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AQUAFIBRE MOULDS


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13 hours ago, KaptinKev said:

Like with most companies, if you can build cheaper and make more money elsewhere, loyalty to your country doesn't come into it!

Let's not forget that buying British is not always a guarantee of quality.  The demise of our car and motorcycle industry could probably traced back to the atrocious build quality of British Leyland, Vauxhall and the other mainstream manufacturers back in the 70s and 80s.  As the result,  we started buying European and particularly models from the rapidly improving Japanese, who offers so many of the extras as standard in their range.

Most of the faults lay with the lack of investment.  Why were Triumph still producing motorcycles in the 70s that were introduced in the fifties when it was plain to see that the likes of Honda were stealing sales with their multi cylinder bikes and why were Leyland (laterly Rover) still producing car engines in the 90s that were introduced in the 50s.

It's easy to blame the consumer for a lack of loyalty or for not being patriotic towards home built products, but the lack of current choice can frequently be traced back to out own fault many years ago.

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4 hours ago, Mouldy said:

Let's not forget that buying British is not always a guarantee of quality.  The demise of our car and motorcycle industry could probably traced back to the atrocious build quality of British Leyland, Vauxhall and the other mainstream manufacturers back in the 70s and 80s.  As the result,  we started buying European and particularly models from the rapidly improving Japanese, who offers so many of the extras as standard in their range.

Most of the faults lay with the lack of investment.  Why were Triumph still producing motorcycles in the 70s that were introduced in the fifties when it was plain to see that the likes of Honda were stealing sales with their multi cylinder bikes and why were Leyland (laterly Rover) still producing car engines in the 90s that were introduced in the 50s.

It's easy to blame the consumer for a lack of loyalty or for not being patriotic towards home built products, but the lack of current choice can frequently be traced back to out own fault many years ago.

Absolute rubbish. There was nothing wrong with the quality of British built cars of the 60s, 70s, and even the 80s. I had many, most of which i never looked after. Yes, they did rust, but then so do any other nations cars, Japanese cars were well noted for it, excellent reliable engines and running gear, but no bodywork to use them on because they rusted away.  As for British bikes, again, nothing wrong with the quality of materials, they were just built to an old design because there was no money to invest in modern technology and manufacturing machinery. Now look at the Hinckley Triumphs, of which i`ve had 3, and still have 2. Build quality is amongst the best in the world, with the most up to date manufacturing processes and machinery, result, Triumph are now looked upon very much as market leaders, and are more often than not, the world leaders in motorcycling trends, as so many of the mainstream manufacturers are following in the ideas and model ranges, but many are nowhere near as good.  In fact, Triumph Motorcycles are the only manufacturer in recent years to see significant increases in sales and profits. 

These days though, many British manufacturers are too keen to shut down industry in this country, and opening up abroad purely and simply to increase profit, at the expense of quality, i know, i`ve been a victim of such, though only in a small way. 

Through facebook, i found an old school friend who was running his own business. He made big of the fact he was opening a manufacturing plant in eastern europe because he qualified for business grants from the eu that he simply WOULD`NT qualify for had he wanted to expand in THIS country. Result, his manufacturing plant in this country closed down, while HE was buying a much bigger house, and trading his 32ft yacht for a brand new Oyster, and all at the expense of his loyal workforce and cheaper options in eastern europe.  Needless to say, when i ripped into him for doing such a thing, him and i soon stopped being old friends.

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22 minutes ago, SPEEDTRIPLE said:

Through facebook, i found an old school friend who was running his own business. He made big of the fact he was opening a manufacturing plant in eastern europe because he qualified for business grants from the eu that he simply WOULD`NT qualify for had he wanted to expand in THIS country. Result, his manufacturing plant in this country closed down, while HE was buying a much bigger house, and trading his 32ft yacht for a brand new Oyster, and all at the expense of his loyal workforce and cheaper options in eastern europe.  Needless to say, when i ripped into him for doing such a thing, him and i soon stopped being old friends.

Sad that you lost an old friend but this illustrates the opportunities that will be denied to us when we wave sad farewells to our European cousins.

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the big problem is that by moving the manufacturing the qualified experienced workforce here move to other fields, apprentices are not trained and 20 years later you dont have the workforce here to bring the factories back to, no youngsters learning the trade, and the plant is no longer here to do the manufacturing. How long will it be before all the skilled boat builders have retired, and all the new youngsters will just be trained up as fixers not builders.

