The McCoy story
By Pam Mann
The McCoy story started in 1976 with Brisbane shipwright Peter McCoy agreeing to fit out an Adams 40 foot round bilge steel hull by Steelcraft Engineering and John and myself working with him as apprentices. The skills we learnt in those 4 years stood us well in the intervening years. Peter unfortunately died one year while we were cruising in New Caledonia.
When John and I decided to build a new boat, it had been in planning for a long time. Our previous boat ‘Nuages’ was an exceptionally seaworthy vessel, so we opted for an Adams design again. We had lived and cruised aboard Nuages for ten years and during that time conducted extensive research into the characteristics of a successful long term cruising vessel.
Lyn and Larry Pardey’s ideas influenced our thinking when considering our new boat. We wrote to them and their help with information was greatly appreciated. The decision to go engineless was central and to achieve this, we had to have a boat that is easy to sail and easy to handle for two people.
Our choice was the Adams 13metre. The decision to build the boat in Toowoomba was taken after pricing the industrial sheds available in Brisbane and Toowoomba, 100 kilometers inland, where we were currently living. We decided on the western side of Toowoomba. One of the factors influencing our decision was the low humidity of the dry inland conditions, (driest on record) in Toowoomba, which would be optimum conditions for epoxy curing. An industrial shed was found which was big enough to contain the boat under construction. Lofting started in July 2005.
Having long been admirers of the ‘cold moulding’ method of boat construction for ultimate strength and rigidity without too much weight, this was our choice of method. The design called for four layers of ¼ inch ply glued with epoxy then glassed using double biased cloth. After researching suppliers of plywood, we were fortunate in sourcing excellent quality marine grade Gaboon.
When the planking was finished, and before we turned the boat over, we made a mould for the keel which was poured with 4 tons of lead. When it was finished it was delivered to the shed. The truck driver had the truck with load weighed, so we knew the ballast was the correct weight.
By July 2006 the hull had been faired, glassed and sanded and was ready for turning. This required a crane to haul the hull out of the shed, turn it over and return it to the shed once more.
We then put two lavish coats of epoxy wood preservative over the inside of the entire hull before any fitting out started. Spotted gum floors were then fitted to the spotted gum backbone with handmade copper bolts, then the keel was fitted with bronze bolts and nuts through the spotted gum and large bronze plates.
The centerboard case was also made and fitted at this time. We purchased the centerboard from Shekinah Boat works who were doing production Adams 13 meters at that time. Hoop pine was used for the interior fitting out because of its good strength to weight ratio. The cabin sole was teak and bulkheads teak veneer marine ply. While work continued on the interior, 316 stainless steel water tanks, shower tray, gravity tanks, galley sinks, benchtop, stove recess, and pushpit and pulpit, and arch for the solar panels were made and supplied by a contractor.
May 2006 saw us purchasing deck fittings such as Goiot hatches mainsheet track etc. 29th October 2007 the transom was fitted. On 2nd January 2008 John began splicing the one by nineteen wire for the rigging. During this period we undertook numerous trips to Brisbane, Sunshine Coast and the Gold Coast organising quotes for sails and rigging. We decided on ‘Cookie’ of S & H Spars for the mast and fittings in preparation for the launch at Brisbane Shiplifts. For sails we decided on Sailmaker Greg Ellis of Manders Sails in Brisbane. The sail wardrobe consists of main, storm main, yankee with a bonnet which can be zipped on to make the size of a genoa, staysail and for light weather, a drifter (code zero cloth).
June 16th, 2008 was launch day. We had decided to name this boat ‘McCoy’ after our dear friend and mentor Peter McCoy in recognition of all the information and skills that we learned while we worked with him on our first yacht. When meeting other boats in different anchorages they usually comment “is this the real McCoy?” and of course we reply YES!