KAURI SHIPS.

Press, Volume LIII, Issue 15929, 16 June 1917, Page 11

KAURI SHIPS.

A NEW ZEALAND PROPOSAL. Mr Henry J. 'White, the structural engineer and architect, whose work is well knovc-n ail over Australasia, and who visited Wellington last week in connexion with a very large work of which more will be heard shortly, was ill hia years of greater leisure a keen yachtsman (saye tho "Dominion"). Only last year, he broko up • a big yacht ho had in Auckland, as he had no time for the sport and could not find a buyer. Tho money the lead from tho keel prodnr.cd was also n factor. Mr White Baid that his yacht was 33 years old and kauribuilt. ajid thouph it had not been given the attention a trading vessel would ordinarily receiTo (as the yacht was too big- to beach in the ordinary way and docking charges were heavy), he found that her tim- I bers were as sound as the day they were put together. This started a vein of {bought, in which a war-time need might be supplied. Mr White believes that an opportunity presents itself for snpplyine the tonnage needed by 2Cew Zealand in the Pacific Ocean at least in building • four-masted _Bchooncrs of kauri, cither in Auckland. Dargaville, or one of the northern ports cloee to the eonrcc of the kauri # timber supply, on the Hues of the American schooners, which comc down to New Zealand. Mr White proposes a schooner about 300 ft jn length, isoft in breadth, with a carrying capacity of about SOOO torn'.' These schooners, he explains, are run by a crew of from six to eight men, cs there oro no I BquaTC-aaila to manage, and the lowering or hob ting of the main-sails (four in number) !3 icanas-ed by tho aid of winches, which means that. tbore is no going aloft. Each vessel would t* fitted with a Diesel oil engine that would mean a speed of sis or seven knots in calm weather, and. all the parte of the vessel would be Ftandardised. "As these vessels." eays Mr White, "sail to within three points of the wind, they couki almost be run serosa the Pacific, to time-table, talc - xng what we have to offer in the wav of wool, flax, kauri-sum. etc.. and bringing back the manufactured goods that- will ho badly needed in Sew Zealand, if the present rate ot depletion o, our shipping continue. Ther womd be good cargo-carricr3 for 'tho Xrw Ze&lana-Ansirauan trade, and alßo for the in ter-.*s Iliad otKi Eastern trade. "i " c^° n u" v , Mr "that such Zi , nt \ or oetween £30,000 and a '- present freight rates I between America and New Zealand they! themselves in a rounle of | ITLIi, mast ' remember this—that tbongh the war were to end this year-which necessarily bo a nL?^S: nage or four or /ivc years bnsi^tP ro mise to be the W t£ 0 «?«" iaown to the Seven vptv ' W 7 rr vi :a ' tU 2' we , hßve ont> °f the very best timbers for ship-building and I aa.snie that if facflitW WTriVeT the ont well. Were the idea. < SiJo? iZPi Zealand (schooner could bj, launched in rix months* timTiri ** tamgA