Atli launches new trawl doors

Atli's involvement with trawl doors goes back to 30 years ago. He is one of the sons of Iceland's trawl doors pioneer Josafat Hinriksson and worked as the designer and sales manager of Hinriksson's Poly-Ice trawl doors. He continued to develop and market the trawl doors even when the company was sold to Hampidjan Group.

He said to World Fishing of his decision to get back into the trawl-door business: “The pull was too much and I couldn't keep away from it. We are offering the full range of trawl doors, suitable for bottom and pelagic fishing and different conditions, and all sizes and types needed.”

He chose the name Polar for marketing because the word is associated with Iceland and Northern “as these areas are well-known for quality equipments for fishing,” and the doors have been named after planets. “My father was an engineer on the Icelandic side-trawler Neptunus and as doors for bottom fishing need to be strong and reliable, I found appropriate to name [the new door] Neptune.”

Other types of doors that are being tested include the Mars (pelagic, suitable for mid-water fishing), the Jupiter (pelagic for close-surface fishing) and the Mercury, a combination door suitable for bottom and pelagic fishing. These are “only the beginning, there are more designs to come,” Atli said.

He adds that results from the prototypes have been far better that expected. “The Scottish trawler Caspian confirms reduced fuel consumption of an average of six per cent after replacing fairly modern type of doors with Neptune 6.0 square-metre doors. They increased spread from 80 to 90 fathoms using the same size of doors but with far less wire ratio than before and with reduced fuel consumption,” Atli said.

“The Icelandic freezer trawler Vigri uses a pair of 10.5sqm Neptune with very positive results: more spread than with previous doors of larger area and reduced resistance.”

Rio Caxil, a Spanish factory trawler which tried a pair of nine square-metre Mars Pelagic doors, fishing redfish in the southwest of Iceland, reported good performance of doors and nets, says Atli. Several pairs of smaller Neptune and Mercury doors are being use in Argentina and Chile. There they reported a reduction of RPM from 1700 to 1500, keeping the same trawling speed and using more door-to-door distance. “Resistance against modern doors can vary between three to five per cent, and even more against old and less efficient doors,” Atli said.

A pair of eight square-metre Jupiter pelagic doors are on the Geysir. This is based in Las Palmas and fishes mackerel and sardinella in Mauritanian waters.

Atli explains that by replacing the same size of doors, the operators are gaining an increased and more stable spread of the trawl with reduced resistance. “The doors perform well in shallow-water fishing close to the surface as well as at 400m depth.”

Atli says that all these trials have shown that the new Polar doors increase the spreading force but also reduce resistance, a very important factor for today's high cost of fuel. Atli is working with Hleragerdin, Iceland for manufacturing and the doors are also being built in the Baltic to serve Northern and Southern Europe. In South America the production setup is in Argentina.