![]() The hull framework used celery-top for the keelson and King Billy pine for the frames, stringers, and laminated stem. With the King Billy pine in hand, David agreed that construction should go ahead. The Yasa-400 motor sits on a custom-cast mount that is supported by the engine bedlogs. All of these are increasingly hard to obtain Andy sourced the required quantities of now-rare King Billy pine through a government register that gives priority access to boatbuilders, so they can obtain good, clear stock. The hull construction benefited from three superb boatbuilding timbers that grow only in Tasmania: King Billy pine, Huon pine, and celery-top pine. As with GEORGINA, the Wooden Boat Centre would build the hull and David would install the propulsion system. He had long been attracted to the Chris-Craft Barrelback designs of the 1940s, so he decided to build a slightly stretched version of the Barrelback 19, to plans from Glen-L Marine Designs. His experience with GEORGINA confirmed for David that he really would like an electric boat of his own. ![]() But the woods used are prized Tasmanian boatbuilding timbers: King Billy pine, celery-top pine, and Huon pine. The construction is standard runabout fare: batten-seam planking on sawn frames. ZELECTRA is built to the enlarged version of the Barrelback 19 design from Glen-L Marine Designs of San Clemente, California. Although Andy officially owned the boat, which he kept for about five years, David used her 90 percent of the time. With her electric propulsion system, GEORGINA had a cruising speed of 5.5 knots. But the hull was built of the wonderfully durable Tasmanian timber Huon pine, and was in remarkably good condition. The result was the 1938 GEORGINA, a 20′ displacement powerboat that was a “sunken hulk” when Andy found her. This was followed by an electric-car conversion and an electric quadcycle he built for a sheep farmer.ĭavid and Andy came to an agreement whereby Andy would buy and restore an old boat and David would design and install the electric power system. David, in fact, had by then advanced his youthful obsession with batteries, and in 2008 he built an electric vehicle, a microlight airplane that he thinks was the first electric aircraft to fly in the southern hemisphere. Both of them were interested in electric boats. So, it was probably inevitable that one day he would have an electric-powered boat.Ībout a decade ago, David met Andy Gamlin, who at that time was director of the Wooden Boat Centre, an Australian boatbuilding school in the town of Franklin, Tasmania, just south of Hobart. He has also been a keen sailor for a similar length of time. Under the hood, she’s on the cutting edge of propulsion technology, with a 90kW electric motor that will drive the boat to a top speed of 27 knots.ĭavid Warren has been fascinated with batteries since he was a small boy. On the outside, the 20′ runabout ZELECTRA harks back to 1940s-vintage Chris-Craft Barrelbacks.
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