Bill Austin has been busy building a replica model of Bluebottle. Completed in the summer and delivered to the Boat Museum. What a great job and no doubt fiddly and time consuming.
Bill Said "a bit of car body filler will soon fair in the keel to the hull and smooth out any irregularities. Thank goodness Bluebottle didn’t have a varnished hull! I had to use Lime wood for the planking in the end, as there is a world shortage of obechi. Lime is much stronger and harder and I think I can still get it to stain to the correct mahogany colour inside."
Bill is not new to creating boat models for the Classic Boat Museum. In 2021 he also delivered a 1/12 scale 36" long model of “Tramontana”, the winner of the 1962 Cowes-Torquay Offshore Powerboat Race.
“Tramontana” was designed by Commander Peter du Cane, who was Managing Director of Vospers in the 1960’s. He was the author of the book “High Speed Small Craft”, which remains the definitive resource on this subject. “Tramontana” was constructed at Vospers’ boatyard in Portsmouth for her owner, R.S. Wilkins. In the Cowes-Torquay race she was driven by Jeffrey Quill, the famous test pilot of the Supermarine Spitfire. So Tramontana has a strong local connection to the Solent area.
