SOUTH OF PERTH YACHT CLUB ST AYLES SKIFF SECTION Concept and Funding proposal
Ref John Longley RFBYC Stray Dog Boats
Commodore John Midolo Jr@midolo.com.au
South of Perth Yacht Club St AyIes Skiff Section The building of these Flat pack style craft would be an excellent project for the Bosun’s Club. This would give the members a project to manage with a positive outcome. The project would also fit in with the Strategic Plan with the emphases on community-based activity and increased membership. This would also introduce team building amongst our membership. This could in the way of intersection rowing, with the champions rowing out in a regatta format. There is also the possibility for inter club Regattas. I can also see the benefits to our inter club sailing squads to improve the teamwork. The only cons I can envisage, would be the storage, and managing the training programme, but in reality, this may be easy as the ideas and benefits unfold. The club may need to look at the forward planning of the Bosuns/maintenance area to accommodate the boats and equipment. I can see many benefits in this project. If nothing other than a new water sport to the club. As we have a shipwright on staff and the promise of assistance of Ian Weaver, the only other challenge is the Treasurer and the finance Committee. Comments from John Longley I attach a brochure that we, (RFBYC) have produced on the St Ayles Skiffs. It was plagiarised from one produced by the Scottish Coastal Rowing Association and as such contains a good background to the skiffs. I first came across the skiffs in Hobart while attending the 2015 Australian Wooden Boat Show. I was very taken with them and thought they would be a great project for the members at RFBYC. Although the General Committee most likely thought I was a bit daft when I suggested the project, they fully backed me. I was able to point out that on the first opening day of the Club in 1896 there were more rowing than sailing races. We raised the money from members and the CEO, Paul Bayliss, quickly organised an old shed at the back of the Club to be refurbished in which to build the skiffs. We ordered the kit from Stray Dog Boats in South Australia and started to build them that winter. It took us 7 months to build the two skiffs, working three 4-hour sessions a week - two during the day and one in the evening. The build was overseen by Steve Ward, who admitted he had not built a clinker ply boat before but saw no problem. About 15 members were involved with the build and we usually had about 5 or 6 on any one session. You do not need any more or you run out of tasks. Those involved with the build just loved it and learnt a lot of new skills and drank a fair bit of single malt scotch to mark each milestone.
We launched both boats in February 2016 and they have been in continual use within the Club since then. On completion of the boats, they were formally gifted to the Club, so they became Club boats for insurance etc We row them every Tuesday and Thursday in two sessions - one at 0600 and a second at 0700. We also row them once a month on Sunday morning followed by a breakfast. There is also a women’s only session on Friday mornings. We regularly take them on trips and aim to row every river in the State at some stage. The next trip is to Kalbarri where we will row the mighty Murchison. Thirty members have signed up for that venture. We organise the rowing by an "opt in" system using Google Sheets so that it is not onerous to organise the crews. Once a year we take the boats out of service for a fortnight to carry out maintenance as the boats are most likely the most used Club boats RFBYC owns. The maintenance is done by the building team and gives them an opportunity to drink more whisky. We currently have over 60 members who pay $20 a year into a maintenance fund and are therefore acknowledged as part of the Club’s SAS Squad and can take the boats out when they want to for private rows. This number is growing quite rapidly, and we are starting to talk about building a third boat. The important thing to emphasise is that we row for pleasure, camaraderie, and exercise. Racing is incidental to the program, although we do once a year for the Parmelia Ball on Opening Day. We also attend the Margaret River Rowing Club on or about Australia Day and row with that community in several races. I think the success of the program lies in a number of areas. 1. It gives older members who may have dropped out of sailing an activity to keep them involved with the Club. 2. It is very attractive to women who make up a lot of our rowers including the women only sessions on Friday mornings. Several have joined the Club purely to be able to row. 3. All Sailing Clubs have fiefdoms but as the rowing attracts members across the whole spectrum of the Club, from sailing, powerboat, associates and so forth it becomes a very unifying Club activity. 4. It is just so lovely to be out on the river with friends and dolphins early in the morning. The kits come from South Australia. I would not recommend getting all this from Rob, as it is cheaper and more fun to source the other timber locally. I would just get the basic kit and maybe the fittings. You can easily source your own paints and epoxies, although the Bote Cote stuff is really good, safe and easy to use but once again can be sourced from a local supplier.
Obviously, you also need oars. We have begged, borrowed and traded (for beer) with local school rowing programs for their old carbon fibre oars. We have then adjusted the lengths to get the gearing right by increasing the length of the handles as required. We then bought off the shelf standard rowing shell rowlocks for about $40 each. This set up makes the boats really easy to row and we find that people who have never rowed anything before quickly pick it up and start having fun. The only problem is that these oars are illegal in the SAS world as they are supposed to be made out of wood. So we are making a set of wooden oars that we will set up on the other of the skiffs in case we ever go into competition. Interestingly our building team are always itching to have something else to build so it keeps them happy. To build these wooden oars allow $800 for materials if you want to go down that route. So, putting that all together your budget looks something like this; Basic kit and fittings from Stray Dog Boats $6,100 Other timber $2000 ($2800 from Stray Dog) Epoxy, paint etc $1500 ($1690 from Stray Dog) Oars $1000 Total per boat $10,600 I think it is essential you build launching trolleys as one of the great attractions of the skiffs is that you are out on the water 5 minutes after arriving at the Club and it takes the same time to put them away. I would suggest $3000 to build two trolleys with beach tyres like the ones we have. We also built two sailing rigs for use in Raids, but they can come later. If I can be of any further assistance, I am only too happy to do so. In closing I was thinking what a great place SoPYC would be to row given its protected waters. We sometimes take a bit of a battering with hard easterlies although we still go out and enjoy it,
In Summary These are the costs from Stray Dog Boats The skiffs from order to despatch will be about 14 days. The kits now include everything but tools, and space to build in. The basic kit, which includes the planking and the moulds and insured freight. $5789.00 Dimensioned timber pack. Premium Hoop Pine. Includes insured freight. $2800.00 Bote Cote epoxy products for sticking it all together. Includes insured freight. $1300.00 Aquacote polyurethane paints and clear (varnish) $390.00 All fittings, drain plugs, gudgeons and pintles brass keel strip, bronze screws etc $320 Total $10,599 Boat x 2 $21200.00 Building frame $ 1200.00 Power and incidentals $ 800.00 Jinkers $ 3000.00 Total $26200.00
*As this concept of water sport gathers momentum there will be a need for trailers - these can be purpose made for around $6000.00 or as RFBYC use their rib trailers with a few adjustments I would like you to give this project some serious thought - the boat could be in the water for the summer opening season!