Re: [Paddlewise] Granta Folding boats

I'm waiting for some more detailed information on Friedel Meyer that might be 
forthcoming from the other side of the pond.

Jack Kissner actually started Folbot in Germany, already before his move to 
the UK. See: www.Folbot.com. Phil Cotton has an historical overview on the 
website.

Granta, Tyne and a couple of other folding boat builders were reasonably 
healthy in the UK well into the sixties, although it appears that they eeked 
out the latter part of their existence by reducing costs to the buyer by 
selling boats in kit form (thus avoiding having to charge a good part of the 
labor).

What did in some of these marvelous old companies was the advent of cheap 
outboard motors on cheap plastic hulls (rather than "cheap" fiber glass 
kayaks, as is often believed), which made "water sports with the family" much 
more convenient and comfortable (though a little less sporty?!?). 

In fact paddling on the whole only survived because of the emergence of 
cheaper plastic kayaks. This in turn has allowed a modern renaissance of 
folding boats (which the other Ralph has been documenting for the last decade 
of its growth on this continent).

As to why the Krauts would not have sold folding kayaks to the Tommies in WW 
II, I have no idea. Hey, they sold "equipment" to Iraq, Iran, Libya ... T34s 
(Russian tanks of WW II) were propelled by adapted aluminium aircraft engines 
made by Maybach (Germany!!) ... perhaps if more Brits had learnt to read the 
assembly instructions in German there might have been a market ... it worked 
in the USA, where at one point the German speaking population was almost as 
large as the English speaking part (ent ve are not too far behint zese 
dayss!!).

The Other Ralph
Ralph_at_PouchBoats.com
www.PouchBoats.com
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