News from Cygnet Wooden Boats September 11, 2021 at 08:49AM

UIRA UPDATE NO 20. A TOUCH OF GREEN AND A NEW KEEL. AND BOAT BUILDING 101! UIRA lost her original lead keel to bullets during WW2 but the hull survived due to her then owner Charles Marshall. Charles Marshall's love affair with UIRA lasted 40 years and only relinquish ownership on his death on the 3nd of April 1953. When rediscovered in 2018 UIRA was still fitting with the keel made of steel punching's from Marshall's manufacturing company and concrete! To recreate a new lead keel as close as possible to the original we took into account the shape of the existing concrete keel and reports from newspapers at the time of her launching that stated that UIRA had a short length of bulb keel between 4 and 5 tons. Taking all this into account and the weight of UIRA'S hull at 3.6 tons, add into the calculation her waterline length of 30ft and draft of 7ft and a ballast ratio between 60 to 65% a keel of 4.3 tons should do the job! Calculations done, now just create a plug to create a mould in which to pour 4.3 tons of moulted lead! Ganz einfach! 😊 Jeremy, Matt, Iefke and Andrew have also been busy with the teak deck seems now sealed and ready for sanding, the toe rail is in place and painted ready for the teak capping. Big thanks to Iefke Van Gogh for the recording the progress through her wonderful photographs and thanks also Martin Clowes!