Don’t get done – Get details

Following an enquiry from someone regarding a boat believed to be built by us, I looked through some boat sales on-line to see what’s about.

Within minutes, I’d found five boats. One was easily identifiable as a boat we’d built back in 1985 – the seller was claiming it was and 1987 but this is the miracle we commonly find when older boats come up for sale. That and the fact they become thicker! In fact we’d been out and had a look at this boat when it last came up for sale and found it to be in good condition with an excellent hull report. It was then in need of some work on the hatch frames but presumably this has now been done as the boat has had a complete repaint.

Two other boats were definitely not built by us. In fact one of them was on a well-known broker’s site and advertised as a David Piper, but when you clicked on the link for further details it actually said it was built and fitted out by another builder. This isn’t a criticism of the boat or the builder, but it’s not a David Piper. The photo of the other boat showed something a long way from a Piper and this was on a broker’s site too. I can’t believe that anyone would be taken in by it!

It would be very easy for a broker to contact us and check the details and yet hardly any do, they just get the customer to sign that the details are correct and get the boat on the market. One or two of the surveyors will contact us with a query and we welcome this.

We hold records of virtually all the David Piper (Boatbuilders) boats and can usually identify them given a few details. They all have David Piper numbers, which will have been known by the original owners and the traditional ones are more likely to have had that number on their signwriting at each repaint.

If you’re looking at a second hand one of our boats, you’re very welcome to get on to us and confirm the details. We should be able to confirm things like year of build, original thickness, stage of supply (bare shell, part complete or fully fitted} and lots of other interesting details. There’s no charge for this and once we’ve confirmed the details we can add any changes to our register.

As David Piper (Boatbuilders) we built boats from 1968 through to 2000, for which we have a register and each boat has a number.

Since 2000 all boats have had Hull Identification Numbers, which has made life easier, but not as interesting!

We can help.....Contact Dot Piper 
 

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