BACK TO THE FUTURE
Having been fascinated by batteries since he was a small boy and a keen sailor for a similar length of time, it was probably always inevitable that one day David Warren would have an electric-powered boat to explore his home waters around Tasmania.
In 2008, he built his first electric vehicle: a microlight with a hang glider wing. This was followed by an electric car conversion and an electric quad bike, which he built for a sheep farmer, before he was introduced to Andy Gamlin who, at that time, was running the Wooden Boat Centre – a boatbuilding school which also does commercial work – in Franklin, just south of Hobart. Both of them were interested in electric powered boats and so they came to an agreement whereby Andy would find an old boat for the Centre to restore and David would design and install the electric power, a 20ft displacement boat which, when completed, had a cruising speed of 5.5 knots. Andy, who officially owned the boat, kept her for about five years but it was David who used her “90% of the time”.
