The Bermuda Sloop Foundation?s (BSF) idea to build a ?mock-up? of its traditional 88 foot Bermuda schooner struck many in the Island?s sailing fraternity as a intriguing notion. Many seamen, in fact, had never heard of a mock-up being done before said Travis Burland who is one. But with the construction now complete, the advantages of putting up a full scale model of the ship?s interior have become tangible, both in terms of practicality and real savings.

At last week?s open house at the BSF?s sail loft in Dockyard was taken on a guided tour of the mock-up with two of its builders, Zander Kirkland and Travis Burland. And with the help of a little imagination, the pair of young Bermudians helped to turn a rough-board model into the shape of grand things to come for the BSF.

Built out of board and ply wood and panelled with cardboard, the model is meant to be low cost and functional. Sitting inside the BSF?s sail loft it is certainly not expected to withstand any high sea battering nor to look very pretty, the two builders say. But it does serve a highly practical purpose in allowing the BSF to rework the design of the ship?s interior; an exercise which may have saved the charity a good deal in the long run.

?We figure we?ve made between $500,000 and $750,000 in changes just by building the mock-up,? says Travis. That?s how much was saved by tinkering with the mock-up?s layout and not having to make the same changes to the interior of the real boat once it was done, he says.

?Ripping up something here in the mock-up just means taking some screws up and moving it somewhere else. But in the real thing, after it?s finished nicely, it?s going to cost you around ten grand just to move a small detail,? Travis added.

And that is the point of the mock-up, the pair explained.

It?s a technique to physically evaluate the design of the ship?s living spaces before the first boards of the real ship?s interior are put into place. And since this vessel is going to be serving a specialised purpose as a training ship for Bermuda?s youth, every nook and cranny on board had to be well thought out. Optimum use of space was central for this design, said Zander.

The mock-up is only a small part of the BSF?s grander scheme of introducing a sail training programme to the Island for Bermuda?s youth. With a focus on experience based learning, the BSF hopes to touch as many as 1,500 Bermudian students each year with their day-long teaching modules. This is not to mention the 200 students who are slated to take part in lengthier expeditions or the 150 young people who will receive vocational training on board. But construction of the ship, which is not expected to be launched until September 2006, has only just begun at Rockport Marine Ltd., in Rockport Maine. This also means that there is plenty of time to implement many of the mock-ups redesign work.

In building the mock-up in the cavernous Royal Naval sail loft in Dockyard, the BSF were lucky to be able to fall back on the experiences of veteran mock-up builder, Paul Wolter. A German who served for many years in the Merchant Navy after losing his family during the Second World War, Mr. Wolter now lives and works in Maine. But for a few weeks this summer he guided the two young Bermudians in their task of piece by piece creating the interior. And having already hammered out 26 of these projects, Mr. Wolter had a few things to teach Zander and Travis.

But this is not to undermine what this pair had to bring to the table. This includes Zander?s experience as one of Bermuda?s top competitive sailors and Travis, also a sailor, who is trained as an engineer.

The threesome also had quite a bit of help from many local sailors. As their work progressed over the three weeks it took to finish the project, there was a constant stream of mariners who would stop by the sail loft and inject new ideas for the design.

?As we went along we changed things from the original design,? Travis said. ?As soon as we got the designs and started laying them out, we all said ?Wow, we have to change the whole aft section of the boat?.

?The mock-up really lets us get an idea of the the ergonomics of the design, just to see if you can walk through this passage, if you?re going to trip on these steps, see if the kids are going to be able to fit past the engineer?s cabin,? Travis says as he pointed towards some steps in the aft section.

Then, turning to the engine area of the mock up, he said: ?They had designed the engine underneath the floor where you would have to lift up the floor and lean down to get in to it. So we changed that all around and put a full engine room in there where students can go to work and learn in a big open space. So its more user friendly for kids, and makes it safer and more of a working a ship

?And not a yacht,? Zander added adamantly.

The difference being for this ship is that it won?t be serving any luxury purposes, said the pair. The original design left a great deal of open space which wouldn?t be useful for teaching the technical skills the BSF hopes to encourage. Now, thanks partially to their redesigning, the entire layout of the ship will be more ?practical, spartan and functional?, making sure that the ship is best suited for teaching.

?Everything aft of the main room was completely redesigned. The engine room was redesigned and relocated. We wanted a big engine room where you can get a bunch of kids so we changed that to make it better for teaching,? Travis said.

?We also created crew quarters for the engineer and first mate, separate from the kids. We changed the location and design of the captain?s room giving it more private space.?

But even that serves a practical purpose. With a closed off room, the captain will have a place for private meetings as well as somewhere to pull students aside individually.

?The navigation area was relocated completely,? Zander said.

?Before they had this far forward,? he commented ?It was designed as a yacht in that way. So there were some changes that had to be made to make it more hands on for the kids.?

?We made sure in the navigation room that we would have good visibility for the people steering the boat. With steps leading to the deck and steering wheel.

?That way you can navigate and talk to the person at the wheel who can ask, ?hey look, what course am I steering? and the person below can give them instructions right away.?

Looking at the sleeping quarters one is certainly given an idea of what the youngsters have to expect for expeditions:

?There?s going to be 12 individual bunks, here. It?s pretty big, eh?,? he said pointing out the sleeping quarters towards the bow. Here tiered bunks have been laid out in rough board to show where the crew will sleep in sets of threes. Adding to the notion of a ?real? life at sea?, Zander and Travis promise that the room will ultimately have hammocks to bunk a few more crew members.

Ultimately the 88 foot vessel is expected to sleep 26, Travis said. ?And then when we go to sea this will all become storage where we can put sails and such.?

Moving aft, we pass the plywood cut outs of two heads which lie opposite each other. As with the rest of the mock up, Zander and Travis tried to give a full scale representation of the complete interior, including in this case, a toilette and sink in the compact spaces.

Moving past a pillar, which the guys say is one of the ships masts, we entered what will be the main living and learning area.

?There will be classrooms, bunks and a kitchen in here,? Zander said, pointing out the largest space in the mock-up. At a total of 16 by 26 feet this is where students will gather for group instructions with a wall-mounted, flat-screen monitor and a large table in the centre of the room.

Pointing out a waist high wooden box sitting near the galley corner, Zander said this was going to be a deep freeze. Another box with four black rings drawn on to the wooden top was a stand in for the ship?s stove.

?There?s only four burners on here now, but there will be eight ? I hope,? he said reminding himself just how many students are going to be using the kitchen when the sloop is finally complete.

?It was an absolutely fulfilling experience,? Travis said after showing us around. ?You learn so much from doing one of these mock ups and on paper, its awesome and inexpensive.?

?I don?t think that many people do them, though. They really should.?