Bluebird K7 Latest
Discussion
Equus said:
Jordie Barretts sock said:
Anyone close to the Ruskin?
Photo of her in her purpose built garage would be wonderful in the coming weeks.
Assuming it's all there and put on display fairly quickly, I might have a run up at Easter, if time allows.Photo of her in her purpose built garage would be wonderful in the coming weeks.
Given Billy's past reputation for, ahem, 'losing' bits, it's rather worrying that there's no sign of the cockpit canopy, spray deflectors or (so far as I can see, and perhaps most worryingly in terms of its suitability as a souvenir) steering wheel, though. They'll need to mock something up for the tailpipe on the missing engine, too.
On balance I think it should have been left alone in the lake - it seems to ultimately cause a load of misery for whoever gets involved with it.
dr_gn said:
On balance I think it should have been left alone in the lake - it seems to ultimately cause a load of misery for whoever gets involved with it.
I'd disagree; the story of Bluebird is going to be much better remembered if the boat is there for all to see, and as time passes memories of the bickering will fade. The average tourist won't know anything about that anyway.dr_gn said:
lufbramatt said:
ecsrobin said:
I never knew this bit:
His initial plan had been to "nick the tail".
"It's true... I fully intended to hack it off and add it to my trophies, but I couldn't find the wreck immediately and in the four years it took I fell in love with [Bluebird] K7."
Says all you need to know about the guy, what other trophies has he stolen?
Ask the fleet air arm museum, I’m sure they have an idea His initial plan had been to "nick the tail".
"It's true... I fully intended to hack it off and add it to my trophies, but I couldn't find the wreck immediately and in the four years it took I fell in love with [Bluebird] K7."
Says all you need to know about the guy, what other trophies has he stolen?
Plenty of videos now circulating on Facebook of it being driven through Coniston, preceded by a Piper walking in front of the lorry. Crowds of hundreds of people watching. It was quite a sight.
Nearly another Campbell tragedy though. Gina Campbell falls over right in front of the lorry causing it to have to brake to not run her over!
Nearly another Campbell tragedy though. Gina Campbell falls over right in front of the lorry causing it to have to brake to not run her over!
Grrrrrrrrrr. I’m not on Facebook or Instagram so can’t see any of the videos.
I didn’t get to see it yesterday, I was too busy with other things. I reasoned it’s at a place where I can see it from now on.
Doesn’t it look fantastic? There is a video on the BBC site.
No canopy over the cockpit though? Maybe removed for transport purposes?
It now looks complete with the Lloyd’s registry K7 infinity markings on the sponsons.
Chuffed to bits it’s back at Coniston. It’s been a long saga.
I didn’t get to see it yesterday, I was too busy with other things. I reasoned it’s at a place where I can see it from now on.
Doesn’t it look fantastic? There is a video on the BBC site.
No canopy over the cockpit though? Maybe removed for transport purposes?
It now looks complete with the Lloyd’s registry K7 infinity markings on the sponsons.
Chuffed to bits it’s back at Coniston. It’s been a long saga.
Jim H said:
No canopy over the cockpit though? Maybe removed for transport purposes?
Yes, I've just it on Sky News now settled inside the museum and it does seem distinctly odd to have no canopy. IIRC it ran with different canopies at different dates but always with something in place. Albeit the canopy blew off the last time they ran K7 in 2018.The woman in charge of the museum seemed to think they intended to get it re-engined and running on Coniston again. Sounds crackers to me; leave it in history.
Panamax said:
Jim H said:
No canopy over the cockpit though? Maybe removed for transport purposes?
Yes, I've just it on Sky News now settled inside the museum and it does seem distinctly odd to have no canopy. IIRC it ran with different canopies at different dates but always with something in place. Albeit the canopy blew off the last time they ran K7 in 2018.The woman in charge of the museum seemed to think they intended to get it re-engined and running on Coniston again. Sounds crackers to me; leave it in history.
I wonder if - with some replacement casings and mountings - it would be possible to put the remains of the original engine back in the hull? For me that would make it far more original and more valid as an historical exhibit. Then again I guess the front of the engine will have seen significant damage, which might make it impossible to re-fit. I can't remember how bad it was when I saw it.
Jim H said:
It now looks complete with the Lloyd’s registry K7 infinity markings on the sponsons.
Off-topic, but so far as I've been able to ascertain, the Lloyds registry thing is a myth, stemming from an error in a 1950's book, that everyone seems to have repeated..
When I was designing a boat for the WWSR, we investigated because we weren't thrilled with the idea of being given the registration number K9 (which would have been the next in the sequence following British Pursuit/Miss Alton Towers), particularly given that at that time 'K9' was still very much associated in the public perception with Dr. Who's robot dog!
Lloyds of London denied all knowledge and maintained that it bore no resemblance to any form of registration they maintained (a lot of their historic archived shipping registers are now available online, so you can see this for yourself).
Our research concluded that the 'K' registrations related to racing classes established by the International Motor Yachting Union (predecessor to the UIM) and adminstered by the Marine Motor Association in the UK, both of which are long defunct (their roles were taken on by the UIM and the RYA, respectively). Beyond that, the actual classes proved difficult to decipher, without a copy of the rule book: we figured out that the letter 'K' denoted a hydroplane, and there were then various apparently weight-based sub-classes (with the infinity symbol used on K7 obviously representing unlimited). For example, Norman Buckley's Jaguar Engined Miss Windermere IV is a hydroplane (registered K41) in Class Z:
K7 is obviously the 7th hydroplane registered in the unlimited class (hence the infinity symbol).
