Lights and Moths! There's more than Mach 2's at McConaghy's in China

by John Curnow on 22 Jan 2010 In talking with McConaghy co-owner, Jono Morris recently, a lot more became apparent about how they got into China in the first place and what they're up to, now that they're fully established.

Since 2000, which was when Jono and Mark Evans took stewardship of the McConaghy brand, every time they were asked to price something that was a reasonable, small boat, it became apparent to them that the cost structures they were dealing with, just wouldn't make it cost effective. It was during 2005, whilst they were building Bob Oatley's Wild Oats XI that they had the opportunity to talk with a company in China about doing a joint venture.

'What got us interested in that, was that we'd been looking at trying to build our wheels (remembering that McConaghy's created the iconic Y-frame composite wheel back in the 80's) more cost effectively and had looked at different composite companies in Malaysia and other places. We kept running into dead ends with all of that, but it was an interesting learning curve in terms of how much cheaper we could make something elsewhere in the world', Jono said, by way of starting the story.

'As we had the opportunity to talk more with the company in China, they informed us that they were also keen to embark on boat building. We thought that it was an interesting opportunity and looking at the cost structure we would be dealing with there, it seemed to make complete sense.'

'At the time, we didn't think too much more about it, but reflecting on it now, it was a fairly big step to take. We launched into it and went through the usual learning curve. It was only through getting in there in the first place and being involved and making contacts in the industry, who somewhat ironically were in fact Chinese, that we could get to the bottom of the whole thing.'

After about 18 months, McConaghy's grew out of the situation and set up their own company in China. 'It's what they call a wholly owned foreign entity, so we're now completely independent. We learnt a lot very quickly out of the whole thing and we're in a much better shape now that we're in control of our own destiny, to a certain degree.'
Mark Evans is in China full-time. The wheels may well have been the catalyst and the launching pad for the whole thing, but there were some 50 to 80 footers and other vessels too, which also came out of the whole process very quickly. In addition to being where John McConaghy started the business some 40 odd years ago, Foiling Moths were also definitely part of the equation for moving into China.

'We've kicked off with our own Foiling Moths designed by Andrew McDougall. They're called the Mach 2, as used by the reigning World Champion, Bora Gulari, who also recently cracked the elusive 30knot barrier aboard his own Mach 2. They're a very complex little boat; so ultimately turning them into a production item has been a great achievement. With the McDougall designed, McConaghy built Mach 2, I think we've been able to take Foiling Moths to another level all together.'

'Part of the reason we want to be involved in the Moth thing, is not that it generates any money for us, it's just that it's where the company started. It's what John McConaghy started', an enthusiastic Jono commented.

'We didn't realise it at the time, but John actually called the second Moth that he built, the Mach 2, as well. It's quite funny. For us now, the Mach 2 and the Foiling Moth stuff is so much about pushing the boundaries, not only in the construction, but with the design too. It pushes us all the time to come up with solutions and better ways of building things stiffer and lighter. It really is cutting edge stuff, which is important for us. I think it really is a good flagship to have and shows that we can cover all sections of the boat-building spectrum.'

'We saw the potential of the China plant for Foiling Moths from day one. The beauty of China is that the Mark 2s are now built without any expat involvement at all. They are all now built by Chinese people, who started with us three years ago and have come through the whole system.'

Now they know exactly what they're doing and the quality control is up to standard, so everything is just perfect. I know that to try and achieve that in Australia would be near on impossible, because there's a slightly different mentality here in Australia, where people want to learn the process and once they've learnt it, they want to go onto something else. Alternatively, in China, once they get the process they're happy to keep repeating and doing the same thing and achieving the same standard every time', Jono commented.

'Probably the only area that we will be developing further with Andrew McDougall is the foil design and trying different foil alternatives. I think eventually there will be a Mark 3 Foiling Moth, but at the moment the Mach 2 has solved all the obvious problems. As the Moth is such a development class, we will definitely want to stay at the leading edge of all that', was how Jono finished talking about the Moths.

'We are also doing Greg Elliott's 6m boats for the Women's Match Racing at the 2012 London Olympics. These were first used at Kiel Week in 2009 and have been on delivery to competing nations since late last year. Naturally, these are strict One Design vessels, definitely similar to the original Elliott 6m's, but with changes to the hull shape and keel, yet with carbon rigs and smaller sail areas etc. Sailors think the boats are very quick and responsive, which is just perfect for Match Racing.'

