144 Boating New Zealand
tools. Politely, one can only describe it as organised chaos.
The mezzanine office with its expansive windows
overlooking the Tory Channel entrance looks like the perfect
spot to design boats. It’s littered with drawings, half models
and piles of boating magazines, including numerous copies of
Boating New Zealand.
Another shed houses the gardening and lawn mowing
equipment, along with the hull mould of a 9.1m powerboat
that Saunders had planned to put into GRP production, an
idea he’s since shelved.
Outside is just as interesting. There’s the decaying remains
of an old bach, a bit further along is a dead Hillman under a
pile of timber, while a clinker launch rests on top of another
one at the water’s edge. Rusty implements – tractor, concrete
mixer and a big winch – are all well past their best days.
There’s no proper slipway, but that’s not from choice. In
days past, the Council refused to allow Saunders to build a
slipway, so launching boats was done the old-fashioned way,
sideways on a cradle, using baulks of timber, caged rollers,
wedges and grease.
“It was hard work,” he says ruefully.
When he first arrived in the Sounds, Saunders took note
of the Perano family’s high-speed whale-chasing boats and,combined with his own research into planing hulls, began
refining his hull shapes for better speed and efficiency. While he
used to build his launches in two-skin kauri, in the interests of
time and labour savings he switched to plywood many years ago.
Getting back to the launches inside the shed, Saunders
has designed these himself and all feature the hard chine,
easily-driven shape he’s evolved over the past 60-odd years.
The hulls are warped V, with a fine, 35°^ entry flattening off to
15 ° at the stern. Due to their relatively lightweight plywood
construction and narrow beam, horsepower requirements are
modest. These hulls will all be fitted with stern-drives.
All three have been built on spec as Saunders rarely builds
to order. His preferred method is to build a boat to suit
himself then sell it when it’s finished, as opposed to dealing
with customer demands during the building process. “I don’t
need all that stuff,” he says.
The amount of work that Saunders has accomplished over
the years on the farm is staggering; more than 80 boats,
three sheds, a house, concrete retaining wall, paths, roads
and a wharf. Especially when you consider every piece of
material – timber, windows, roofing, boatbuilding supplies,
tools, concrete and shingle – has been shipped in by boat and
unloaded by hand.CLOCKWISE FROM ABOVE
Harold Saunders – still working
at 81; the shed’s interior with
mezzanine design office top
right; the Saunders launch JB
tied up at the wharf.