First for five years
What is said to be the first new whitefish boat to be constructed for Shetland owners for five years has now been was delivered by the Whitby, Yorkshire yard of Parkol Marine Engineering Ltd.
The 18.77m Copious represents an investment of over £1 million for the boat, licences and quota for joint owners skipper Mark Anderson, Andrew White and Steven Wilson.
No EU or UK grants are available for building fishing boats these days and construction of the Copious was made possible by a decision of the Shetland Development Trust to invest £575,000 in the project in the form of loans and a share.
Constructed of steel with a double chine hull form, transom stern and semi-bulbous bow, it is the third boat to bear the same name and has been built as a single and twin-rig trawler for whitefish and prawns with Lerwick as its home port.
There is a full length shelter deck and below deck three watertight bulkheads dividing the boat into aft accommodation with steering gear, engine room, fishroom and forepeak tank/store.
The boat is also equipped to convert to pair-seining, although the owners see this more as a future selling point rather than a technique to be tried by themselves.
The design of Copious is based on the Whitby-built Reliant which operates out of Buckie. The new boat has a beam of 7m and a moulded depth of 4.15m, and an aft draught of 4.15m.
The new boat is powered by a 470 kW Mitsubishi main engine with Doosan auxiliary. It incorporates a custom-designed fish handling system, with an ice locker capacity of 10 tonnes, and the latest in fish finding and navigational electronics.
As the new boat joins the local fleet, there has been a resurgence in catch levels and prices for those local boats left following the years of cutbacks. Nevertheless, fuel prices continue to rise, seriously affecting profits profitability and thus requiring a new boat to earn more through a better performance.
Scallop trawler order
The Parkol yard is also now building an 18.9m scallop trawler for Star Fishing Ltd. This is again a steel-hulled boat with double chine, transom stern, and bulbous bow, and will be rigged for scallop dredging with dredge emptying doors and catch handling conveyors for 10 dredges per side. Fabrication commenced on the new boat durin January this year.
Below deck will be four watertight bulkheads giving spaces for the aft accommodation (for a crew of five) and steering gear, engine room, hold and forepeak tank/sonar/gear store.
The main deck will incorporate split trawl winches, hinged outrigger arms, dredge pulling in winches, with catch conveyors and dredge emptying doors fitted into the bulward sides.
Dimension include a length overall of 18.9m with a beam of 7m, moulded depth of 4.05m, and an aft draught of 4.2m. The hold capacity of the new boat is 250 bags, equivalent to 660 gallons.
Miller builds for the south
Meanwhile, construction of a new twin rig trawler for two Devon fishermen has been completed at the Miller (Methil) boatyard, at St. Monans in Fife and the vessel run trials. The new under-15m trawler, named Our Olivia Belle, was built for Scott and Paul Wharton (S & P Trawlers) of Ilfracombe in North Devon.
The new boat is powered by a Caterpillar 3406C diesel of 433 kW, supplied by Finning Power Systems.
Macduff's latest
Finally, Macduff Shipyards Ltd has almost completed the 21.3m steel scallop beam trawler King Challenger for West Coast Sea Products Ltd of Kircudbright. Designed by Macduff Ship Desing Ltd, the new boat has a round bilge hull form with transom stern and bulbous bow.
The 7.8m beam by 4.2m depth boat carries a six-man crew and is fitted with a Macduff split trawl winch positioned at the aft end of the working deck – all other deck machinery, including topping winches, gear handling winches, tipping winches and doors, and hydraulic shakers, has been supplied by Macduff.
Propulsion is by a Caterpillar3056E, rated at 530 kW and driving a Kort Propulsion unit in a fixed nozzle via a Reintjes gearbox. Hydraulics are driven by a separate Caterpillar C9 variable speed engine while two Caterpillar 3056DIT gen sets, each producing 84 kW, provide electrical power.
