Between 1957 and 1970 Cheoy Lee produced approximatley 133 folkboats originaly sold as the the Offshore 25, better known as the Frisco Flyer.

There were three versions of this small blue-water boat.
91 in all wood and 42 in Fiberglass with wood. There were 55 Type I's and II's and 78 of the Type III's. The Type I (aka the Pacific Clipper) was an all wood boat, had a mast that was stepped through the deck, a traditional folkboat fractional rig and a smaller cabin. The Type II's had a larger teak trunk cabin and a masthead rig. The Type III's had a larger teak dog-house cabin, some "standing" headroom and a masthead rig stepped on deck. The earlier Type III's were solid teak built onto a fiberglass hull and the later Type III’s (1966-1970) were made entirely out of fiberglass with teak paneling.

This boat, Yard # 1507 is one of approximatley only 30 Type III's left. It was out of the water for the previous 16 years when I got it and then about another 5 more while I rebuilt it. It was an empty, cracked hull when given to me and needed a complete restoration/refit.
It took about five years of long nights and weekends of working outside under a tarp, in the garage or in the boat during cold winter nights, wet rainy afternoons and everything in between. The occasionally eager assistant on the project was my four (now ten) year old daughter who can have this boat as soon as I convince her mother to get another one. This blog is the record of all the work that "we" have done to the boat as well as some other somewhat related events with friends and family. Eventually, this will be put together in a book which will stay with the boat.


She still has plenty more to go but for now, Jackaroe has been in the water for a couple years now and thats all that matters...

To see past projects, use the links below.



Questions and comments to Matthewearlgarthwait@gmail.com





Sunday, December 30, 2007

New tarp, new start....

Just when I decided that I had to take a break from "working" on the boat, the tarp that had worked so well for a while, disintegrated. This was on a really windy day just before the first big winter storm of the year.

Its hard to tell from the picture but the wind was really blowing and it was COLD....


I had to fix this fast because the forecast was calling for weather like this...


Instead of buying another cheap blue tarp that would need to be replaced again in a few months, I decided to get one of these HEAVY duty canvas ones that the old timers seem to have on their boats. The only one they had left was 40 by 25 ft (so maybe I need to get a bigger boat). The tarp felt as if it weighed 200 + pounds and it took a while to get it up there but it would be worth it if the boat was dry in the spring. This was what the next day looked like..


I went out to the boat this morning for the first time after 4 weeks of snow storms and lots of freezing rain. Except for some very slight condensation the boat was bone dry one the inside. I opened the tarp up today to allow some of the moisture to escape.

The good news is that over the last week my work has calmed down some (I cut back on one of my jobs, which in its own way is pretty stressful). Since then, I have been finding my self thinking more and more about the boat.....I think it may be time time to start working on Jack A Roe again.

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