Howth RNLI to Benefit from Dublin Bay Old Gaffers Zoom Session On Building Bray Droleen Dinghy

22nd November 2020

Classic boat-building from an 1896 design – the 12ft Bray Droleen built by Michael Weed of Donegal during a recent course at the Boat Building Academy in Dorset

The Dublin Bay Old Gaffers Association winter talks series on Zoom continues on Thursday (November 26th) with a deeper insight into a classic boat-building story that has featured recently on Afloat.ie

DBOGA member and a graduate of the Boat Building Academy in Dorset, Michael Weed from Donegal, will talk about the Droleen (Dreoilín), a one-class design dinghy built in the late 1890s for members of Bray Sailing Club. The designer was club member W Ogilvy, and the original builder was Foley of Ringsend.

The Droleen class was described by Henry Coleman Folkard in his international nautical bible "The Sailing Boat" of 1906 as being of "so safe and sturdy a form that they can carry their whole sail, without reefing, in almost any weather that an open boat can be out in".

Michael's talk will cover not just the origins and history of the class, but also the construction of the Droleen which he recently undertook with his colleagues at the Boat Building Academy.

DBOGA Fundraising for Howth RNLI: Pre-Covid, DBOGA listened to talks together at Poolbeg Y&BC in Ringsend while passing the Yellow Welly around for €5 donation for the RNLI Howth Branch, to which the Association recently paid €1500 from activities in 2019/2020. In Zoom Land, the DBOGA has to hand round the Yellow Welly Online, and the RNLI urgently needs funds.

Please click on www.justgiving.com/fundraising/DBOGAHowthLifeboat to donate your €5. Thank you.

The details of this Zoom meeting are:

Topic: Michael Weed Droleen Talk
Time: Thursday Nov 26, 2020 20:00
Link to join meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84992586133
Meeting ID: 849 9258 6133

Published in Dublin Bay Old Gaffers, Historic Boats, Dublin Bay

Published in Dublin Bay Old Gaffers

Tagged under

About The Author

WM Nixon

Email The Author

William M Nixon has been writing about sailing in Ireland for many years in print and online, and his work has appeared internationally in magazines and books. His own experience ranges from club sailing to international offshore events, and he has cruised extensively under sail, often in his own boats which have ranged in size from an 11ft dinghy to a 35ft cruiser-racer. He has also been involved in the administration of several sailing organisations.

We've got a favour to ask

More people are reading Afloat.ie than ever thanks to the power of the internet but we're in stormy seas because advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. Unlike many news sites, we haven’t put up a paywall because we want to keep our marine journalism open.

Afloat.ie is Ireland's only full–time marine journalism team and it takes time, money and hard work to produce our content.

So you can see why we need to ask for your help.

If everyone chipped in, we can enhance our coverage and our future would be more secure. You can help us through a small donation. Thank you.