In the News
Young Brothers' molds are sold
With his latest acquisition, Stewart Workman of SW Boatworks in Lamoine, Maine, has doubled his number of boatbuilding molds.
After Thanksgiving in 2008, Workman took over the 34-, 36-, 38- and 44-foot molds of Beals Island, Maine, boatbuilder and designer Calvin Beal Jr.
At the end of 2009, he bought the molds from the Young Brothers boatshop in Corea, Maine, which has been closed for some time.
All of the Young Brothers boats were designed by Beal Island boatbuilder Ernest Libby Jr.
This isn't the first time Workman has thought about building hulls from Young Brothers molds.
"I toyed with the idea a while ago of buying the whole shop, but I didn't want to live there -- I worked down there years ago -- so I let it go. Then someone bought the property, was tearing the building down and getting rid of the molds."
He bought Young Brothers' 30-, 33-, 35-, two 38-, 40-, 42- and 45-foot molds.
Workman says while two or three of the molds have some age on them, they are "not in too bad of shape. I'm going to do some work on them, but I could get a hull out any of them." The 42-foot mold he describes as "like brand new," with only six hulls out of it.
He has had some calls about building boats from some of the molds.
It's not new, but there is a 38-foot Young Brothers boat in Workman's shop. It's owned by Lamoine lobsterman Dave Herrick and is undergoing some repair work.
The Julie Ann's 225-hp John Deere engine had to be pulled out and rebuilt. (Workman thinks the engine's demise was due to being over-wheeled.) To make room for an engine hoist to haul the John Deere out, the cockpit platform had to be removed and then rebuilt, as well as the winter-back.
While the engine was out and the platform removed, new fuel tanks went in the boat. A 2-inch shaft replaced the previous 1 3/4-inch one, and a new cutless bearing with a PYI dripless seal was installed.
SW Boatworks is building two Calvin Beal 38s. One is going to a yacht club and the second to a sport fisherman. Another 38 will go out of the shop as a kit boat, and Workman sold a Calvin Beal 36 that he had built as a spec boat to a sport fisherman. - Michael Crowley
