As a confirmed LesRo Rapier fan, I have been hoping to find a pocked sized version that could live more easily in the car so that if we should happen to stumble across a suitable stretch of water when out for a drive in the car with my wife ... I would just happen to have a classic model powerboat in the boot that I could take out and use - just to break the journey up a little
I am sure this thoughtful act would be greatly appreciated !
I have been hoping (without success) to find a Stiletto to restore for some months now, but nothing has come my way.
However, there could well be some light at the end of this tunnel as my friend Will has found (and bought) a Stiletto kit on eBay ...(why is it that everybody else spots these things and I seldom do?)........ but it was not exactly what he expected.
It turns out that his "kit" had already been built once and then taken apart and put back in the box!
Some of the parts have "lost their newness" and the keel has been snapped and part of it is missing.
When the Arrow and Stiletto were both current LesRo kits, my guess is that they both shared the same hulls - just like their bigger brothers Rapier and Javelin did?
Now as it happens, when I first returned to this hobby after so many years of absence, I treated myself to a new Arrow kit as I thought it would be a nice easy way to get myself reacclimatised - but that was just before "lock-down" and the discovery of a discarded Rapier that needed some TLC......so the Arrow kit never got started as other restorations followed that appealed to me more that starting to assemble this new kit!
Although my new Arrow kit is of the current re-engineered type (and is not an original LesRo kit) I am hoping that the shape has not strayed too far away from the original as Will is sending me his Stiletto "kit" and I am hoping to be able to make a new keel for him (using the Arrow keel for shape reference) - and replace any other parts that may be missing or broken with parts cut from nice new wood.
The idea is that I also make a copy of these parts for myself so that we will both be able to build a Stiletto each.
What could go wrong?...........