Construction
The Dee Why and Curl Curl, were built for the Port Jackson and Manly Steamship Company (PJ & MS Co.) by Napier and Miller, the famous Scottish shipbuilders, at Old Kilpatrick, Glasgow, Scotland. They were of a design by naval architect E.H. Mitchell. Mitchell was given the basic specifications by W.L. Dendy, then the General Manager of the PJ & MS Co.
In keeping with all other Manly ferries of the time, they were of steel construction, but with a wooden superstructure, and were double-ended. Each was 220 feet long, 35 feet 11 inches broad, and drawing 12 feet six inches of water when fully laden. Each displaced 799.5 tons of water. They were the second-last steam powered ferries built for the PJ & MS Co., possessing triple-expansion steam engines manufactured by David and William Henderson and Co., of Glasgow, producing 3,200 horsepower, enough to propel the Curl Curl through the water at over 18 knots. For some inexplicable reason, the Dee Why was never quite as fast as her sister ship. Both ships exceeded 17.5 knots on their trials. Steam for the engines was provided by four single-ended cylindrical Scotch boilers, placed in pairs back to back in two stokeholds, and fitted for burning either oil or coal. This arrangement necessitated the use of two funnels, which, because of the arrangement of the boilers, had to be placed slightly forward of amidships, resulting in a strangely asymmetrical appearance. Each boiler was 11 feet six inches long, and 12 feet wide. The propellers were of solid bronze with four blades, being nine feet three inches in diameter. Each ship had a passenger capacity of 1,500.
It is interesting to note that SS South Steyne, the next ferry built for the P.J. & M.S.Co. was of very similar dimensions and machinery, yet displaced two-hundred tons more. This discrepancy is because the Dee Why and Curl Curl had sliding doors fitted to their promenade decks, instead of swinging doors like those on the South Steyne. Spaces enclosed by sliding doors at the time were classed under British rules as having no tonnage-earning purpose, and so the two-hundred tons this space would have earned was deducted from the displacement of the vessel.
The Dee Why and the Curl Curl were the first Manly ferries since the 1883 paddlewheeler Brighton to be built in Britain rather than Australia, and were launched on 23 December 1927, and 27 February 1928, respectively. They were fitted out in the United Kingdom, and sailed under their own power to Australia, via the Suez Canal.
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