Radio Direction Finder Receiver

The radio direction finder receiver sits on the bridge of MV Cape Don, positioned to give the officer of the watch a bearing on coastal radio beacons. Behind it, a door opens to the port bridge wing. The instrument is typical of mid-twentieth-century shipboard navigation: a dedicated receiver for fixing position by signal, working alongside the chart table and compass to keep a 76-metre steel vessel on track along coastlines that offered few landmarks and fewer safe anchorages. MV Cape Don was built at the State Dockyard in Newcastle, New South Wales. Her keel was laid in 1961, she was launched on 28 May 1962, and she completed her maiden voyage on 29 March 1963. She was one of three Cape Class lighthouse tenders designed by the Australian Shipping Board for the Commonwealth Lighthouse Service, the others being Cape Moreton and Cape Pillar. She is the only one of the three still afloat, and the sole surviving vessel of the entire CLS fleet. Powered by a 5-cylinder Polar diesel producing 2,000 BHP, Cape Don carried a complement of 39 and was equipped with workboats, davits, and a LARC-V amphibious vehicle for reaching stations that could not be approached directly. Her primary operating area was the Western Australian and Northern Territory coastlines, though she also worked Tasmanian and eastern Australian waters. The progressive automation of Australian lighthouses through the 1980s steadily reduced demand for vessels like her, and she was retired from government service in 1990. After a period as a cargo vessel between Australia and the Solomon Islands, Cape Don was laid up on the Clarence River before being sailed to Sydney and moored at Balls Head Bay, Waverton. She is now registered on the Australian Register of Historic Vessels (HV000208) and is managed by the Sea Heritage Foundation, with conservation work carried out by volunteers of the MV Cape Don Society. This photograph was made in 2016.