Heritage Boatworks Volunteers keeping busy with Wanda III projects
Heritage Boatworks Volunteers keeping busy with Wanda III projects
The talented team of volunteers at Heritage Boatworks are always busy helping with important projects for the steamships and MDC, but recently their focus has been on items for the Wanda III. Currently they are working on several finishing touches to complete the Wanda for relaunch. One of the bigger tasks has been adding safety netting to all of the railings around Wanda’s decks. The task of adding this special netting is more complex than it sounds. It all has to be precisely measured, cut, and then carefully threaded and attached to the many railings. The process started by the team making detailed templates of the areas to be covered and then building a work surface large enough to lay out all the materials for further measurements and cutting. This was done both on the ship and then at the workshop next to the steamship office. Once cut and ready, the netting had to be woven and tied along the rails. When asking about how the process was going, the comment back was that the team have now had a lot of knot tying practice! With the job nearly complete now, it really looks great. The colour and material selected fit with the look of the ship as best as possible. This may look like a simple job, but has taken an extreme amount of planning, coordination, and talent to complete.
The boatworks team is also busy with other projects for Wanda that include cleaning and polishing the antique gauges from the ship to go on display as part of the exhibit, refinishing tables and other furniture for Wanda, building a lifejacket box, and countless other tasks behind the scenes that are contributing to the success of the Wanda relaunch. We truly could not complete these projects without the amazing support of the Heritage Boatworks team!
Other recent projects by the boatworks team include: building a mast for Wanda, refitting the Wanda canopy, restoring the Wanda fenders, restoring the Segwun’s Phoenix, restoring Segwun gangway & cabin doors, cleaning & restoring the Wanda steam engine for display at MDC, and many more! Thank you boatworks volunteers!