Van Munster 'Magic'

The job to be done on the Lumix 18ft Skiff © Frank Quealey

The damage to the Lumix 18ft Skiff hull © Frank Quealey

Work in progress on the Lumix 18ft Skiff © Frank Quealey

When the Lumix 18ft Skiff hull was badly damaged during a racing incident in Race 1 of the recent 2017 JJ Giltinan Championship, sponsored by The Winning Group, on Sydney Harbour, it looked as though the young team who were sailing the hull would have to use a borrowed hull for the remainder of the seven race regatta.

The crew took the damaged hull to the class boat builders, Van Munster Boats, and left it with Brett Van Munster to see what he could do with it to help them out.

Brett and his team are often called on to make repairs caused when the high tech boats are involved in incidents or suffer structural problems as a result of the enormous pressure being applied in the quest for greater power and speed.

Usually the repairs are need for next week's race which gives the Van Munster team a few days to complete the job. This time they had one day if they wanted to get the skiff back on the water for Race 3.

It wasn't surprising when the Van Munster boys produced their normal 'magic' and got the boat ready in time for it to be collected, driven back to Sydney (from Morriset), rigged and raced in the third race of the championship.

Brett explains: "The repair involved cutting away the damaged area of the hull, deck and internal frames."

"To get it turned around overnight, we used panels from an old boat owned by the Australian 18 Footers League, which is no "longer being used."

"That mainly involved cutting the old boat into thirds behind the centre case to get the panels and structure required to repair the damage."

"The team used the longitudinal frames, deck section and hull out of the old boat which was sacrificed."

"The replacement hull section was glued and taped in place, the longitudinal structure replaced and other damaged internal structure repaired."

The finishing touches to the repair on the Lumix 18ft Skiff hull - photo © Frank Quealey

"The replacement deck section was then scarfed, bonded and taped back together."

"The hull and deck were faired and primed around the secondary bonding and non skid added to the cockpit."

"It's a pretty good testimony to the current one design nature of the class when you can use one boat to repair another."

Sounds simple when Brett explains the technique, but in fact it was another great job by Brett and the boys.