Dear Editor

After having been for some six years an enforced landlubber, I NOW HAVE A BOAT! And this is how…

Was getting around exploring the old and interesting parts of Halifax on foot with a pack on back. Had several times looked over a dry stone wall and down a steep slope to where beside the (non-navigable) Hebble Brook there reposed an inverted boat with an obvious hole in the bottom. At last plucked up courage to enquire at the old mill whether the boat might be for sale. Was told that, if I could get it up the slope and over the wall, the boat was mine, as the owner just did not have the time to overhaul it. So, in hopes, I bought from the ironmonger a couple of stout metal pulleys, and from a dinghy shop a length of blue polypropylene rope. Wyn phoned her son at Reading: he suggested contacting his old schoolmate (also in the youth adventure business) who lives only half a mile from here. So, this Max turned up with the Land Rover and trailer and his nine year old son. By dint of lashing pulleys to trees, we edged the boat across the dry bed of the derelict canal, and did pully-hauly up the bank till one end of the rope could be attached to the Land Rover. Then over the wall and onto the trailer and delivered to the crazy-paving where the boat just fits across the front of the house, in the garden just outside the window where I write.

It turns out to be a 12 foot plywood motorboat (speedboat?) to take an outboard motor, and equipped with wheel steering, and a speedo graduated up to 45 m.p.h. Returning to the generous owner, was presented with four vinyl-covered foam seat cushions, and the Perspex and frame for the windshield. Well! The wheel was rusted solid in its bearing, and could not be freed in situ. So, part of the dashboard with wheel had to be sawn away, and bearing heated over the kitchen gas stove till it could be freed. Hole in bottom repaired with inside patch, then bottom of hole filled with sawdust and Aerolite mixture and smoothed off. Various patches of bad plywood replaced on three quarter decking, and seams and joints thoroughly re-glued and strengthened with extra runner sections. Decking scraped and sanded and varnished. Cleat for prow carved out of an old oak chair leg, bottom boards made up from scrap kindly supplied by local carpenter shop, no charge. Total cost (rope, pulleys, glue, screws, paint, varnish, etc.) £29.70, and five months of spare time work.

Then: the engine! The same Max knew of a 4 hp outboard, a Canadian ‘Triton’, with which the owner was fed-up because of such difficulty in starting. No one has ever heard of this make of outboard. So I gave £15 for it. Fortunately, I had the workshop manual with it. Obviously in need of stripping down, so every nut and bolt was taken apart (except for the magneto). Unfortunately, the manual had an error which cost me £6.95 for new big-end needle bearings. The manual gave the number of needles as 74, but on reassembly I discovered they had mistakenly doubled the actual number 37. Otherwise, the manual was most helpful, except when it came to the propeller and water pump shaft assembly! This nearly put paid to the whole job, as the exploded drawing showed the water pump body only as a featureless lump. This body refused all efforts at removal. Even took the assembly down to Reading, on a visit to step-son. He heated it over a calor gas ring, and after he chipped lumps of metal off with hammer blows, I noticed that the casting was rotating slightly in the housing. Next day, confirming my suspicion that it had a left-hand thread I painstakingly drove it right-handed till it unscrewed. Chunks of metal were built back into casting by means of Araldite, but impeller cover had to be drilled and tapped 6ba into casting to retain it. New piston rings almost unobtainable — local Hepolite agent could not supply, directed me to firm in Surrey who said only hope was a firm in Bristol. Well, in desperation I had a word with the young mechanic who services motor-mowers in Halifax. He sent me to a really helpful man, not five minutes from where I first enquired at beginning of search. Two rings supplied, gap cut to size, piston grooves opened six thou’ on lathe, £2.99 — broken portion of water cooling pipe replaced with plastic pipe, crankcase seal renewed with O-ring ground down to size, various minor repairs done. To date, engine runs well but is difficult to start — requires priming with petrol. Total cost of engine £32.49.

Of course, this is not quite a DCA sort of craft. Could be sailed by fitting lee-boards and mast and rudder, to become motorboat with auxiliary sail. Wyn will not go in if mast fitted, so might have holiday with boat as is, possibly Leeds-Liverpool Canal where we have already walked some beautiful stretches. Then perhaps exchange craft for something more DCA, or exchange for cruising canoe (which would be modified to sail). One way or another, have promised myself a sail of some kind on eightieth birthday, now just over 1½ years away.