Maud

I was given the prewar toy boat shown in the attached picture. It is about 21 inches long, seems to be carved from solid although it has a ply deck with ruled in planking detail. It has an unquestionable provenance since the man who gave it to me was given it when he was a child, he is now retired.

The paintwork is awful as someone has repainted it with emulsion paint. Jib and most rigging is missing and all the fixings have rusted through.

Any help would be appreciated.

Answer from TS: Sadly I am unable to identify your toy boat, it is typical of the sort of thing available pre-war but without a maker's name or trade mark or evidence that it had one once then things are very difficult. It could be home made, there were plenty of plans in hobby magazines of the time. Does the previous owner remember if it had a single or double jib, look for evidence of a drilled hole or screw eye half way along the length of the bowspit.

Carry out minimum restoration to start with and see if it sails properly before spending a lot of time on repainting etc would be my advice.

Comment from owner. Trevor is completely right I'm sure. I found plans for an almost identical boat in a 1932 copy of The Handyman and Home Mechanic - reproduced here in plans It's a sweet little boat so I'll tidy it up and find a nice shelf for it - may even take it for the odd sail.

The plans show bermudan rig without bowsprit and gaff with bowsprit. I have retored with gaff and retained the bowsprit. Looks good on the shelf and sails quite nicely - seen below on a blustery day with the topsail removed.

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