The design for Velocette was settled. Going from lines drawings to a boat is quite another project. Jean Francois created the 2D lines drawings and a friend of his converted these to full 3D DFX files. I'm not a CAD guy so this still presented a hurdle.

Ocean Blue to the rescue. Derek and Leslie on Ocean Blue own a CAD software company Caddie. We had been sailing with them for over a year in French Polynesia. Derek and Leslie graciously gave me the full version of their program. What's more, they spent countless hours teaching me how to use it. Some say you can't teach an old dog new tricks. But with Derek and Leslie's gentle efforts, I learned some CAD basics.

The next step in the Velocette process was to build a model. Initially, I expected to build Velocette in New Zealand during the cyclone season. But that was going to be awhile, building a model became the next step. I carry a supply of 3mm balsa wood and thin plywood on Uproar and previously built a model of the 1936 Crandall Flyer racing boat. I decided to build a 1/6th scale Velocette, about two feet long.

With Caddie, I was able to scale the design down to 1/6th scale, pull off the sections and print them on paper. I glued these printed sections to balsa wood and cut them out. With the sections properly spaced and squared on a stick, I now had a mold to build the Velocette model.