INVESTIGATOR 563

Hi Sean, if you are still viewing the forum I have sent you a new PM
Ozzie

Giday Ozzie, (and Sean), I've found Sean's boating blogspot site last "Whispering Wind" (I563) post was in 2019 when he sold her (with some cruising boat schemes for future),

https://seansboating.blogspot.com/2019/ ... ve-on.html

(There is a link to his "Tammie Norrie" that he built in the UK as well. last post in 2012.)

https://seansboatbuild.blogspot.com/?view=magazine

Cheers

Thanks Andrew. Interesting the link to his blog in his signature doesn’t seem to work but your longer url works fine . Read his blog and it’s interesting . Totally agree with his idea on retirement I’ve never met anyone who retired and said to me “wish I’d kept working “ but other than financial reasons I’m sure there are. My wife retired early as I was retired. Our financial advice was after 5 years you won’t notice the difference and they were right. You can’t buy back a second of your life . Anyway thanks for link.

Ozzie, Andrew and Sean, FYI, Whispering Wind Investigator #144 is currently undergoing a full refit, re-rig, and refurb at Milton 2538.
Such great little boats. I am enjoying the process.

Cheers

Tony Marshall.

Gidday Tony, great to hear that your refurb of Whispering wind is going well.

My only visit there, Wairo beach sand dunes in 1960's on a familtly EH Holden road trip, amazing coastlines and country.

Recently repairing the deck core on 49yo Teria, she will be solid, epoxy injection method.

Good luck with the resto,

Great to hear Tony. It’s always great to see these amazing vessels being refurbished and given a new life rather than relegated to landfills like so much of our disposable society these days. I was trying to contact Sean to see if he had any fruit looking for a new investigator. He’s owned two before and sold them due to os posting but is looking for a third one now. Testament to the boat I guess. Please post some pics of your renovation. Always inspiring.

Hi Tony, Andrew and Ozzie, sorry for missing your posts.... I purchased Whispering Wind in 2015 and sold her via a brokerage in 2017, and then I put a deposit on her in Christmas 2024 when I just noticed her on FB Marketplace, but quickly realised I do not have time or space for an i563 at the moment and so I forfeited my deposit and am glad she found a good home.

I wish Tony all the best with Whispering Wind, the boat is great design (I'll be getting another when I can) and some of the individual virtues I enjoyed about her was the tilting tiller, the little home made galley in the cabin, how dry she was, and the strong single axle trailer (all features I would look for again in future). The major task I completed in my short ownership was to drop the centre plate for sandblasting and re-gal, then refitted to get rid of slop in the fittings I posted about this with pictures on this site at the time). I did notice some water getting into the keel-box but was never able to identify the source before I sold her. I priced up sails and would have purchased from Rolly Tasker if I'd kept Whispering Wind. The outboard (Yamaha 4stroke 6hp?) was a very sweet engine, nice and quiet and fuel efficient, but a bit too heavy for my feeble back so I added a cheap Chinese 2-stroke long-leg 2.5hp to her for lake sailing - much easier to lift.

I sailed Whispering Wind on Lake Burley Griffin (she was parked mast-up at Canberra Yacht Club), and took her on road trips to Broken Bay, Newcastle Harbour, Lake Macquarie, and to Batemans Bay a number of times.

Hope all goes well with the rebuild and cleanup Tony! I'll be watching with interest.

Cheers
Sean

Thanks for your update Sean, and hope that one day you can get another Investigator. They are definitely very safe and fairly comfortable for 18 footers. Had a look at your Tammie Norrie build blog, that plank-up looks like advanced wood epoxy boatbuilding and an intersesting saga moving her around as she was being built too. Cruising dinghy's like that are rare gems in Australia and are a nice weight and size to manage.

I've owned a few wooden dinghy's ages ago, and fixed them up a bit (but never built one), it's a very workable material. Might get a small wooden day-sailer in future (and keep Investigator for multi-day trips. Cheers