Last update 16 May 2024
Boy John
I noticed Boy John on a trailer under the cover of a balcony in Mylor Bridge while I was looking for a different boat that I’m involved with (I am the Master and Principal Skipper of Soft Wing from 2023, a 123-year-old Truro River Oyster Dredger – a true working boat. She’s owned and operated by the http://cornishmaritimetrust.org so pop along to the site and join the trust to sail on these wonderful old vessels). The owner was outside the house so I got talking to them and offered to buy her! We came to an agreement that she should be purchased for 1 guinea (This is £1.05, a throw-back to the days of old money. £1.05 is 21 shillings, where a shilling was 5 pence. Very confusing!).
As well as receiving the boat, we were also given a lines drawing and a short write-up from her second owner, who took ownership of her when he was 14 years old back in 1949!! He says he first rowed her when he was 5 years old when she was owned by his grandfather, so we know she was around in 1940.
The lines drawing will allow us to build station moulds to give her some structure while we remove and replace planks. She was restored around 20 years ago, and her swing keel and masts were removed, so we need to fit them back in. With her centreline and garboard planks and transom being about the only parts salvageable, we’ll need that structure. There is a steel keel band that travels the length of the keel which will have to come off as she’s become hogged from sitting on a trailer for too long. We think she can be straightened out with a little pressure from above and with new planking.
May 2023 – Boy John is inside a waterproof tent and waiting for funds to begin her restoration.
June 2023 – We have been awarded a £1000 grant from Falmouth Town Council to restore Boy John to floating condition! This is brilliant news and it allows us to start work. We are now building the team who will be restoring the boat. We’ve also started a YouTube channel and will be posting videos online once we have some footage to show.
July 2023 – Work is underway! We have drawn out the station moulds from the lines drawing that came with the boat. She is now on a strongback which holds the boat in position at a suitable height for working on and with the keel at the correct angle so she is at a level where the water lines are horizontal.
August 2023 – The majority of the frames have been removed as well as both sheer planks and the garboards. We found there had been a repair at some point when the single, wide garboard had been replaced by two narrower planks in the majority of the boat. Removing the garboards has allowed us to fit upright support timbers from the strongback up through the boat in order to temporarily attach the station moulds to. Once the moulds are in place we can then attach a temporary sheer batten and strengthen the moulds so we can then remove the support timbers allowing us to refit the garboards. Even though Boy John will be returned to a sailing punt, we’ll still build her with battens going right across the boat, then cut through them in the later stages of the restoration to fit a centreboard case.
October 2023 – Well, a lot has been going on since my last post here! We fitted all the station moulds to find that the boat had sagged badly, so when trying to pull the planking up to the moulds we couldn’t fit them all in. This was partly because as the boat had sagged (as well as becoming hogged) successive owners had caulked the joints with silicone. This meant removing some of them. Others were broken, so they had to go as well. We replaced some of the planking with temporary planks and others with battens. The outside of the hull is now fair along its length, but has different thicknesses of timber around its girth. This doesn’t matter though because the whole point of pulling the planks (and new battens) up top the moulds is to get the inside of the boat fair, then when we add the steamed ribs we’ll have a smooth surface to add the new planking to on the outside of the ribs.
January 2024 – A side view of the hull with temporary planking and gaps for clamps to hold the ribs as they are steamed in place.
January 2024 – From this backlit photo it’s clear that we’re now ready to begin steam-bending ribs back into the boat. We did a practice run and bent one of the longer ribs in amidships and this went well. Currently waiting for funds to be able to purchase the rest of the ribs. Falmouth Town Council awarded us £1000 but this has to be drawn-down retrospectively.
May 2024 – Boy John is now in a new and better workshop location. Her planking stock has been sawn from a tree that once grew in the grounds of Longleat and is now air-drying for a few weeks. The oak for her ribs is being sourced locally and will be green, allowing it to be steam-bent into place more easily.
July 2024 – Boy John is now set-up in her new workshop, the larch planking and oak have been delivered and is being cut by Kyle at Abingdon Marine Carpentry in Mabe Burnthouse. She needs a new stern knee and stern post and the bottom of her transom
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