Gone: For auction June 2024: Kingfisher 26 (Chichester UK)

  • 18 May 2024 18:24
    Message # 13358602

    Hi all,

    I saw this listing from Chichester harbour; they are having one of their periodic sales of abandoned boats.  And one of them is a 23' or 24' junk rigged boat, with a wind vane.  This could be a very nice purchase if the price is right.

    Name: Dark Lady,  Length: 7.3m, Bilge Keels, GRP

    see picture attached

    For details of the auction and the catalogue, see here: https://www.conservancy.co.uk/boat-auction-2024/

    See Lot #19.

    1 file
    Last modified: 20 Sep 2024 18:18 | Anonymous member (Administrator)
  • 18 May 2024 19:54
    Reply # 13358620 on 13358602
    Anonymous member (Administrator)

    It's listed as 7.3m but it looks seems to be a Kingfisher 26 which would be just a few cms under 8m.

    Last modified: 19 May 2024 09:14 | Anonymous member (Administrator)
  • 19 May 2024 16:25
    Reply # 13358772 on 13358620
    Anonymous wrote:

    It's listed as 7.3m but it looks seems to be a Kingfisher 26 which would be just a few cms under 8m.

    Chichester is a long way from my home in Plymouth.

    Any idea what condition she is in and engine if any members 

    are taking a look please ?

  • 22 May 2024 20:50
    Reply # 13360445 on 13358602
    Anonymous member (Administrator)

    I'm afraid I know no more about the boat than is in the auction listing.

    But she's got to be worth a punt.  She has a mast and what looks like a sail - that's worth a few bob.  And, if the photo is to be believed, a wind vane steering apparatus.  Again, worth a bit.  And the hull can't be that bad, as she's floating.  So even if no engine, and just a bare hull - with the rig and vane, she's worth a bit.  If I didn't already have too many boats I'd be seriously considering her myself.


  • 23 May 2024 10:21
    Reply # 13360669 on 13360445
    Anonymous wrote:  If I didn't already have too many boats I'd be seriously considering her myself

    Same here. I once had a K26, a solidly built boat that felt reassuring at sea. Their only weakness is the keels. They are strongly fitted, with 20 ½" stainless steel set screws fastened through steel plates glassed inside the hull. I don't know of any failures ...  But the hollow keels are fabricated out of 3mm mild steel plate and contain poured lead ballast. The remaining void served as fuel tanks. In almost all cases, internal corrosion has made these unusable. I filled them with oil, capped the filler and suction pipes off and led an expansion pipe up from the breather tube. Treatment of external corrosion with an angle grinder, fertan and repainting was an annual chore. Blasting would have been better, but not many yards permit this nowadays, and I don't know how the blasting contractor might avoid damage to the fibreglass hull. In spite of this weakness, she carried me to the West Indies and back, then to West Africa and Brazil. Built in 1968, Antares is still afloat under her present ownership, in North Wales.

    Last modified: 23 May 2024 14:57 | Anonymous member
  • 18 Sep 2024 16:32
    Reply # 13408097 on 13358602

    Does anyone know who got this boat?? 

  • 18 Sep 2024 17:18
    Reply # 13408112 on 13408097
    Anonymous wrote:

    Does anyone know who got this boat?? 

    I went and had a look. Years of neglect had taken their toll and there was a good deal of dirty water inside her. 5 minutes spent down below sufficed to make me decide not to proceed. If nobody else wanted her, I think it likely she was broken up.
  • 20 Sep 2024 06:52
    Reply # 13408756 on 13358602

    Ahh . That’s a shame. 

       " ...there is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in junk-rigged boats" 
                                                               - the Chinese Water Rat

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