The other 'K' registered unlimited hydros are:
K1 Miss England III
K2 Miss Britain III
K3 Blue Bird (Malcolm Campbell's original single-step hydro; originally registered Z/K30)
K4 Blue Bird (Malcolm Campbell's three-pointer)
K5 White Hawk
K6 Crusader
K7 Bluebird, of course
K8 British Pursuit/Alton Towers
...but by the time we got to British Pursuit, the classification system was in fact long defunct, and appears to have no real meaning - just a tradition.
dr_gn said:
Panamax said:
Jim H said:
No canopy over the cockpit though? Maybe removed for transport purposes?
Yes, I've just it on Sky News now settled inside the museum and it does seem distinctly odd to have no canopy. IIRC it ran with different canopies at different dates but always with something in place. Albeit the canopy blew off the last time they ran K7 in 2018.The woman in charge of the museum seemed to think they intended to get it re-engined and running on Coniston again. Sounds crackers to me; leave it in history.
I wonder if - with some replacement casings and mountings - it would be possible to put the remains of the original engine back in the hull? For me that would make it far more original and more valid as an historical exhibit. Then again I guess the front of the engine will have seen significant damage, which might make it impossible to re-fit. I can't remember how bad it was when I saw it.
I would love to nip up the road and see it running on Coniston, but I also like the idea of all the existing original parts put back in place as much as possible.
Either way, its home.
Equus said:
Off-topic, but so far as I've been able to ascertain, the Lloyds registry thing is a myth, stemming from an error in a 1950's book, that everyone seems to have repeated..
When I was designing a boat for the WWSR, we investigated because we weren't thrilled with the idea of being given the registration number K9 (which would have been the next in the sequence following British Pursuit/Miss Alton Towers), particularly given that at that time 'K9' was still very much associated in the public perception with Dr. Who's robot dog!
Lloyds of London denied all knowledge and maintained that it bore no resemblance to any form of registration they maintained (a lot of their historic archived shipping registers are now available online, so you can see this for yourself).
Our research concluded that the 'K' registrations related to racing classes established by the International Motor Yachting Union (predecessor to the UIM) and adminstered by the Marine Motor Association in the UK, both of which are long defunct (their roles were taken on by the UIM and the RYA, respectively). Beyond that, the actual classes proved difficult to decipher, without a copy of the rule book: we figured out that the letter 'K' denoted a hydroplane, and there were then various apparently weight-based sub-classes (with the infinity symbol used on K7 obviously representing unlimited). For example, Norman Buckley's Jaguar Engined Miss Windermere IV is a hydroplane (registered K41) in Class Z:
K7 is obviously the 7th hydroplane registered in the unlimited class (hence the infinity symbol).
The other 'K' registered unlimited hydros are:
K1 Miss England III
K2 Miss Britain III
K3 Blue Bird (Malcolm Campbell's original single-step hydro; originally registered Z/K30)
K4 Blue Bird (Malcolm Campbell's three-pointer)
K5 White Hawk
K6 Crusader
K7 Bluebird, of course
K8 British Pursuit/Alton Towers
...but by the time we got to British Pursuit, the classification system was in fact long defunct, and appears to have no real meaning - just a tradition.
Wiki link to sail codes
ETA some examples.
The International 14 class of sailing dinghy had up to 2000 a designation which looked like the following:
14
K 363
Which would change in 2000 to:
14
GBR 363
As it's an international class a Japanese registered boat with the same number would be:
14
J 363
And now:
14
JPN 363
And for those who want to quote Topper / Laser numbers.... Those are registered through an international registry which administers numbers globally.
Edited by RustyMX5 on Tuesday 12th March 15:37
RustyMX5 said:
Personally I've always viewed K7 as the 7th registered British WWSR craft but that's only based on my sailing experience.
As above: it's the 7th registered unlimited class hydroplane in the UK*, although that pretty much amounts to the same thing.Unlike the United States (where 'unlimited' hydroplane circuit racing is a thing... albeit not properly unlimited any more), we've only ever really built unlimited class hydros in the UK for the purposes of record breaking and (pre-WWII) to contest internationally for things like the Harmsworth Trophy
RustyMX5 said:
Up until 2000 UK registered sailing boats were given a designation of 'K' before they were forced to change to GBR. My guess is that the earlier speed boats followed a similar thinking.
But no, I'm pretty sure that K was a designation denoting 'hydroplane' under the IMYU class structure.This is Mathea VIII, for example (German, also registered 'K7', but Class D):
.. and no, I don't think the 'D' is for 'Deutschland': you commonly also see it on Italian boats: it seems to denote 800kg class.
* At least since the IMYU/MMA classification came into force: there were several 'unlimited' UK boats before then, including Miss England and Miss England II, and Betty Carstairs' Newg and Estelle IV... an anorak speed record fact is that the engines for John Cobb's Railton Special LSR car came from Carstair's Estelle IV
Edited by Equus on Wednesday 13th March 16:10
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