Roach is Registered for Brest 2008

Well I have decided that I will take Roach down to Brest 2008 http://www.brest2008.fr/en/ for the festival between 11-17 July next year. I seem to have lost a bit of focus regarding outstanding work on Roach, but by registering on the web site I have realised I have some new found enthusiasm for boat DIY! Getting down to Brest in a tiny 22fter will be quite an adventure. I will try and post as mush as I can regarding the preparations and the trip on here. At last I might be posting stuff that actually relates to the title of this blog!

Another little Dallimore will be travelling down. Athena is the same tonnage as Roach, but has a counter, centre-board, larger rig and longer waterline length http://athena1950.blogspot.com/ I bet she flies.

Earl's Court Boat Show

I like these nav lights!

A nice selection of varnish!

Shall I add a pocket to a pocket yacht?

The metre Fifes lookes stunning, but shame there was not a raised paltform to see them properly. You can't really fully appreciate them without looking at them at deck-level.

GM's Self-steering gear.

The Classic Sailing Club had their SCOD there - and a very nice one she is too. Showing off her new cockpit.

Nothing better to do on a wet December afternoon, so a mozied on down to the Earl's Court boat show. A couple of historic vessels!

Roach to get a drinks cabinet! (maybe

The first is a boarding ladder. Yup, I have dedided I need one. I like this design, but will attempt to make it from left over plywood I have remaining from the restoration. I like using off-cuts - something to do with price, although it does have environmantal advantages.

The Second is a drinks cabinet. I saw this one and I think it is a really good design. I know it would be nice to have leaded glass, but this one actually has the glasses stowed inside the doors - which means you can popur yourself a medicinal brandy without going near the galley - well the galley is not that far away to be fair - but it means that the cook ven be left in peace whilst the skipper sits back and commands the ship from his tipple!

Speak to me in 2009 to see if I get them done!

A bit more of Roach's history

Roach's Current Sail Wardrobe


Recently I put a post on the YWB.COM yachting forum to see whether Roach was listed in the Lloyd's Register. Some very kind people looked through their bookshelves and fount out that in 1959, 1961 & 1964 Roach was registered under Blackwater Charter Company Ltd. In 1966 she changed ownership to a M D Clarke. She was built in 1953, of Stebbing's yard in Burnham-on-Crouch.





Her sails were are Taylor, 1958 & 1961. Now she sports a mainsail by Hong Kong sailmakers. No. 1 (heavy cloth - high cut) by BM sails (2002 - never used) No. 2 running sail light cloth by Jeckels (date unknown). No. 2 (on furler) by JM sails (2000) and Genoa by Lucas.





Her first engine was a Coventry Victor 2 cyl, 6 BHP, dated 1950, then a Stuart Turner 1 cyl, 4 BHP, of 1962, this is the one I must have removed from the yacht. That has now been replaced by a 2001 BETA BZ482 13.5 HP running through a Halyard aquadrive unit.