SUPERSAIL WORLD 80 JULY-SEPTEMBER 2018
work in composites, buoyed during the 1980s and 1990s by a
burgeoning IOR scene with an appetite for a competitive edge.
Cleverly, Green and King copper-bottomed the business by
winning an RNLI contract in 1986 to build composite lifeboats,
allowing the company to ride the ups and downs of one-off
yacht building for 20 years before this part of the business
was sold to the RNLI.
It’s a model that Geoff Stock intends to adopt at
Fibre Mechanics. He was a trainee accountant with a love
for sailing when he joined Jeremy Rogers in 1979. The
company was based in the same Waterloo Road factory
that Fibre Mechanics now occupies. It was building
successful one-off race boats, Contessas and the ill-fated
OOD 34, the progress of which was dramatically slowed after
the Fastnet Race disaster of 1979, in which a number of the
class foundered.
Stock went on to join Green Marine in 1983 and was
involved in the construction of a string of IOR yachts like Giant
Panda, Nitissima, Fujimo, Panda 85 and Thumper.
As Green expanded, yachts like Stealth (Fiat car companypatriarch Gianni Agnelli’s 1996 Frers sloop, which was
considerably ahead of her time), Peter Harrison’s Sojana,
Mike Slade’s Leopard, the Volvo 60 Intrum Justitia, America’s
Cup monohulls for Prada and Mascalzone Latino and many
others came their way. It wasn’t until they were asked to build
the hull of the Bill Tripp-designed 88ft cruising yacht Shaman
in 1995 that their attention was drawn to the possibilities
that lay in yachts outside the grand prix arena. In those
days Shaman was a big boat. It was the beginning of the
superyacht boom.
More recently, before and since Green Marine’s acquisition
by the Dutch superyacht builders Vitters in 2010, yachts
like the Luca Brenta-designed Ghost, the Tripp-designed
Cinderella, the Philippe Briand-designed Inoui, race boats like
Jetou and Ran 2, the Wallycentos Hamilton (n ow Open Season)
and Galateia have typified an output matched by few other
builders of high-performance yachts.
Co-owners of Fibre Mechanics include Adrian Gillitt, the
company’s projects director, who has been in the composites
yacht building business for 17 years and was responsible
for the engineering management of the Volvo 65 one design
fleet. As senior project manager at Green Marine, he was also
responsible for the build of Ran 2 and Galateia.
Gary Vaughan, in charge of production and operations at
Fibre Mechanics, was Green Marine’s production manager
for 18 years, responsible for the RNLI building programme
and yachts like Jethou and a number of TP52s, including
Cristabella, Patches, Container and Ran 4.
Eliot Thorne is the company’s design and engineering
manager and also owns Thorne Design, a naval architecture
and engineering firm. He was senior design engineer at Green
responsible for systems engineering, machinery specification
and layouts.
Marcus Attridge handled the build management for
more than 70 components for the Volvo 65 one design
fleet and in his new role oversees structures for foils,
rudder shafts, keel boxes and parts for cruising yachts
up to 66 metres.
James Day is a technical consultant to Fibre Mechanics,
and was heavily involved in the detailed specification for
the Volvo 65 one design fleet when he was at Green Marine.
He was also responsible for the Nigel Irens-design 78ft
catamaran Allegra while he was there.
There can be few composite boatbuilding teams that
can boast such depth of experience. If Fibre Mechanics can
gain a foothold in the superyacht world with this technology
it could completely change the way large composite yachts
are built.‘There can be few composite
boatbuilding teams with such
experience. It could change the
way such large yachts are built’
THE FAST BLUEWATER
CRUISER SHAMAN WAS
A GROUNDBREAKING
PROJECT FOR GREEN
MARINE, THE START OF
THE SUPERYACHT BOOM
Fibre Mechanics has just been named as the second builder for the new
IC37 by Melges one-design class. The Mark Mills-designed keelboat is
a concept created by the New York Yacht Club, which has ordered the
first 20 boats for use in its Rolex Invitational Cup. Fibre Mechanics joins
Westerly Marine (California) as an official builder.