Restoration & Refit

At Demon Yachts we can offer an extensive range of craft repair and refit services. From GRP and Composite to traditional wooden construction, our experienced and skilled team is able to complete a wide range of repair and refit jobs.

GRP and composite repairs

We work with a wide range of epoxy resins and solid or covered laminates. We are highly experienced in using the full range of materials from traditional glass-fibre to vacuumed, resin-infused, and carbon reinforcements.

Marine Electronics

We provide a first-class professional service to customers requiring electrical and electronic work on their boats. Work can be carried out on-site at the boatyard in Aldeburgh, or afloat on the River Alde.

Mechanical Engineering

As with marine electronics, we provide a full service of mechanical repair and installation on site at the yard or on the river. We are also pleased to be a Torqeedo agent.

Rigging

We provide a full rigging service for all types of boat, either here in the yard, or afloat on the river.

Using trusted partners to provide specialised services such as marine electronics and mechanical engineering enables us to deliver a full range of repair and refit facilities to boat owners whilst at the same time keeping costs to a minimum without sacrificing quality.

Restoration

For many years Demon Yachts and the Aldeburgh Boatyard have between them maintained a well-earned reputation for first-class shipwright and joinery skills, and this tradition continues today. Experienced in traditional boat building and classic yacht repairs, including planking and re-caulking as well as replacing cold moulded veneers, our team of boat builders is committed to delivering high quality workmanship.

Recent examples include:

“Powder Monkey”

“Firebrand” – an S&S gentleman’s offshore racer

This beautiful example of an offshore classic came to us when the owner bought her from the late Ed Dubois. We were provided with a clear specification by the new owner to optimise her and refit her ready for racing. Work undertaken included:

New cockpit
Additional two quarter berths built on either side of cockpit
New chain plates
New spars with all rigging
New deck layout design incorporating completely new deck gear
Electrical systems replaced including all lighting
Decking restored
New lockers installed
Engine removed, serviced and replaced.
New wiring and fuel tank.

This work was completed in 4 months by the team in the yard and the owner was delighted to get her back ready for racing in the 2017 south coast regattas. We were all delighted to hear that the hard work had paid off as she won 1st in class for the 2017 Charles Stanley British Classic Week.

“Scallywag” – a 6mR

“Scallywag” started out in life as “Perspicacious”. She was commissioned by Gayle Post and built in San Diego in preparation for the 1979 World Championships in Seattle. The boat was finished late and received her certificate just days before the regatta started in September. “Perspicacious” was in good company at the regatta with other 1978/1979 Gary Mull designs, including “St Francis VII” (USA 108) and “Ranger” (USA 112). She ended up 10th out of 25. The team also competed at the 1983 World Championships at Newport Beach, California, the owner’s homeport, and was placed 9th of 15 in that Pacific Ocean series. Gayle then shipped the boat to Europe to race her in various regattas and ended up selling her in Cannes in 1985. She eventually made her way to the UK with the name “Scallywag”, and sadly fell on hard times. Fortunately she was rescued from being broken up after being found in Cowes for the St Francis Yacht Club 6mR team.

At that point she came to us at Demon Yachts so we could give her the full treatment to get her back to her original performance, speed and beauty in time for the 2017 World Championship in Vancouver.

As can be seen from the picture, “Scallywag” has come from near destruction to live on to fight another day. At the 2017 6mR World Championship “Scallywag” ended up 7^th overall out of a fleet of 24, and won the Nelson Trophy, awarded to the highest-placed boat among those first constructed and certified as a Six Metre between 1966 and 1979, which have had no alteration to their underwater shape other than permitted modifications to the rudder.

“Abu” – a 6mR

“Abu” was designed and built by Johan Anker for his own use. In her first year, Anker won the Scandinavian Gold Cup at Gothenburg with her, selling her to Magnus Konow at the end of the season. In 1932 Magnus Konow won both the Scandinavian Gold Cup and the One Ton Cup, before selling her on to A.E. ʺDaddyʺ Lees in England. He raced her at Burnham‐on‐Crouch for two years without success, before disposing of her and she did not race again. She was converted to a cruiser and remained in the Solent and at Brighton until around 1995, when she was sailed single‐handedly to the East Coast of England. In July 2003, while on a family picnic, Tim Street found her sitting very forlornly under a torn cover in the grass on the side of a road in Essex. He located the owner and shortly afterwards bought her. She then spent two years undergoing restoration at the Aldeburgh Boatyard in Peter Wilson’s care, and finally completed, including her vintage winches (ex-“Titia”) fitted.

Extraordinarily, after such a very long gap, most of her hull was found to be in excellent condition, with only some repair to the horn timber, the replacement of some frames and a new deck being necessary.

There had once been a fire in her galley, whose scars necessitated the replacement of short lengths of planking, together with part of the beam shelves. She has had a beautiful light‐weight Sitka spruce deck fitted and the hull is currently painted off‐white. Once the restoration was complete she was launched at Aldeburgh for trials, before being moved to the Solent for racing.

Earlier restoration projects completed by the Aldeburgh Boatyard include:

“If” – an 8mR

In 2000/1 Peter Wilson and his team carried out major restoration work on “If”, an 8-Metre racing yacht designed by the great Bjarne Aas in late 1929, and then built and launched at his yard in Fredrikstad in 1930. The work included completely re-planking and re-framing the boat, adding metal angle frames to increase stiffness and strength. Peter immediately sailed “If” down to Cowes to take part in the America’s Cup Jubilee Regatta held in August 2001. Thereafter he campaigned the boat on the world 8-Metre circuit annually, sailing the boat to and from the venue wherever possible. Destinations included France, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland and Finland, as well as the Clyde in Scotland.

In 2017 Peter sold “If”, and Demon Yachts was asked by the new owner to prepare her before she was shipped to Norway. Click here to read more about “If”.

“Zest” – a 20 sqm Tumlare

“Zest” was the first of a number of Tumlare yachts brought to the UK by Roger de Quincy and friends. De Quincy was a close friend of Uffa Fox, who describes the design by Knud Reimers as ‘a very advanced type of cruiser … the most advanced type of cruiser in the world’ . Reimers himself said he regarded the Tumlare as his best design. “Zest” was lent to Adlard Coles just before the outbreak of WW2, and his experiences are described in his book, ‘Sailing Days’.

In 2009 “Zest” was discovered in a marina shed in Dumbarton where she had been laid up for at least 10-15 years. Prior to that she had a considerable amount of repair work done by David Spy, a local boatbuilder and model-maker, including completely re-ribbing and re-framing her, replacing her old galvanised steel floors with solid oak, and fitting a new coachroof and ply deck. She was brought by road to the Aldeburgh Boatyard (which is where she was first located when she arrived in England in 1935!). Peter Wilson found that it was necessary to remove the lead keel and re-fasten it with new bronze bolts, and at the same time the hull was stripped back to bare wood. At this point, following a discussion with yacht designer Ian Howlett, who owns “Jill”, another Tumlare, the outside of the now faired hull was coated in epoxy, a polyester film of Diolen laid in, and then epoxied and faired again. Finally, the bottom was coated with CopperCoat. The result of this treatment is that Zest does not leak! Zest has gone on to win her class in a number of classic and other regattas, including winning overall in the 2015 Suffolk Yacht Harbour Classic Regatta. Zest continues to be maintained by the Aldeburgh Boatyard.