Machine Shop

The machine shop aboard MV Cape Don is a working room. A bandsaw, milling machine, and lathe sit on the workshop floor; spare parts, hand tools, and pipe racks cover the walls. When Brett Patman photographed it in 2016, the space was still in use, producing and repairing components as part of the vessel's ongoing restoration. MV Cape Don was built at State Dockyard, Newcastle, NSW, with her keel laid in 1961. She was launched on 28 May 1962 and completed in January 1963, with her maiden voyage on 29 March 1963. One of three Cape Class sisters designed by the Australian Shipping Board for the Commonwealth Lighthouse Service, she served for 27 years, supplying fuel, equipment, and stores to lighthouses and navigational aids along the Australian coastline. Her primary operating area was the WA and NT coastlines, with the vessel also working along Tasmania and eastern Australia. She carried a complement of 39 personnel and displaced approximately 2,140 tonnes. Power came from a 5-cylinder 2-stroke Polar diesel engine producing 2,000 BHP at 250 RPM. Cape Don retired from government service in 1990 as the progressive automation of Australian lighthouses through the 1980s rendered manned supply tenders redundant. After a period as a cargo vessel between Australia and the Solomon Islands and a spell laid up on the Clarence River, the vessel was sailed to Sydney and moored at Balls Head Bay, Waverton. She is now managed by the Sea Heritage Foundation and the MV Cape Don Society, maintained by approximately 20 active volunteers under a staged 10-year conservation plan. She is the sole surviving vessel of the entire Commonwealth Lighthouse Service fleet, registered on the Australian Register of Historic Vessels as HV000208. The machine shop captured here is part of what keeps that fact true.