- Description of contents
Not many thirteen year olds would be ambitious enough to tackle a Marblehead. We asked David the story of how he had Wilkinson gone about (now nearing sixteen) for constructing his ‘Sisca’ A Jjunior-built Yacht blocks fit perfectly, so perfectly that when we tried for a good fit, i.e. using chalk by putting it on the hull and rubbing the blocks up and down, we found that it was just faintly covered all over. The blocks when smeared with glue, would then fit perfectly. Really, 1 do not know what I would have done without him and I thank him for his great help. , As for the keel, another friend of mine, my old skipper Mr. R. Dunning, made that. He had previously made a Witchcraft so he loaned me the pattern for the lead, and also made the deadwood. I had the keel cast and fitted the two together. By now it was time for painting the hull. Richard, who is used to sanding, did the main rubbing down, but after this found that with all his other commitments, he was unable to give me any further assistance, and so the boat was left for about six months. Meanwhile, I started making fittings. On Sisca there is very little which is not used all the time when sailing so there were not many fittings needed. The mast-slide, mast-stop and jib rack were all off an old boat, and the tiller arm and jib horse came off my Saida. For the mainsail horse, I used a three-eyed gunwale eye and the shrouds also gunwale eyes with single screw-eyes silver soldered in. The only extras were three more gunwale eyes, all single hole, and the same as the shrouds for the back stay, and the others for the spinnaker, main sail guys, and spinnaker boom. For mast fittings I did the best I could, buying a gooseneck and making the jib uphaul myself. Finally I had all the fittings chromed and then sent for the sails. In the following April, Richard started helping me again, and together we started putting on the deck. That is, of course, after having put on two coats of glue and two of paint and varnish in the hull. Then Richard fitted the skeg whilst I shaped it and then glued it in. When the rudder tube was in, I then started to make a rudder to the plan and fixed it to the rudder post. Finally, to finish off the hull and keel, I sanded the two and filled in all the depressions with filler. I had decided T the end of the 1958 season, I had no intention of building a boat, least of all a Witchcraft. I soon found that two of my friends, who were new members, were starting to build Witchcraft. My own boat at that time was a Saida and it was becoming outdated, so I decided to try to build one myself, although this was not approved of by my parents. I was offered the loan of a building board and also some plans, which I accepted. Since it was winter-time, my bench was moved into my bedroom, which became a workshop-cum-bedroom. I then went in search of wood and found it extremely difficult to find the kind I wanted. Finally, I obtained some, and in doing so, met a friend of my parents who was a joiner. He asked to come and see what I was doing because he had never seen one before, then after seeing it he became interested and I found a good helper on whom I could rely. After about a week we discovered that the keelson had become warped, and we had to scrap it and start afresh. This time we built on the bow and stern blocks before we fastened it down to the shadows and inwales. Meanwhile, I started to get the inwales and ribs ready and soon we were ready to assemble them, but we then hit on a snag. When we came to letting the ribs into the inwale, the wood snapped as we bent it round the shadows. We were using pitch pine, and so we tried Honduras mahogany and this solved our problem. After rebating the keelson for the planks to be housed, all was ready for planking. Then the hard work began, for neither of us had ever done anything of this sort before. Instead of planking the normal way, we missed out the first plank and laid on the second, leaving enough space for it. By doing this we had eliminated the problem of bending the second plank around the first, because the second plank was just laid on and screwed down. We then fitted the first plank with ease and carried on with the others until the planks were overlapping the inwale at the bow and stern. This accomplished, we planed the planks with a bull-nose plane back to the first plank, this process being repeated on each plank until the boat was finished, except for the top plank. Then we fitted the top plank and allowed it to overlap until set, and we then removed the excess from the garboard. As I was building the boat with a.% in. keelson, I needed to build up the sides of it to make the 2 in. disc (required by the Marblehead rule) fit. This problem gave me some thought, for I knew that now the boat was planked, it was going to be difficult to fit blocks. Here my friend Richard came in very useful. He made the that I would have my boat painted turquoise and I bought undercoating and gloss paint from a local shop. This done, I started putting on my first coat of undercoat and waited for it to dry. At this time the weather was perfect, and I put the boat outside, and for once the paint dried in the stated time. I put four coats a day on and spent the next day rubbing down, so in a week I had finished with undercoat, and had started putting on gloss. By the time I had painted three coats of gloss the surface was quite smooth. My boat was ready on the last day of the 1959 A Class Championship and I took it down to the lake with the help of my father. I put the fittings on and about five o’clock on Sunday afternoon launched her. Ever since Sisca has performed to my highest hopes; among her successes are 3rd in 1959 M.M. Trophy, Fleetwood, 2nd in an “open” race at’ Llandudno, winner 1960 Susan Williams Trophy, Fleetwood, and 3rd in the total points list for the 1960 season. 324
