Chasewater 1968

peter unwin

Senior member
Joined
Sep 1, 2006
Messages
557
Location
East Mids
Cruising area
Southampton
Boat name
Cheetah
Boat make
XRS37 hunton
Engines(s)
twin volvo D6's
Hi All,
Found this photograph of my late father Ken competing in the Chasewater 50 mile endurance race. The basis of the hull was cold moulded by Tremletts at Topsham it was supplied in two halves, my father then made his own hog making the V steeper and much narrower at the front, he also incorporated a pad. The boat was powered by the then new 1300GT Ford Crossflow fitted with big valve cylinder head, wilder camshaft, twin side draft webber carburetors and driver operated advance and retard ignition system, drive was transmitted to the water by a homemade outdrive to an italian 3 blade racing propeller. The boat was built and operated from a shed in our garden. I can remember spending many happy hours helping with the build, i also got to drive it during test sessions. We still have many of the trophies that he won over the years back at work in the midlands. Almost every weekend during the summer was taken up racing mainly at Chasewater but we also frequently went to Fairford, Iver, Carr mill and Windermere were the main venues.

Peter
 

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old pic

cool pic peter , its always good to have pics as well as the memories, i wonder if the boat is still out there somewhere ?
 
chasewater was a great place in the 60's watching my dad racing all day then a visit to the funfair in the evening.

Rob
 
Raced many, many times on Chasewater but always had the run of the whole lake and never once had to share it with the sailing club.

It is currently being refilled and I hope we can go back there to race soon.
 
very interesting post & photo, thanks Peter,

our original plan for T 15 was something very similar, we were going to fit the stage 1 hull out as a NF raceboat by reducing the beam etc etc but unfortunately my brother had a very bad accident while racing in a Morelli NE/ET which resulted in no more racing for us, so we fitted T 15 as a skiboat.

we also had an idea to fit out a stage 1 hull as a Class 3A catamaran by cutting it into two halves and building up from that..... had my dads drawings for it up to a few years ago but they were drawn on tracing paper and when I took the drawing out from the envelope the paper totally disintegrated....... was that telling me something... :speechles



.
 
cool pic peter , its always good to have pics as well as the memories, i wonder if the boat is still out there somewhere ?

Hi boatnut,
Thanks, Skippy was campaigned for two seasons as it appears in the first picture then she had a complete rebuild, the deck was cut of to just above the chines we then made a former for the new deck out of 1" square timber spaced about 3" apart then cold moulded it in a process similar to the hull a complete new deck with rounded corners and bonded to the hull with no gunnel. We then cut all the formers out from the inside this made a very strong and light structure. The drive train also got a comprehensive update, the engine had further tuning and was overboard to 85mm pistons which gave a cubic capacity of 1430cc. A completely new outdrive was fabricated this time unit construction, it was mounted on flexible mountings through the transom and the engine to bearers inside the boat, by changing the spacers on the engine you could very easily change the trim angle for different setups, the steering was accomplished by a tube and bearings round the vertical drive shaft so no need for universal joints which was also telescopic so we could vary the height of the propeller relative to the bottom quickly and easily.In her day she was quite a quick boat lapping chasewaters 1 mile course in well under 60 seconds.

Peter
 

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Hi boatnut,
Thanks, Skippy was campaigned for two seasons as it appears in the first picture then she had a complete rebuild, the deck was cut of to just above the chines we then made a former for the new deck out of 1" square timber spaced about 3" apart then cold moulded it in a process similar to the hull a complete new deck with rounded corners and bonded to the hull with no gunnel. We then cut all the formers out from the inside this made a very strong and light structure. The drive train also got a comprehensive update, the engine had further tuning and was overboard to 85mm pistons which gave a cubic capacity of 1430cc. A completely new outdrive was fabricated this time unit construction, it was mounted on flexible mountings through the transom and the engine to bearers inside the boat, by changing the spacers on the engine you could very easily change the trim angle for different setups, the steering was accomplished by a tube and bearings round the vertical drive shaft so no need for universal joints which was also telescopic so we could vary the height of the propeller relative to the bottom quickly and easily.In her day she was quite a quick boat lapping chasewaters 1 mile course in well under 60 seconds.

Peter

thanks Peter, for the update & additinal photos,


re the deck, thats how we did the decks for T 14 & T15, not an easy or quick job.

have this original flyer......


img_215598_0_f0b144122c1e6d94b77006737a2e9654.jpg


img_215598_1_e8f3519d34a8a9f82e0e29ba670c1c46.jpg
 
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The CMBA has a rally at Chasewater (hopefully 2), every year. this years is 25th of this month. Might be a bit parky but we have to fit in with their calendar.
 
Found in the attic after 44 years, this picture was taken after the Chasewater 24 hour endurance race where the boat performed extremely well first in class, second inboard overall, second index of performance after 12 hours and concours d'elegance. Thanks to Nick at Carbon Weezel for scanning and re-touching the original slide.

Peter
 

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Lmbrc

thanks Peter, for the update & additinal photos,


re the deck, thats how we did the decks for T 14 & T15, not an easy or quick job.

have this original flyer......


img_217994_0_f0b144122c1e6d94b77006737a2e9654.jpg


img_217994_1_e8f3519d34a8a9f82e0e29ba670c1c46.jpg

I was a member of tha LMBRC & raced there many times shame the M25 now runs through the club, many happy memories and a very sad one.
 
Thanks for that, I was at that event, but fortunately had to leave early and didn't witness it.
 
Thanks for that, I was at that event, but fortunately had to leave early and didn't witness it.

That was the the sad memory, i was running the Yamaha Team at the time and mick was our star driver. I won't go into detail but to say it was tragic is an understatement.
 
Bill, that would have been Mick & a young Andy Elliott?

Thats right plus Malcolm Williams from Cardigan, We were all young in them days, It was a lot of fun very close racing and very few incidents until the year Mick died when we lost three drivers from the LMBRC, strangly it was the last year i raced.
 
Please help me with my memory. I think I attended this race as a 12 year old, did Fletchers have a team in the race in '68?
 
Please help me with my memory. I think I attended this race as a 12 year old, did Fletchers have a team in the race in '68?

Hi Chris,
Fletchers ran a works team in both Chasewater 24 hour races crewed by Norman Fletcher plus Peter and David Barnford i think. In the 67 race while refuelling the boat burst into flames right next to the fuel tanker and in the panic was pushed away from the dock, the boat was rescued and flames extinguished with dry powder extinguishers by Freddie Miles and Peter Barnford the cockpit was totally gutted along with the wiring but after a couple of hours work they got it to the end of the race. My dad drove with Ron Worbold and Mike Parks in an inboard bluefin can't remember where they finished.

Regards
Peter
 
Thanks Peter
You have a great memory.
Clearly then it was the '68 race as I dont remember any fires! What I do remember was what a cheerless place that Chasewater could be to a 12 year old in the evening!
All the best
Chris
 
Hi all,
Went to Chasewater on sunday it is a shadow of it's former self, very run down landing stages and slipways are in a terrible state of disrepair with virtually no water activity... The 2 photographs below were taken almost 45 years apart back then the place would have been buzzing even at this time of year with plenty of pre-season testing going on. The lake is however very full at the moment which is very encouraging.

Peter
 

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