| Tugboat technician |
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| Wednesday, 29 August 2007 12:09 | |||
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By Rebecca Aldous The Chronicle Aug 14 2007 Marine industry uses Ron Burchett’s intricate model tugs to train pilots and test new designs Building model tugboats extends far beyond child’s play for Ladysmith resident Ron Burchett. It is a passion, some might say an obsession, which has become a career that takes him around the world and has helped transform the tugboat industry. It all started when he was six years old. After following his father to the shipyard in Tofino, Ron was handed a yellow cedar block by one of the yard crew. The young Burchett was promptly told to carve a boat out of it and stay out of the way. Both of which he did, the first with great talent too. “Tugboats always intrigued me because they do something,” Ron says. After high school in West Vancouver, where Ron lived with his uncle and aunt, he returned to Tofino to work in the shipyard and on the tugs. All the while he was building model boats. With EXPO 86 in Vancouver, Ron’s work was thrust onto the world stage. In front of an enormous crowd, Ron demonstrated the precise maneuvers of his model tugboats. To prepare for the big event, Ron was busy gluing and sanding two years before the celebration. Amid the excitement of EXPO, he realized the full potential of his models. Soon after, Ron started building to-scale tugs for marine architects. The models are tested for design flaws. Ron then began to feed his own ideas on updating the tugboat industry to those designers. “My background of being a tugboat captain as well as running a shipyard worked well with the architects’ knowledge. It allows me to question design ideas,” Ron says. Currently Burchett is teaming up with marine colleges around the world to organize training using the model vessels. The models allow students to see first-hand what emergency situations look like. The control plan on Ron’s model tugboats are exact replicas of full size tugboat panels. “It is a natural evolution. I can see where these models can be used,” Ron says. Ron is also developing a common language that could be used in harbours around the world. To date, an international committee has been established to get the idea afloat. Communication between tanker pilots and the tugboat captains is vital, he says. “Escorting is such a fine art. It can be very dangerous,” Ron says. Each model tugboat Ron pieces together can take up to 700 hours of work. A few of the mechanical pieces – such as the Voith propulsion unit, which uses oar-like structures running vertically rather then a propeller – were custom-made by Ron and can be found nowhere else in the world. His finished models can run up to $70,000. Ron still finds time to enter model tugboat competitions, where he can hone his precision maneuvering skills. His children have also inherited Ron’s love of the sea ox. His son Alan won all five model competitions on the West Coast last year and his oldest son, Shawn, works with Island Tugs in Vancouver. With models completed, half-finished or in their nascent stages scattered around his house, it is easy to see Ron loves his work. Motor components have taken over his basement, his bathroom is also full of models awaiting their maiden voyage around the bathtub and in his sitting room his favourite tug, Seaspan Region, has her proud place beside the sofa. “The world is out there. You can dream and follow that dream,” Ron says. http://www.ladysmithchronicle.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=18&cat=43&id=1043635&more=0
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