How old is my OK

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You may have noticed KA567 on ebay a while ago. Well I bought it and have brought it back to Canberra. I sailed OK's in the 80's, KA353 and bought this one as a bit of nostalgia. I would like to know the past history of the boat. If anyone can help it would be much appreciated. Took it out for a shakedown yesterday in about 25knots....probably not a good idea, but everything is in tact, including the skipper.

[Deleted]

According to the "OK Chronicle", KA568 was about 1976, so your boat would be somewhere around 35 years old!

[Deleted]

Hi OK567,

I wonder if this could be Phil! If so, long time between drinks. If not, maybe KA353 was passed on to you from Phil?

KA353 moved on from Mosman to Canberra some time around 1976 when I brought KA568 (one of the first three Icebreakers) back from New Zealand. You might be interested to know that KA353 is now based at Wangi and is still being sailed on the odd occasion.

As advised by AUS673, KA567 would be up to 35 years old. I've asked our National Secretary for some more information on this boat for you and will pass this on ASAP.

Later:

No information on KA567 in our National Association records. Contact with YA confirms that the boat was never registered. A BFR and a plaque were issued to an address in Queensland.

KA566 was a competitive Horsfall hull registered in Queensland sometime in the late 1970s. That boat eventually came to Sydney and raced with us at Mosman ASC. It is likely that your boat may be a Horsfall hull too as there were a dozen or so built in Queensland around about that time.

I can recall a Horsfall hull in Canberra around that time. We didn't see a lot of the guy at Interclub events and then lost track of that boat. It was a very distinctive purple and green colour! Could this be your boat?

Give us some more details on where you acquired the boat and what rig you have with it. Please make contact with me at [e-mail] and I can update you on current OK Association matters that may be of further assistance to you.

Cheers, Bill.

[Deleted]

Hi Bill. I am Phil Hopkins from Canberra. In 1976 (I didn't think it was that long ago) my Dad drove me up to Mosman to pick up KA353 from Mosman after Jerry Firth and Garry Alexander set the sale up for us. I was 16 at the time. The Canberra fleet was very strong then and I was very much the junior in the fleet. They were very supportive of me, transporting myself and boat all over the state. Greg Comfort was very much a hero, I remember marveling at his see through OK...(no gelcoat). I bought KA567 from Victoria Point Brisbane so that would explain the QLD origin for the boat. It has a Boyce mast and boom and a North sail. It seems structurally very sound. I have cleaned it up, reinforced the mast step. It could do with a better sail, if anyone has an old/ newer than 35 yrs old one they would like to sell,I would be interested. I think I will race the winter series down here and may drop into Sydney to have a poke around.

thanks

Phil

[over50]

Hi, while we are talking about old OK's, any help people can also give me would be helpfull. I picked mine up also from ebay in 2008 from Geelong with a sail number of AUS 69 (5 looks like it has been removed). It is white with a green deck and has another couple of sails with different numbers. I am at Cooma so may join you some time on LBG Phil.

[Deleted]

Great to hear from Phil again after all these years and also from our new OK man in Cooma. If anyone has any information on the boat purchased from Geelong please post a reply and we can investigate further.

I've now established direct contact with Phil and hopefully we will catch up with him in Canberra if we return for our "Myuna Bay" Sprint series again later in the year.

Phil, plenty of good older "give away" sails we can try on your mast when we catch up with you. If anyone wants to sell Phil a newer second hand sail at reasonable cost please post details here and arrange to contact Phil direct to try the sail up the "Boyce" mast.

Phil purchased KA353 from me in 1976 when I acquired my "Icebreaker" from NZ. KA353 is a "Pamcraft" hull and is the boat that John Smallwood used when he won the Australian Championship in Adelaide in 1974. The boat is now at Wangi.

Geoff (Greg) Comfort went on to build the "Comfort and Taylor" boats and is now a successful Canberra based photographer. See www.geoffcomfort.com to catch up with what Geoff is doing these days. The no gelcoat boat Phil referred to was KA453. This was eventually passed on to David Coleman, painted white with red waterline stripes and raced successfully as "Pizzaz" at Mosman ASC during the late 70s and early 80s.

It appears KA567 is a "Horsfall" hull that was sailed as "San" by Andrew Thornton in Brisbane up to around 1981. It is not the purple and green boat referred to in my previous post. Does anyone else remember anything about either of those boats? Maybe "Lotsaluck" can tell us more if Graham catches up with this post!

Lots more history and heaps of information about OKs in our great book "Completely OK". Anyone who would like a copy should contact me at [e-mail] and let me have your mailing address. Cost is $50.00 including postage.

Cheers, Bill.

[Deleted]

I think the Cooma boat is the old KA 405, Pamcraft . I got this boat out of a back yard in Ballarat in about 1990? I never sailed it and sold it on. It was sailed at Lake Learmonth for a few years till the lake dried up. Then ended up at Corio Bay SC.

Hope this helps, Marcus.

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Just found out that OK's are still going strong and a fleet looks like building in Hobart, so I'm looking at getting back into one after 30 mumble years. I sailed a Horsfall hull as Valhalla at Sandgate (Brisbane) until '78 when I sold her to Tom Verdon (I think), she was orange with a bit of a darker speckle fault in the gelcoat. For the life of me I can't remember the sail number. I wonder if she's still around?

Cheers
JM