Thought this might be of interest?

[Andy Dingle]

Apologies if you have already seen it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-mid-wales-26519173

[Peter Taylor]

I note the bit about production work being "completed quicker"!!!
Peter

[Andy Dingle]

Did you see the comment about a 'significant new product to be launched every 18 months' ?!

Wonder what is on Matts drawing board...!

[Tony]

Hi, Andy.

Try this for size. A  BayCruiser 42 :-

[Michael Rogers]

Hmmm….

It needs a flying bridge. Try raising the boom about 6 ft to make room. But then the mast gets in the way, so dispense with that, and the expensive washing attached to it. That's better. Now a pair of rorty diesels, and you're away. But nowhere near me please.

Michael

[Tony]

Hi, Michael.
Don't worry. You'll not see anything of this ilk on the English Raid or Lake Bala.  Like you, I have a preference for small, traditional-looking  boats, making a virtue out of necessity in my case ......
but as a (sort of ) socialist in a capitalist world, I'm all in favour of anything that has the potential to spread one man's surplus cash around Cardigan in a thickish layer, particularly if it gives Swallow Boats the capacity to improve their other products.  (Anyway, I might need a big, secondhand boat one day! )
If all rich men were careful with their ill-gotten gains we'd have no Caravaggio's, either, so let's hear it for conspicuous consumption and a 42 foot oceangoing Swallow Boat!

[Michael Rogers]

Ahem. As a riposte of sorts to your erudition, here and elsewhere, Tony, I have to resort to rather low-grade pedantics and point out that your reference to my personal favourite Italian renaissance artist has been attacked by a greengrocer's apostrophe. Just trying to keep my end up.......

I take your main point, and am all for a flourishing Swallowboats business, both for the sake of the Newlands clan (whom I hold in high esteem), and also for the local Cardigan economy. I suppose I'm a tad wistful about  how far things have come since kits-for-12-footers, which is where my heart is. Can the two co-exist (a 42 footer would be nearly four times the length of my little boat!!)?

By the way, there's been recent discussion on the forum about trailers for 20- or 23-foot boats, and these seem amazing bits of multi-roller engineering to me. Presumably a 42 foot boat goes into the water and stays there - doesn't it?! Otherwise the mind boggles.

Michael

[Tony]

'pologies for the Ted Eef haypostrofe. I dun it on me eyefone, innt.

Kit boats?
I wonder how The Management feels about providing working drawings or plans for third party kit providers? I don't think all the old stuff should be ruled out if someone wants to build a Storm Petrel or a Shelduck, for example .

[Michael Rogers]

I see Jordan Boats, for one, now provide kits for all sorts of designs. If Matt's smaller and/or older designs don't fit into Swallowboats' future Grand Plans (which I sort of understand), it would be good if kit-builds live on, for two reasons - first the huge satisfaction to be gained from kit-building for those of us not skilled enough for lofting, spiling* and suchlike: second because, as I think I may have just mentioned in passing before, I personally think the Trouper is such a little cracker.

Tony, you have possibly missed the small deliberate 'mistake' I made in my previous post, which would have enabled you to continue the banter. You're slipping.....? Incidentally, "I wrote it on my iPhone" is becoming a common excuse for various errors. I don't have said gadget. Can it not spell or do punctuation?

Michael

* The spell-check on my IMac tried to be very severe with me about spiling. We tussled, then - when I wouldn't back down, it offered me a list of about ten alternatives!

[Tony]

Did you see the comment about a 'significant new product to be launched every 18 months' ?!

Wonder what is on Matts drawing board...!

Does anyone know what Matt is REALLY planning?