Thread: Appledore
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Old 5th October 2021, 13:02
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Tim Gibbs United Kingdom Tim Gibbs is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2019
Location: Bideford, North Devon
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Skerries View Post
Best yard I ever worked with. Worked on building of ‘RRS Charles Darwin’ and Rowbothams ‘Tankerman’ there. Great and very friendly workforce who were generally always willing to lend a hand.
There was a slight ‘glitch’ under British Shipbuilders when they shipped a bunch of electricians and shipwrights down from the Clyde to work there which caused some union issues. I remember the electrical boss Jimmy Knott who was quite a character there and his sidekick (think it was Ken Higget?) who had a reputation for ‘linking out’ troublesome alarms in the engine control room. Not always the best solution.
On Charles Darwin during the measured mile we tuned the main transmitter on 4Mhz and the ship went hard a port! Took a while to find that issue……
Ken Higget = Tom Wigget ? !
I have been responsible for 10 ships from ASL since 1977. My experience was that, in general, we got exactly the ships we needed, whereas from many other yards (particularly Dutch) you got the ship they wanted to give you!
It was always a bit stressful getting the Appledore ships finished and performing to spec but in the case of 5 of them (AS 126, 148/9 and 169/70) they turned out to be great vessels and made us serious money ....... because they were exactly the vessels we needed.
You need to know your business now and into the future to know what ship you need to match the business. Sounds obvious but even today there are shipowners who seem incapable of defining what their business needs and end up specifying what they want- often two very different things!
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