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‘Skate’ classer I built in suburban Sydney with my skipper and good friend, Steve Murphy. The story of its construction mirrors a thousand similar projects that were underway that year in garages across Australia. It’s worth telling here in some detail.
    The Skate was a development class. Certain dimensions were limited – including overall length, maximum beam, depth and girth of the hull at specified stations – but beyond those basic parameters the designer/builder was free to create a unique shape and deck layout. Like all mad-keen centreboard sailors, Steve and I had developed firm ideas about how to squeeze the maximum speed potential from the measured limits. We also believed there was a better approach to deck layout that might make these very tippy speedsters a little easier to sail. Before selling the old boat, we ripped off its deck from the mast back, and built our quick prototype version of the full-length ‘through cockpits’ that are now standard on all centreboard boats (and most modern racing yachts). Armed with the knowledge gained through that exercise, we started planning our new boat.
    I’d already moved out of home and was living in a small flat onthe water at Seaforth. Our first problem was that Steve’s dad couldn’t let us take over his garage for three months. He ran a racquet-stringing and picture-framing business from home, and needed unimpeded access to his workbench. Fair enough. We’d have to build our own temporary boat shed, then construct the new Skate inside it. Off we drove to a local second-hand building materials yard and bought big lengths of old hardwood and a pile of rusting corrugated-iron sheets. Steve, trained as an architect, drew a quick plan of how we’d construct an extension to the back of his father’s garage. We dug the postholes after work on a Friday and by late Sunday afternoon we had our shed. The whole thing was held together with four-inch bolts and roofing nails, but thirty years later it was still standing, converted into a pleasant greenhouse full of ferns and orchids.
    From the outset we were determined that the boat itself would be built from the very best materials. As ever with racing boats, this involved resolving the constant trade-offs between strength, durability and weight. It’s reasonable to assume that the basic ‘prestressed box’ structure of a small centreboarder will give it inherent structural integrity, but poor choices of wood for the frames and stringers can easily compromise that advantage. Skates carry quite a large rig for their tiny beam and the boat is kept upright by both crew swinging out hard on hiking planks. The forces exerted on the gunnels and fin-case are considerable. We proudly assembled our selections of seasoned cedar, pacific maple and sapele-veneered marine plywood. (Sapele is a beautiful reddish-brown timber from tropical Africa.) Wherever possible we’d use the newfangled two-part glue called Araldite – much lighter than the traditional fixing method of resin-based glue seized with brass screws. Araldite wasn’t readily available on a retail basis back then, but through Steve’s architecture connections we were able to buy tins of it from the importers. (Later, the same glue was used to fix the tiles to the Sydney Opera House roof.)
    And now the fun part. Lofting the boat around prefabricated ‘mould’ frames; spending countless hours squinting down the curved lines of the keel, chines and gunnels until we were completely happy with the hull shape; cladding that skeleton with ply; turning the boat – always a wonderful moment – to remove the temporary moulds. Fitting the permanent frames, keel plank and stringers, building and fitting the fin-case, fixing the chain-plates and installing the mast step assembly. As we waited for glue to harden we’d sneak around into the garage and work on the laminated centreboard and rudder.