Wanganui Sailing Club gets New Zealand Community Trust funding for new outboard motors

Wanganui Sailing Club's new outboard motors will be safer and cheaper to maintain than the current ones that have been in use for almost 10 years. Photo / Supplied

Boats from the Wanganui Sailing Club will set sail next season with two new outboard motors courtesy of a $7000 grant provided by the New Zealand Community Trust.

With the season for school sailing coming to an end, Wanganui Sailing Club will soon bring the boats in from Pauri Lake and remove the old motors.

The club has been operating since 2010 for about four hours a day, five days a week, and has helped an average of 320 students a year.

Wanganui Sailing Club treasurer Bob Davies said the old motors needed maintenance.

"This had an impact on the costs of running the junior sailing programme, to make our lessons affordable to all, we need to minimise costs," he said.

"It's like anything, as you get a bit older, you get a bit crankier."

The Wanganui Sailing Club has been running the junior sailing programme, aimed at intermediate students, since 1999.

Mr Davies said the new outboard motors would have a single forward/back throttle control and electric start mechanism.

"This means safer control of the boats on the water in groups of children. One of the risks that we face when teaching students to sail is the propeller in the water with students swimming," he said.

"We need to be able to turn off the motor when sailors are in the water close to the motorboat, and the electric start will make this easier."

He said the club relied on grants such as this one.

"We're just trying to get students interested in sailing and encouraging them to take it up as a sport," he said.

"If we can get another 10 years out of these new motors, that would be great."