Multi-Role Service Vessel Gets Refit

In addition to carrying out extensive GRP work and antifouling, Salterns removed, repaired, renovated, refitted and replaced, polished, painted and retouched to bring Jethou Flyer back to what her skipper describes as ‘concourse condition above and below deck’.

The yard planned and completed no fewer than 50 separate major boat repair and marine engineering tasks.

Salterns’ engineers repowered the vessel with a pair of Perkins Sabre M215C engines. They replaced the gearboxes, updated the fire suppression system, and generally refurbished every aspect of the boat’s electrical and mechanical systems.

The 14 ton, 3.8m beam vessel was built in 1994 by William Osborne at the Arun Boatyard in Littlehampton, and was fitted out as a pilot boat. A planing hulled boat with a modified round bilge, it spent its early years as the builder’s demonstration boat.

Jethou Flyer was acquired in 1999 by its present owner, Sir Peter Ogden, founder of Computacenter and The Ogden Trust, which helps bright children from low income backgrounds. It is in near constant use as a water taxi for people working on Jethou and as the essential support vessel for the Ogden family’s private island. The foredeck can carry up to 1,500kg of cargo, and extra fuel tanks were fitted when the present owner acquired it to carry 1,200 litres of diesel for the island’s generators.

Now back in the water, Jethou Flyer has a top speed of 21 knots when the cargo tanks are empty. This compares with a top speed of just 14 knots with the old engines. When Jethou Flyer’s tanks are full, it now turns in a top speed of 16 knots against an original 11 knots.

The majority of the work was undertaken in Salterns environmentally controlled undercover workshop to ensure that the refit was completed within the tightest possible timescale.

In addition to fitting the new Perkins Sabre engines, which were supplied by sister company, Golden Arrow Marine, Salterns engineers modified both M215Cs for an extra power take-off. The port engine’s mechanical water pump runs a fire hose that is housed in the stern locker, while the wheelhouse heaters and demisters are run off the port and starboard engines’ fresh water calorifier systems.