a million.

Edited May 22, 2007 by carlt

[AMModels]

as an aside to the cutty sark thing and more about USK she was/is amazingly original and the only part of her that was in serious need of restoration was the parts where her tanks werent. Maybe carl can confirm this but is this common in Claytons wooden boats or was USK just well looked after by some previous caretakers ...ahem.

 

[gaggle]

well a replica is niether here nor there , if the history has been lost the money would be better spent on other projects

[fuzzyduck]

Hmmmm I'm not sure

 

It's like the botox poisioned artifically inflated women they occasionally stick on TV.

 

They're reproductions, but damn some of them are good to look at.

 

I Think I'd better get my coat...

[gaggle]

Hmmmm I'm not sure

 

It's like the botox poisioned artifically inflated women they occasionally stick on TV.

 

They're reproductions, but damn some of them are good to look at.

 

I Think I'd better get my coat...

yeh good to look at but do you want YOUR money spent on them.

[NB Willawaw]

HMS Victory was built nearly a hundred years before CS.

I wonder how much of her is replica ? Most I would have thought !!

[carlt]

as an aside to the cutty sark thing and more about USK she was/is amazingly original and the only part of her that was in serious need of restoration was the parts where her tanks werent. Maybe carl can confirm this but is this common in Claytons wooden boats or was USK just well looked after by some previous caretakers ...ahem.

 

The tar boats didn't have tanks. Their hold was stanked off just in front of the engine room, midway down the hold and behind the first bow knees.

 

Spending their whole working life being soaked in oil has meant that the planks have been very well preserved.

 

The only work that will be done to Usk's sides is a 35' long plank in either side (second plank down) to straighten out the hog.

Oh and the two planks burnt in the engine room fire. She needs a complete liner plank apart from a 20' length of original which is sound. The rest is sound too but it is a pine replacement.

 

The top bends in the bows are also very dodgy repairs so they will come out.

 

The keelson is original and is as square edged as the day it was cut.

 

The plan, now we're no longer liveaboards, is to deck her over as she was originally. I may have a cabin extension to accommodate the boys though.

 

As to her previous caretakers. I found her lying over at an angle, in mud, full of water with a siezed engine.

 

I paid 5k for her, emptied her out, got the engine running and boated her back to Wolfhampcote. She now pumps out once every couple of months her hold is protected by tarps and I have all the wood seasoning for her restoration.

 

 

HMS Victory was built nearly a hundred years before CS.

I wonder how much of her is replica ? Most I would have thought !!

All wooden boats, that are maintained regularly, are being constantly rebuilt. What proportion of their timbers are the same as the day they were launched is not really a good measure of whether it is a replica or not. It is the proportion of wood that is replaced in one go during restoration that matters. If like Saturn, Severn and, eventually Lucy, all the planks are replaced at once then it is a replica. If like Hardy, clee, ariel, and Usk the boat is restored gradually as a sort of accellerated maintenance program, then I would describe it as a restoration. If you take a wooden boat, burn all the timbers before measuring them, rebuild it inaccurately, but are left with a 100% new boat, that is called a Raymond sorry rebuild.