28th October 2011 We have had an intense week setting up shop, which is fully operational and running smoothly, with orders being dispatched daily. We have done a myriad of boat jobs, including hauling out and applying new anti fouling - We had a celebrity boat boy arrive to assist with the anti fouling, and we were impressed with how well JB picked up the difficult task of applying underwater paint whilst keeping his clothes clean.
Nice Work Mr Byerley..............
20th October 2011 After driving over 2000 kilometers in 2 days, we have now packed all the stock on board and it is business as usual. We are currently in the Brisbane / Gold Coast area and will be here for about 1 more week. Anyone local thinking of purchasing hard to ship items like masts or keel bulbs etc. should contact us for pickup. The boat comes out of the water tomorrow for a clean and anti-fouling. - Any volunteers....................
10th October 2011 Welcome to the new home of Radio Sailing Shop. We are packing all our stock into the truck and driving to Queensland on the weekend of 15/16th October and setting up Radio Sailing Shop on board. We will spend about 10 days in Queensland preparing the boat, and will then cruise down the east coast back to Hobart during November. We will still be dispatching orders almost daily from the ports we visit on the trip home, and have full broadband and phone facilities on board. "Seaca" is a Buizen 48 Series 3 Pilothouse Sloop, and we will keep you posted on our trip south.
8th September 2011 - Hot off the press - Jeff Byerleys new 10 Rater Design emerges from the workshop. - Showing the influence from recent developments in the IOM Class, this boat is bound to be a rocket. - Launched 2 weeks ago, Jeff is very happy with the performance so far.
The design name is JAB. It has conventional number 1 & 2 Rigs and a pocket luff number 3 rig. The designed waterline length worked out perfectly at 1230mm.
7th September 2011 - Jon Holmes has been developing his "mini A Class" (see post 21st July below) - The design is appropriately called "Lower Case" and is seen here sailing with a smaller rig. Jon has been working on the balance of the boat by moving the keel back slightly and other tweeks. It will be interesting to see it sail in a competitive fleet.
1st August 2011 - Hobart is fortunate to have the skills of Clive Udy, who builds faithful working models of our famous Derwent River sailing boats. Below are some photos of the International Dragon Class that Clive builds in incredible detail. Clive hand makes virtually everything, and builds them exactly the way the full size craft were created. These are true working models, and after being fitted with radio gear and winch, they are a beautiful sight to see sailing.
1st August 2011 - Pictured below is a faithful reproduction by Clive of the Derwent Class Yacht. Designed by Percy C. Douglas in 1927, the Derwent Class has sailed continuously on the river, with a few fine examples still being sailed in club racing today. Clive has extensively researched the build from original plans and photos, and note that he has even built a faithful reproduction of the cradle used to haul out the boats. The full sized craft were 24'-6" long with a 6'-10" beam and drew 4'- 1" with great sailing characteristics. I look forward to seeing Clives boat sailing soon.
July 21st 2011 Our resident design genius Jon Holmes - The designer of the hugely successful VENOM A Class, has been working on a "Mini A Class" design, and has just launched the prototype. With a short waterline, the boat is allowed a big sail area, but as it is a smaller and lighter design, Jon has taken a draught penalty, by adding a longer keel and reducing the sail area. He is experimenting with the right balance between the draught and the sail area, to arrive at an optimum balance. This boat will be a rocket down wind in a good breeze, and should plane off the wind. I am looking forward to seeing it sail soon - Thanks for sharing your photos Jon.
May 25th 2011 - Here is our old mate, Michael Grieves - aka Knuckles, beautiful new Pikanto IOM. The hull was built by Tim Brown and the rigs and sails were made by Mark Paterson. This is probably one of the most formidable IOM's in Australia at present. Knuckles reports it is wonderful to sail, and so far his results have been very impressive. Thanks to Knuckles, Tim and Mark, for giving us the opportunity to supply all the rig kits, masts and fittings for this fine craft.
