Fw: Tiare Taporo III

Hi,

This records some of the shoddy work done to our boat during its so-called refit at Waipapa/Kerikeri in 2007. We don't propose to say any more about it but we hope that it may serve to alert anyone proposing to have work done on their boat, particularly in the Bay of Islands, to be extremely careful. We are still in Bundaberg Australia waiting for our replacement watermaker pump. None of this would have been necessary had the supplier, Open Ocean Watermakers of Opua, been competent and above all honest. They were anything but and have fallen out with their Australian agents over similar issues. Fortunately we have found a stainless steel pump which we are able to use so the system will be reliable once that is installed.

Peter Busfield is the Director of the Marine Industries Federation of NZ and has replied to this email. In his reply he says that he has noted the various names and also that he will congratulate the Norsand Boatyard when he next talks to them! But none of the contractors we have complained about are members of his organisation so they are relatively toothless. The fact that they're not members need hardly come as a surprise! 

We can only hope that this warning at least saves someone from making a similar mistake.

Cheers again from us...............................

----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Jim Donald <tiare_taporo@yahoo.co.nz>
To: "info@bia.org.nz" <info@bia.org.nz>
Sent: Wednesday, 7 December 2011 12:52 AM
Subject: Tiare Taporo III

For attn: Peter Busfield

Hi Peter,

Not sure whether you remember me - Jim Donald -  I worked at "Busfields" around 1992-93 as a broker. Since then I have owned a liquor retail franchise on Waiheke Is. and a motel in Takapuna. Then moved to Kerikeri in 2004 and built a new house but unfortunately my marriage ended there and I brought my yacht to Whangarei for an extensive refit before finally embarking on  a series of offshore passages this year which is a work in progress! At the moment we are in Bundaberg, Queensland after a passage from New Caledonia and the intention is to go to Darwin next year and then on to Malaysia. Although we may go back to New Cal and Vanuatu before SE Asia - just another year in the scheme of things!

I have decided to write to you on a disappointing subject. It concerns the shoddy work that was done to my yacht in the BOI before bringing her to Whangarei in 2008. I realise that most, if not all the various contractors are not members of your organisation but felt that you should be aware of some of the issues in NZ's marine industry which are impacting on NZ's marine reputation generally. My boat is a classic 12 ton Gauntlet design - carvel planked 38' double ender. Designed in Britain in the 1930's by H.G.May and this one constructed in Wellington over 31 years being launched in 1978. Originally named "Reflections of Wellington", but I changed the name to "Tiare Taporo III" after a 110' schooner built in Auckland in 1913 for my grandfather, A.B. Donald who operated an island trading business in the Cooks and Tahiti for about 100 years until the 1970's when it was all sold. He died in 1922 and his sons and grandsons carried it on. I have been living on her on and off the hard for the last 3 years with my girl friend and this year we sailed from NZ to New Caledonia, circumnavigated NC and then came here to Bundaberg. The following is a chronicle of the work done over the last 3 years:

1) In 2007 when I was living in Kerikeri I decided to take the boat to Partridge Yachts yard at Waipapa to have work done to bring her up to scratch for offshore passage making. The work was to have included converting her to a cutter rig but they didn't understand what was required and that didn't happen.  Many things were either not done at all or were so shoddy that they had to be redone later in Whangarei. They built a fridge and freezer but it was so badly put together that an adjacent chart drawer was full of condensation from the freezer! Partridges subsequently removed  it from the boat in Whangarei and rebuilt it but this has only been partially successful and from expert opinion received since it appears that there is no vapour barrier and it will never perform satisfactorily. The performance of the freezer is still very unsatisfactory as it doesn't hold a sufficiently low temperature. So I'm faced at some stage with completely scrapping their efforts and starting from scratch with someone who knows what they are doing. There are many other issues too numerous to detail here.

2) Then there was the rig. Partridges stripped the mast and boom and then in conjunction with Northland Spars and Rigging put it all back together again with new wire rigging. It transpired that the mast fittings had never been constructed properly when the boat was first launched and when the boat arrived in Whangarei the starboard spreader was about to part company with the mast. It should never have been re-assembled as it was and at the very least I should have been made aware of the problems, particularly as it was well known that I wished to take the yacht offshore. The assessment at Whangarei was that the rig would never have survived even one Pacific Is. passage.

3) The final matter of note was a watermaker which had been supplied by Open Ocean of Opua while the boat was at Partridges. The main issue here is that OO used a brass headed high pressure water pump and other brass fittings which from information gleaned subsequently is an absolute no-no with HP salt water. The inevitable result has been that during our circumnavigation of NC the pump failed totally which severely affected our cruising plans. They claim that it's our fault for not always flushing the system with fresh water but we did do this most of the time and had we known how critical it was in view of the inherently unsuitable nature of the components we would have been more diligent. However, the fundamental problem is the useage of brass components and this has been confirmed many times by experts here in Bundaberg and Brisbane. The owner of Open Ocean, Terry Forsbrey has been appallingly rude and hung up the phone on me at one stage. He's even threatened to sue me for libel!!! I since made contact with his ex-agent in Australia (Brisbane) and they said he did the same to them! They are no longer his agent, not only because of this but also because of  his failure to honour warranty issues. I threatened to sue him but he knows this isn't going to happen because we are not in NZ and have no immediate plans to return. His business ethics are shoddy to say the least and the adverse publicity that he is receiving from his ex-agent and ourselves and no doubt other dissatisfied customers will be doing his business no good at all. More importantly, for NZ's maritime reputation generally all of this is doing a great deal of harm and we make no apology for our part in that because we feel a duty to other cruisers to warn them of the problems likely to be found with specific marine contractors in NZ.

On a positive note finally, we found more or less by accident a great company in Whangarei. This is the Norsand Boatyard where most of Partridge's work was re-done and other issues found and rectified. The yacht is now a true cutter and the performance is markedly improved as a result. The list of work is far too involved to go into here but suffice it to say that we have been totally saisfied with everything that has been done. So different from the Bay of Islands experience. In particular the shipwright at Norsand, Noel Barrott, has done superb work and he has a knowledge of wooden boats second to none. He has built many boats including 2 of his own. He has circumnavigated on both of them and for his exploits on the latter yacht he and his wife were awarded a medal from the Cruising Yacht Club of America - a most prestigious award. Later a similar award was presented to them by the Royal Akarana Yacht Club. 

This is a very condensed account of the problems involved with a refit that spanned 3 years and, had I taken the boat to Norsand at Whangarei in the first place, the total costs and time taken together with the considerable frustrations and eventual outcome would have been very different.

I daresay that there is nothing you can do about any of the foregoing but at least you are aware of some of the cowboys who are causing damage to NZ's marine reputation. For me, I am putting it all behind me as life is too short and I have a number of goals to acheive with our cruising plans while I still can.

With very best regards,

Jim Donald

s.v. Tiare Taporo III

Bundaberg Port Marina

Bundaberg

Queensland 4670.

P.S. My ex wife Sue (nee Tomkinson) was at school with your sister Pam and we used to see her and Garth whenever we passed through Whangarei en route to the Bay of Islands. They stayed with us up there at Paroa Bay on one occasion. Please pass on my regards to them when you next have an opportunity.