Kai-Uwe Eilts, boat builder and lover of old and new wooden boats. We visited him at the Ilensee Boote shipyard and spoke to him about his passion.
BOOTE: What does genuine craftsmanship mean to you in the age of automation and series production?
You say that the Ilensee 16 should be "affordable, available and yet special". What was the most difficult moment along the way?
Eilts: These three points are directly related. A boat becomes affordable and available when savings are made on the biggest cost factors of time and labour. Labour costs are the most expensive item today. If machines can take over work steps faster, more precisely and with less waste, then I work more economically. In this way, you can still build a wooden boat affordably today and maintain it well later on.
What does it feel like when you're standing in your workshop working on a boat?
Eilts: I am a very emotional person. I think it's great to restore old boats. When I imagine how people built this boat in the 1950s and I'm standing here today repairing it. That really touches me. So it's definitely emotional.
If young people today wanted to learn the profession of boat builder, what would you tell them?
Eilts: Make it! Boatbuilding is incredibly versatile: aluminium, GRP, wood - it's all there. If you find the right company for you, you learn an incredible amount in the four years of your apprenticeship. You hardly get this variety anywhere else.
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Jan-Ole Puls
Editor Test & Technology
Ole Puls was born in Schleswig in 1999. He quickly swapped the football pitch for the Schlei and grew up sailing a wide variety of dinghies and tall ships. From his grandfather's self-built wooden opti and a Europe to a 49er and an X362 Sport, there was a lot to choose from. After leaving school, Puls decided to train as a boat builder at the high-tech shipyard Knierim Yachtbau in Kiel in 2016. He successfully completed his training in 2020 and stayed at the shipyard as a bachelor. In 2022, he decided not only to build boats, but also to test them. Since then, he has been working for Delius Klasing Verlag in the Test & Technology section of BOOTE magazine. The training he received and the eye for detail and quality of workmanship he acquired help him immensely today. Even though he is a regatta sailor with heart and soul, he feels right at home on motorboats and enjoys separating his professional and private lives and yet combining them. Because we all know one thing: there is simply no better place to be than on the water.