May 20th 2011 We supply fittings for all types of building projects and this project below was completed by 14 year old Callum. The hull which is carved out of solid oregon was given to Callums father when he was 10 years old by his father. Callums dad added the coach roof as a boy, then it lay idle until he gave it to Callum recently. Callum has fitted a winch and servo and rebuilt the coach roof and epoxied the deck to make a fine working r/c yacht which has taken 3 generations to bring to fruition - Callum plans to upgrade the sails and give the hull a new paint job in the future - Good work Callum, your grandfather would be proud of your great effort - we sure are.
November 10th 2010 - Our good friend Pat Parisienne has aquired a new IOM yacht. It is a BTL design from Scott Condie (see below - May 2010) and Pat has built the rigs and finished the boat to his usual high standard. We are looking forward to having a hit out with Pat and Scott at the NSW IOM State Champs at the end of the this month. We are pleased to have supplied the Rig Kits and other fittings to complete the build. Sails by Brad Gibson - Good looking boat Pat.
6th November 2010 - A great part of our business is the interesting people and interesting boats we get to supply winches and fittings for.
John Fries of Florida has built a 7 foot long R/C sailboat which he will race in Antigua as part of the Antigua Week yacht races for full sized yachts. in Johns words........
"We are building a boat to race in Antigua in their model yacht series. The classes range from 5-7 feet in length. The conditions are usually 15+ trade winds or more with good size waves. So, our boat is quite robust in design....."
We are happy to have supplied John with a 380EH Smartwinch for large R/C yachts and a variety of deck and rigging fittings.
14th October 2010 - Leigh Peterson of Melbourne is building a new Marblehead design from the board of Frank Russell. He is building it from scratch and it looks a very sweet design and Leighs workmanship is very good. - Leigh says........" This is Frank Russell's latest Soroban design. I built the plug with 4mm balsa planks on the shadows provided by Frank, and completed it with a single layer of fibreglass and epoxy resin which has been filled and sanded. The hull comprises one layer of 200gm carbon fibre and one layer of 120gm fibreglass with FGI epoxy resin. This has been filled with a microballoon/epoxy mix, which has been sanded down. I have also applied a two part primer, and sanded this smooth. The deck will be foam laminated with carbon fibre (in load bearing areas)and fibreglass."
Leigh hopes to have his new Marblehead in the water and sailing in a few weeks, and it is really good to see a new Australian designed Marblehead being built. Hopefully there will be more of these built in the near future, which would be a great thing for this fine class of boat.
16th September 2010 - Our old mate, Brian Lever must be suffering aquaphobia, as he has just put this land yacht together, and in his words.....
Hi Den and Cas,
As promised here are a few pics of the prototype Land Yacht. Have tried it out and WOW does it go in a breeze. I am using in-line skate wheels and alum channel for the main part and 8mm carbon tube for mast and boom. Mast sits on a dished out nylon tube with a plastic rawl plug in bottom of mast so it can swivel. The Planet radio is great but I may need to get a stronger servo for the sail control later but will try out in more breeze first. - Cheers Brian
ps. forgot to mention that the sail is a cut down IOM "A" rig Jib, and mast is 1mtr. long. Hoping to get a bigger mast and sail shortly.
September 15th 2010 - Peter Williams has just received a new IOM boat from UK boat designer/builder Bill Curtis. The design is called "Shadow" and this is one of the first boats out of the mould - nice looking machine, we look forward to seeing it on the water soon Peter.
August 28th 2010 Here are two newly built Emo IOM designs, constructed by Ben Durie from free Plans by Frank Russell. Ben has produced his own plug and mouldings and the boats shown here are number 2 and 3 from the mould - Ben has increased the height of the freeboard by about 10 mm in the forward sections on these hulls. There is a link to Frank Russells free plans for the Emo on our "Free Boat Plans Links" page.
June 19th 2010 - Mark Rogers has just built a timber kit Marblehead from the USA - It is a Tippencanoe T50 which Mark has modified considerably to make it more competive, especially in regard to the rigs, fin, bulb etc - It has a displacement of 4.3 Kg and a 200mm beam. - Pictured here with C Rig.
