Image taken from the NEMT Spring Newsletter which was circulated amongst its members in April 2025 and it does not matter whether Dave is asleep or not because he gives it scale which indicates that the boat that they are building for the South Shields Sea Cadets is about eighteen foot long with a beam of six feet(5.5m x 1.8m) and we were told:-
The boats are jointly designed by the combined efforts of NEMT, SSSC and Marine Architect Francois Vivier, with boat parts supplied by Jordan Boats in Cumbria.
Mr Vivier, the Marine Architect has produced mostly sailing craft over the years but one of his designs, Ebihen 16 Strip Planked Traditional sail boat of 4.8m water line length, almost matches perfectly what Dave Parker and other NEMT volunteers were building when the Colden Gleam was finally moved from St Peters Basin to the NEMT Workshop off Wapping Street.
Having worked on two St Ayles Skiffs in Amble, I knew that the kits provided by Jordan Boats, the Home of Plywood Boat Kits, were in the form of the planks and frames, cut from 2440mm by 1220mm sheets of very good quality marine ply of 9 or 12mm.
It appears that the rowing boats being built for the Sea Cadets was with the aid of a grant from UK Docks of £10,000 were similar to the St Ayles Skiff but with a central flat panel, rather than a keel running the length of the hull.
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