Previously, McConaghy co-owners Jono Morris and Mark Evans said, 'We're thrilled to be working with Greg Elliott and ISAF to provide these fantastic yachts for the London 2012 Olympic Games. It speaks volumes about McConaghy's versatility, dependability and quality.

Not only do we make the winningest Maxis in the world, but through our China facility, we're able to produce these strict one design yachts quickly, efficiently and on budget!' All of which is very important when you need to have a level playing field for all the countries concerned.

However, these are not the only small boats to come out of the McConaghy Chinese factory. There were also 52 Melges 20s built, before cessation of production of those boats.

It is also true that there is also a lot of componentry being worked on in China, in addition to the carbon fibre steering wheels. McConaghy's make composite tube, pre-preg tube, masts and some uber-cool boat items. Jono informs us, 'We did all the masts on the Melges 20s, and so we've got a full set-up there for building smaller sized masts. No, not like the Maxis or anything, but we are doing a new bowsprit for Neville Crichton's 100 foot Alfa Romeo II, at the moment. We're also developing a new carbon winch handle, several passarelles out of carbon, one off rudders along with some high tech bits and pieces.

'As you know, we are building a range of our iconic Y-frame wheels in China. We've got about eight designs including a new powerboat wheel that we're just tooling up for at the moment. It is in carbon fibre and a similar design to our yacht ones, but would fit onto a powerboat steering head. Neville just won a personalised one as part of the McConaghy Cup in the Rolex Sydney Hobart Yacht Race.

'I suppose supply as original equipment was where we were thinking we'd like to get to, but we want to get the product up and running first. We want to be able to get it on a few boats, so that we can offer it as an accessory more than getting it into standard equipment on a Beneteau or the like, at this stage. We have adapted all our designs on the wheels and everything, so that we can come up with a system whereby we can retrofit our wheels to any production boat, cost effectively.

'The way that the hub has been designed is quite clever. We can use slightly different adapters in the hub to suit basically any brand of pedestal. We can then adjust the offset, so that it aligns with the wheel well in the boat. This is the clever part, as what you end up with is that even with the same steering head, different boats have a slightly different positioned wheel well, relative to where the steering head is situated, depending on what design of wheel they've had on there in the first place. We needed to make it pretty universal. It's taken us a while of going backwards and forwards, trying our wheels on different boats, in order to be able to come up with something that we hope we've covered nearly all the scenarios' said Jono with a smile that covers the many yards it would have taken to get there.

'We're finding it more and more the case, that the Chinese are taking things like build drawings on themselves. Australia is the R&D base - this is where we've nutted out all the processes over the years and resolved construction issues. Then we take it to China and say ‘Here's the answers to the problems. Can you guys turn it into a process?' A lot of the stuff we're doing down here now, things like passarelles or a new wheel design, we then ship up as prototypes.

'Steve Moxham, who's our main sculptural guy, will shape up a new wheel, we'll send it to China and they'll scan it, mill the mould and ultimately, put it into production. A lot of the feel for what we're making and that we want to produce is still done in Sydney. It may be where we develop the feel or form of what we want to produce, but from a cost point of view, it wouldn't be sensible to roll into production. No one would ever buy productionised things built in Sydney anymore, given the cost of doing it here', said Jono, as he finished that section.

This is to say nothing of the architectural and mining industries, which McConaghy also serve. They are buyers of many of the high-tech bits and pieces (lightweight, yet fiercely strong composite constructions) Jono referred to earlier.

You would be justified in thinking and wondering exactly what a global leader in the marine business is seeing of the whole industry at present. Jono had this to say about all of that.

'We're innovating, not only in terms of getting product out the door, but what Mark and I started to appreciate five years ago, was that we needed to keep innovating on the business front as well.

'The days of just employing guys to come in and sand boats on the factory floor was really not going to last forever, not while there were emerging markets like China out there. We've tried to take the innovation that's always been applied to the product and boats, keep that rolling and then also apply it to the business overall, so that we can get cost-effective, world-class product out there, for as many people as we can', Jono finished with.

In the end, there are two things we can be certain of in relation to all of this.

Firstly, is that there will be more innovation coming our way from a company that has it imbued in their corporate culture.

Secondly, there will be more than just a few Moths hanging around the charity auction of a McConaghy built Mach 2, which is part of Audi Victoria Week in Geelong at the end of January.