Westerly 22 "Windrush" Sail No 81

In November 2004 the ownership was transfered to Mr & Mrs T Roberts, and Windrush is now based in North Wales

Windrush is a Westerly 22, which we believe was built around 1965. We know very little about her past. We came across her around Christmas 1998 and finally started the restoration of her in early May 1999. She had been partly converted to a Bermudan rig however the mast that came with her along with the fitting were not in our view satisfactory to make her fully seaworthy, so we have restored her back to Gunter rig.

The first photos are of her as she was when she first came out of the water. We believe that she may not have been out of the water for 4 years and possibly up to 12 years. (click on any thumbnail to see full picture).

We worked on Windrush throughout the summer of 1999 and stripped her back to a bare hull. We replaced the rubbing strakes along the edge of the gunwale and we restored much of the original wood on the top deck to it's former glory. The next pictures show her after having the rubbing strakes removed and then with the new replacements.

The inside was stripped bare and the interior was given a fresh coat of varnish. Once completed we then lined the inside with foam backed vinyl, this proved to be a difficult job and due to the nature of the material and glue was very much a once only shot at fixing. We finally found the best way of fixing around the windows was to remove the foam about 10mm further from the window, and then glue the complete sheet to the interior. Then once the glue had set cut the apature for the window. On our first attempts we cut the window first and suffered due to the vinyl stretching.

The following pictures show her mid September, the top side was then painted and the deck fittings replaced. Also the original (heavily crazed) Perspex windows have now been replaced with polycarbonate which should offer better durability and longevity.

As we headed into autumn we found the weather working against us, however Windrush was returned to the water during October.

8th October 1999, the big lift and finally Windrush was returned to the water. It was decided to keep Windrush on the boatyard pontoon during the winter thus allowing easy access for the on going restoration.

17th October 1999, and the new hatch cover was fitted along with the two new stern hatch covers and the duck boards in the cockpit. All these were manufactured from scratch by John.

The winter months prevented us from getting all the necessary work done on the exterior. However John was hard at work in the boat yard's workshop making the new spars, whilst at home he made cupboard doors, new entry steps and a new cabin sole.

By mid March 2000 we raised the new mast and set up some of the rigging. Our target was to have her on her permanent moorings at the top of Fareham Creek by the end of the first week of May.

On the 6th May 2000 (exactly 52 weeks from starting the restoration), we set off from the boatyard in Gosport to Windrush's permanent mooring at Fareham.

The spars now made we were able to order the new sails from Jeckyls.

Windrush sat on her mooring, which as the following pictures show dried out at low water.

Windrush was finally under sail on the 1st July 2000, almost exactly 14 months from the start of the restoration. We spent the day fitting the new sails and ironing out minor rigging problems. Then the breeze got up as the tide started to rise, allowing a gentle evening sail down Fareham Creek.

This gave Windrush her first journey under sail for many years. Although the wind was relatively light, gusting to a force 3, she handled well and was surprisingly responsive on the helm.

We would like to thank everyone who helped with the restoration of Windrush, especially John (Julie's father) who put in many hours of work whilst we were at our respective work places and also a big thank you to Bob McFetridge, who owns a W22 in Canada, for supplying so many measurements and answers to the questions we asked.