MODEL YACHTSMEN TALK IN LANGUAGE OF SEA

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27820, 19 November 1955, Page 3

MODEL YACHTSMEN TALK IN LANGUAGE OF SEA

Shakespeare’s Antonio could not have awaited the return of his argosy with more anxiety than that of the 57 model yacht owners who sail their craft each week-end on the placid waters of Victoria Lake. Although these small vessels carry no cargo, no crew, and no provisions, their owners follow their courses with an interest as intense as if an entire ship’s company was aboard at the mercy of wind, and tide.

Typical model-yachtsmen are Mr J. Matthews, the club's secretary, Mr W. A. Schenkel, a shipwright, and Mr Bert George, a former Cornish fisherman. Mr Matthews first sailed a model yacht at the age of six on the Round Pond in Kensington Gardens, London. His first boat, the Cygnet, was fashioned under the skilled guidance of the foreman of his joinery firm in that city, and since then he has built 30 or 40 models. None, however, was a replica of actual racing yachts. “They are never any use if they are designed to scale with racing yachts because you can’t shift ballast on a model,” said Mr Matthews.

When Mr Matthews is not officiating for the club’s week-end races be sails the Alpha which he built in 1919. It is built in layers (known' as the “bread and butter” design) and took 40 hours to build and 20 man-hours to rig. When asked if the sewing of the sails for model yachts was entrusted to wives of the craftsmen, Mr Matthews answered with an emphatic

—almost indignant—“ No.” “I would never let a woman sew a sail for me," he said. “An the sails have to be double-sewn and a woman would jilst whip around with a sewing machine. So we aU do our own sewing.” Mr Schenkel is the club’s experimenting model builder. He has followed the shipwrights trade for 50 years and has built many models of different designs. One was modelled, as an experiment, on the Pastime, a well-known Lyttelton racing yacht which was built in 1889. The Pastime was built on the “plank on edge” design and won nearly every championship in New Zealand from 1889 to 1900. Mr Schenkel had no difficulty in finding the exact specifications of the original as it was built by one of the founders of his firm. To provide his model with an acceptable generic tree and to give it a really "salty" character, Mr Schenkel salvaged his materials from the wreckage of the Darra, an old coal hulk that waS broken , up in the lee of Quail Island about 18 months 'ago. The hull of the boat was carved put of the Darra’s Unlike his fellow enthusiasts, Mr George uses no blue-prints and no written measurements in the construction of his models. Boat-building experience of his own backed by that of many generations of his family in

Cornwall, have given him the almost instinctive ability to shape a model “to eye.” He knows exactly where to place the mast and how to set his “canvas” to the best advantage, and he never has to make an- alteration. Mr George’s sails are all meticulously hand-sewn and his boats are all shaped with hand tools. He generously sells his “cast offs” each year, at the cost of the materials only, to other club members. In fact, most of the vessels sailed on the lake are the work of either Mr George or Mr Schenkel. The only standard specifications required for boats sailed in the club’s competitions is that of the overall length. Model builders can, and do, give their imaginations full play in all other aspects of design. The Marconi or “leg o’ mutton” sail is most commonly used as it has been found best adaptable to the rubber guy control. When the pressure of the wind is off the sail the guy pulls the boom over and puts the boat about. Each week-end, model yachting draws enthusiasts ranging in age from 13 to 80 to Victoria Lake, and so great is their enthusiasm that even the most elderly, , will „ JoyftxllXt disregard the physical handicaps that accompany Old sprint along the. bank to set thewv.Lmodels on another tack. Their i conversations are held in the accepted jargon, of seafaring m6n and their favourite topic is the art and knowledge of sailing. In the words of Mr Matthews . there is more science in it than there is in billiards.”