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the big problem is that by moving the manufacturing the qualified experienced workforce here move to other fields, apprentices are not trained and 20 years later you dont have the workforce here to bring the factories back to, no youngsters learning the trade, and the plant is no longer here to do the manufacturing. How long will it be before all the skilled boat builders have retired, and all the new youngsters will just be trained up as fixers not builders.


When we’re serious about wanting it back we just do the same as China. The government supports industry, people only buy locally made stuff, people want jobs in industry.
Easy peasy
Will it happen?
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7 hours ago, Mouldy said:

Let's not forget that buying British is not always a guarantee of quality.  The demise of our car and motorcycle industry could probably traced back to the atrocious build quality of British Leyland, Vauxhall and the other mainstream manufacturers back in the 70s and 80s.  As the result,  we started buying European and particularly models from the rapidly improving Japanese, who offers so many of the extras as standard in their range.

Most of the faults lay with the lack of investment.  Why were Triumph still producing motorcycles in the 70s that were introduced in the fifties when it was plain to see that the likes of Honda were stealing sales with their multi cylinder bikes and why were Leyland (laterly Rover) still producing car engines in the 90s that were introduced in the 50s.

It's easy to blame the consumer for a lack of loyalty or for not being patriotic towards home built products, but the lack of current choice can frequently be traced back to out own fault many years ago.

I think the Ryder Report had a lot to do with the demise of British Leyland

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4 hours ago, SPEEDTRIPLE said:

 As for British bikes, again, nothing wrong with the quality of materials, they were just built to an old design because there was no money to invest in modern technology and manufacturing machinery. Now look at the Hinckley Triumphs, of which i`ve had 3, and still have 2. Build quality is amongst the best in the world, with the most up to date manufacturing processes and machinery, result, Triumph are now looked upon very much as market leaders, and are more often than not, the world leaders in motorcycling trends, as so many of the mainstream manufacturers are following in the ideas and model ranges, but many are nowhere near as good.  In fact, Triumph Motorcycles are the only manufacturer in recent years to see significant increases in sales and profits. 

Exactly what I said - no investment.  The original Triumph Motorcycle Company went into receivership in 1983 and John Bloor bought the rights to the name and restarted the company, initially building new versions of the old bikes, but eventually developing new models using Japanese manufacturing techniques.

Incidentally, I used to own a Triumph 955i Daytona which proved to be the most unreliable and expensive machine to maintain that I ever owned in 35 years of motorcycling.

As far as British cars were concerned, I used to work opposite the Pressed Steel Fisher works at Cowley where many of the British Leyland bodies were produced and used to see Austin Princess bodies with rust on the rear three quarter panels before they were even finished.  Little wonder that they were covered in vinyl on the finished car.

The difference between our industry and others from Europe and the Far East is that we were content to rely on past 'glory' whilst others were intent on improving, by investing in new techniques.

As Grendel said, there is no base to train new people into now, the industries that have been lost, will remain lost.  We are no longer a force in manufacturing in this country, too many are employed in service industries or in the financial sector. In my humble opinion, there is too little focus in our education system in encouraging youngsters into apprenticeships, when they can go to university to earn a debt and a degree, usually in a subject that has little to do with the field in which they are eventually employed.

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Hi Mouldy, the bikes that John Bloor inherited was the "Diana" project, which was again very much a further, more refined developement of the old Bonneville, with an overhead cam engine. These were complete bikes which they merely looked at to make sure they were doing the right thing in dropping them, and building an all new up to date range of bikes built out of the modular concept. As for the 955i Daytona,  SNAP, i had one too, but traded it in for a Street Cup last year. I needed something much slower to save my license, and more comfortable, because with age, the bike stayed the same, but i did`nt lol. I had no problems with it, apart from the plastic fuel tank started leaking, because of the chemical change to the make up of lead free petrol, for the sake of emissions, of which the new petrol was incompatible. Something which has happened to quite a lot of bikes, and surprisingly, to some cars that have plastic fuel tanks.

I don`t know whether you`re up on how the modern Triumph company developed, but one thing most people DON`T know, is that John Bloor subsidised a developing company to ensure of its future, by covering an annual average operating loss of around £4,000,000 pa for 10 years, stipulating that after that time, the company MUST be able to stand on its own two wheels (not feet lol.) or face what future it had.  Now, Triumph motorcycles is in fact Britains biggest automotive manufacturer, something again that most people don`t realise.

