We do not know the reason for naming her "Midnight Oil" but possibly was after the Australian rock band of the same name, who hail from Canberra.
To the best of our knowledge, "Midnight Oil" was converted into a coastal cruiser, including the addition of a 6litre 130 hp Cummins diesel engine , around 1997 / 98, and spent a fair deal of time around the Western Scottish Isles, based around Gourock. She was advertised for sale, which we are led to believe for a price of £24,000.
She was bought by a Mr Peter Smith, a gentleman of 80 years who also had a narrowboat moored at Newhaven. After spending some time at Kip Marina, Inverkip, he headed south in June 2008, down through the Irish Sea, along with his son, then being towed into Milford Haven on the 10th June by the RNLI lifeboat "Sir Galahad" to repair a leak on the Calorifier.
His son then left the boat to continue his journey home and Mr Smith set off on the morning of the 28th June heading for Falmouth.
He never made it ! The boat was found drifting 23 miles off St Ives, Cornwall, by a Belgian fishing boat the "Marie Louise". Mr Smith's body was found two weeks later, off Morte Point, North Devon.
Press report as link below.
She was listed for sale on several web sites, where we saw her on Boatbreakers.com, in May 2012 originally for a price of £15,000.
By the time we finally got round to viewing her in June, the price had dropped to £7000, as the broker required the berth she was on in Fareham, Upper Quay.
We struck a deal for the £6000 to include 2 months of free moorings at Fareham while we made arrangements to move her up to Kent
She was my grandads boat for years when she was in scotland (Andrew Fraser) she was moured at rosyth caravan site on the clyde, she was sold to Mr Smith when my Grandad sadly passed away it would be nice to see some pics of her now. Regards Ross Fraser
ReplyDeleteThanks for the info Ross, it is good to trace the history back further than that we already know. Do you have any idea just how long your Grandad had her. I would be very grateful for any further info, or memories you may have about the boat.
DeleteI will eventually get round to putting more photos on the blog, but am very busy re-building all her topsides as they are rotten !
Thanks again
Hi …Nick and Pam
DeleteHere is some information for you about your boat “Midnight Oil” you already know it came off the Canberra when it was going to the Falklands,
The life boat was then taken to Fairley boat yard just south of Largs on the firth of Clyde in 1983 and that’s where the conversion was done, she originaly had a Ford Sabre 6 cylinder Deisel and the 3/1 gear box came from an auxiliary engine from a Submarine Yes a Submarine, I was told it could have been one of the torpedo loading engines, the gearbox still had the M.O.D. plate on it. And it was as big and heavy as the engine itself.
She was then sold on a couple of years later to the then owner of the Tighnabruaich Hotel he bought her to use for fishing trips for his guests, on the fist trip out one of the guests cut his bait up on the coach roof, that caused steam to come from the owners ears and no more fishing trips.. He took the boat out of the water at the Tighnabruaich boat yard, where it lay for quite a while, now at this time I had a small 27ft boat and loved to sail round the Kyles of Bute, one day we were caught out with the weather and like the film I was told we need a bigger boat, and that was Midnight Oil, I bought her in 1988 and had her for 3 years.
When I got her she had been sitting in the yard with the bow lower than the stern and inside it had water half way to the rear steps to the wheelhouse we managed to drain her and get her dried out, she needed a new engine I fitted the same Ford Saber 6 cyl. And changed the gearbox for a up to date hydraulic one, it took the crane I had for the engine to lift the original box, later I had to transfer some of the ballast from bow to stern because of the difference in weight of the boxes, we then sailed her to Largs Yaught Haven and finished off the repairs there, I see from your photos she no longer has the pitch pine deck, pity it looked great but took some amount of work to keep it looking good, when I had her in the marina one of the employees of the Fairley Boatyard, came down and was telling me about the trouble they had working on her, when cutting out the scuppers they normally used 1 blade to cut out 4 in modern boats, it took 3 blades to do each one on Midnight Oil he said that she was one of the first fibreglass boats for a cruise ship and the over built her by a mile, when I had her she still had the Lloyds 100A1 plate on the hull near the bow, unfortunately that was stolen within weeks of being in the marina you will still be able to see the screw holes just under the rubbing strip.
We had 3 great years with her, but unfortunately work commitments forced me to sell her in ’91
If I can find any photos I will pass them on to you, Oh and the name ‘Midnight Oil’ that came about because of the amount of time the original owners spent at night working on her, one of the kept saying here we go burning the midnight oil again, so the name was born
Regards Tom Crawford
hi ross i bought the boat from mrs fraser at roseneath i also put in the 6bt cummins and spent a lot of time rebuilding her in inverkip before i sold her to mr smith
ReplyDeletewhen i bought boat the engine and gearbox was out off line thats why there was a new stern-gland fitted tha wheelhouse was rotten as it was built straight on the deck and therfore drew water into wood i fitted back hatch and fitted generator system engine never missed a beat i purchased the engine from HGV truck robin campbell alexandria and fitted it inside hull in bits solid big boat yes built to lloyds standards i also put on the proper propeller 4 bladed from lancing marine i still have a few full size photos of her worse thing about boat was her steering which was awful
ReplyDeleteHi Nick and Pam,
ReplyDeleteIt’s Ross Fraser am wondering how you are getting on with my grandads old boat.
Can you please reach out to me on rossfraser2000@hotmail.com it would be great to see some pictures of how she looks now.