At a great launching ceremony at the CSR Boat yard on the Seattle’s Ship Canal, Gordy and Judy Cole, and about 100 of their friends, launched their latest and quite possibly their very coolest project to date; the Cole 26 Slightly Dangerous. Gordy and Judy built the efficient Island Hopping commuter vessel as a quick way to get from Anacortes to their place on Lopez Island. Slightly Dangerous was designed by the ever clever Paul Bieker and built in Gordy and Judy’s garage in West Seattle in just over a year.
Leave it to Gordy (who btw taught Chip Hanauer how to drive a hydro) to come up with something new, different and very hi-tech when it came to putting SD together. He ordered up some 46 sheets of special Okaume aircraft plywood that were 4mm,6mm and 9mm in thickness which he imported from Holland and sent them to Branden Davis at Turn Point Design in Port Townsend. Eric Jolly from Bieker’s Riptide Design sent cad drawings to Turn Point Design and the magic began. Each piece was then NC cut, numbered and shipped on a pallet to Gordy in West Seattle.
Assembled with marine epoxy, SD came in at an amazingly light 2368 pounds. And that’s with twin outboards and a load of fuel. The outside finish is stunning including the graphics for the name which came from Gordy’s love of WWII history. The name Slightly Dangerous came from a famous P-38 that flew out of China during the war. The nose art was captured by Brad Cole over at Prism Graphics who removed the rivets that showed in the original and came up with, as usual, an outstanding piece for Gordy’s new yacht.
At launching the vessel floated perfectly on its lines and when fired up the first time, the Allison V-12’s (at least that what it says on the engines) thundered to life and Slightly Dangerous zipped away from the launching party. Scott Anderson from CSR confirmed for me that the outboards were in fact Allison V-12’s that did in fact have 12 cylinders that were really, really small.
All in all, a great party, with lots of friends and an outstanding new vessel for the Cole’s.