Why John Bloor has never been knighted i don`t know, but i do understand why the likes of Camerons hairdresser did, as did one of Tony blairs personal aquaintances.  Nothing but a corrupt bunch of crooked b.....ds the lot of them.

 

Anyway, back to moulds, i see on "Boatshead Norfolk" the Moonraker 36 moulds are up for sale for £2,000, are you interested Clive (cricko).

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On ‎30‎/‎03‎/‎2018 at 16:33, grendel said:

 How long will it be before all the skilled boat builders have retired, and all the new youngsters will just be trained up as fixers not builders.

I have heard about a similar problem in my field and I'm sure other trades have the same problem. Youngsters are growing up with the skills of operating a game pad and making sure they are keeping up with social media and not interested in what the old boy is doing. I grew up with interacting with my mates like riding our bikes and playing football, where nowadays it's all done electronically. Most importantly Blue Peter:3_grin:  has a lot to answer for, as I always use to watch this programme and had a lot of pleasure making things, which I think helped me in my future job. Although I do have to use drill and screws to fix things and not double sided sticky tape. :default_biggrin:

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we have similar skills shortage in my field - electrical engineering (electricity supply) we are currently slowly recovering from a lack of training over the last 20 years, and the majority of our engineers are either in their late 50's 60's or under 30, thus we have just caught things in time, as some of the 30 year olds work into the senior roles.

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  • 1 year later...

Cool thread

Still a real shame aquafibre has gone. Of all the boats on the broads I probably have a theoretical top 10 of boats I want to own and they'd fill that up I think. I still think the lowliner was the best thing ever made and the diamond 43 which I've owned part of would have been lovely to have seen more made with different layouts, a luxury 4 berth perhaps

Was quite surprised when I was talking to the lads at Barnes that the chopped up the 43 mould to make serenade rather than just putting a new **** on the 35 mould. Was hoping they may have made an updated 43 but not to be now. Screenshot_20181214-205120.jpeg

Sent from the Norfolk Broads Network mobile app

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Most of the unwanted moulds at Rackheath were just chopped up from dinghies to larger boats - I did approach the administrators about a smaller mould but they just did not want to know, I am afraid.

Its good to see the old Diamond 35 mould being resurrected by BB with the added bit, - just shows how some moulds could actually stand the test of time in design terms.

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That's the thing though it's not the 35 mould it's the dual steer 43ft version and they chopped the back off to make an updated 35 essentially. Seems a shame to have lost the dual steer version in my eyes.

Most of the unwanted moulds at Rackheath were just chopped up from dinghies to larger boats - I did approach the administrators about a smaller mould but they just did not want to know, I am afraid.
Its good to see the old Diamond 35 mould being resurrected by BB with the added bit, - just shows how some moulds could actually stand the test of time in design terms.


Sent from the Norfolk Broads Network mobile app

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I do like the new 'Diamond' 39 in terms of the extra space and the engine being out the back where it's quieter, but the original helm station was an excellent piece of design and it's a shame that was lost.

It wasn't needed to house an engine but nor was it on the 43's and it worked well there.

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1 hour ago, marshman said:

Several new ones up for sale at around £245k as well through NBS

I see these are listed at being built by 'Heritage Broads Cruiser'. Who are they. I thought BB had the moulds and were building them for their fleet. Is 'Heritage Broads Cruiser' the boat building arm of BB or someone else altogether?

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Yeah Barnes do some weird things they managed to turn one of the best saloons on a hire boat for comfort and looks and make it look awkward and messy.

I do like the new 'Diamond' 39 in terms of the extra space and the engine being out the back where it's quieter, but the original helm station was an excellent piece of design and it's a shame that was lost.
It wasn't needed to house an engine but nor was it on the 43's and it worked well there.


Sent from the Norfolk Broads Network mobile app

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The 286 looks great, PH bridge passagable, dining and sleeping for four, attractive lines, regatta pontoon to sling a half decker alongside, set me adrift on a heritage bbliss.... always like the BB boats even the HUGE one that looked like a helicopter landing pad, may have been Enchantress and possibly triple bow effect but I may be mistaken, very long time since I saw it.

If my numbers come up I know where to head!

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52 minutes ago, Turnoar said:

may have been Enchantress and possibly triple bow effect but I may be mistaken, very long time since I saw it.

Take a trip down the Bure, you’ll find Enchantress moored between Acle Bridge and Acle Dyke. Perhaps the owners may be open to an offer.............

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