Summary
Michael Porter came to us as the designer of this wonderful, long-range voyager that he and his wife wanted for cruising the waters of Maine to the Caribbean as well as the canals and rivers of Europe. The key element of his dream was to build a boat (and home) that would carry them safely, and with reasonable dispatch, wherever they wanted to go on the oceans of the world and allow them to live and work aboard without major readjustments. He turned to us to build his custom aluminum, long-range, “live-anywhere” cruiser, one that would fit within the draft, beam, and height restrictions of European canals, but still have the range and seaworthiness to cross oceans. BARBARA was the second custom aluminum yacht from our metal fabrication shop. As we had very successfully done before, we used the computer water jet cutting by our friend Jeff Pierce, owner of Pierce Aluminum and the Lyman-Morse aluminum-built COMET . This allowed us to build the boat with clean-edged materials that were cut in such a way that the pieces could be bent into place and fit perfectly. Her accommodations are relatively simple compared with those of most sixty-foot power boats and, except for the large engine room, are more like those of a sailboat of her size. For ease of maintenance (and for economy), she was built of heavy aluminum plate with stout framing and finished like a high-end commercial vessel. Her equipment and electronics meet commercial ship standards. To suit her owner’s requirements, she has an elegant owner’s cabin aft, a guest cabin forward, and two pipe berths in the forepeak for grandchildren. She also has provision for two people to work independently in separate spaces. In addition to the fully-equipped pilothouse, she has an outside steering station and aft cockpit area behind the pilot house with Bimini cover for shade in the tropics. Her RIB tender is launched by the boom on the foremast. She can easily carry a small sailboat, as well. BARBARA is powered by a strong 255 HP Cummins diesel for 4300 NM cruising range at 8 knots. For ease of maneuvering in tight spots, she is equipped with a Sidepower hydraulic 10″ bow thruster.