cool trawler I saw

Here's a very neat looking trawler I saw in Johnstone Strait BC last week.

A grand old lady

I can imagine the engine down in the bilge.

check it out in detail here: Glendevon Tugboat Restoration

ksanders said:

Here's a very neat looking trawler ...

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If one likes tugs.

ksanders said:

Here's a very neat looking trawler I saw in Johnstone Strait BC last week.

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Great looking boat. I wouldn't consider it a trawler however, even in the incorrect sense that the term is used to describe a type of recreational boat. I would be inclined to call it a tug.

I'm not sure what i would call this one, but it was extremely cool. Extremely.

Greetings,
Thanks so much Mr.koliver. Fantastic link!

Conrad said:

I'm not sure what i would call this one, but it was extremely cool. Extremely.

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That's a tug, too, albeit a very gussied up one. They've even retained the vertical towing lights on the mast.

markpierce said:

If one likes tugs.

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Just ain't the same without the sail, right Mark?

Marin said:

That's a tug, too, albeit a very gussied up one. They've even retained the vertical towing lights on the mast.

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I guess it comes by the tug appellation honestly Marin. It turns out that St. Eval is a converted tug owned by Dennis Washington, owner (or at least was) of Seaspan Marine Corporation.

And, unlike the flag would suggest, its home berth is in Vancouver.

As long as the subject is cool tugs, here's one I took some photos of when it came into Friday Harbor to clear customs the other year.

St eval can be seen tied to Washington's North Vancouver dock at the Quay, foot of Lonsdale, when she is in town ( most of the time). For an old girl, she is in wonderful condition! a good look is here: St. Eval - IMO 5070127 - ShipSpotting.com - Ship Photos and Ship Tracker

Washington has other interests now, http://megayachtnews.com/2010/12/attessa-iv/#axzz1u9N5ykVJ, so St Eval gets to stay home a lot.

FlyWright said:

Just ain't the same without the sail, right Mark?

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Yeah, but my sails are mostly a hobby. This weekend the winds were so weak they had little benefit other than pretty scenery for others.

Perla took this photo of my sister on the Coot yesterday. The photo caught great lighting.

Boy I like how the exhaust is exposed. I may do that on my boat.

RT Firefly said:

Greetings,
Thanks so much Mr.koliver. Fantastic link!

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Same here.

These conversions from real working tugs are interesting. They make good character vessels but, lousy cruising boats.
The high gear ratios, large propellers, deep draft and heavy weight make good tugs but inefficient yachts. For their LOA there is very little interior space.A lot of volume is devoted to machinery spaces and fuel capacity. Most of them will roll your teeth out at sea!

koliver said:

check it out in detail here: Glendevon Tugboat Restoration

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Great link.

The photo does not do the actual boat justice. She was quite remarkable on the water.

Many of the older tugs still are direct drive, no transmission. Have shut down the engine, switch the cam cog so the engine start up in the opposite direction. My diver thought the Eagle prop was huge, 38”, until he dived on the GillSpray, 1930 something, 70 ft tug with a 6 ft prop moored next to us. To start the main engine, they first started a smaller air compressor engine, to turn the main engine over. If it did not start you have to what until the PSI built up again. The main engine turn very slow like 300 to 500 rpm, but move a lot of water. There are several old tugs, late 1800 and 1900 around the Puget Sound. The why they made 120 volt was to wire ten 12 volt batteries together.

A little history:

Foss tug was start by Thea Foss mid 1800, who started a renting row boats in Tacoma and Seattle when the large sailing ships come in the fleet would row out and two the big old sailing ship to the dock. Harbor Island was created from the rock ballast that was of loaded from California when the ship come up empty. The Thea Foss, a 120+ ft, steel 1930 was moored behind us on Lake Union is still the Foss executive yacht. oldtacomamarine.com/atlas/theafoss1.html</SPAN> - Cached Was direct drive until mid 1990 when she crashed through to many docks so they installed a transition.

Sailor of Fortune,
How true but there are many that will pay that price and more to be cool, cute or otherwise endearing.
But when these tugs become yachts (most will never "tug" anything again) how can you not call them trawlers? Only if "yacht" is insufficiently described.

Phil Fill said:

Harbor Island was created from the rock ballast that was of loaded from California when the ship come up empty..

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Actually that part's not true. I recently wrote a book that included some of Seattle's history. Harbor Island and much of what is now the industrial area south of the Seattle downtown was actually underwater most of the time. Elliot Bay came right up and lapped against the bluff that the elevated I-5 runs along today.

In the late 1800s or early 1900s (I'd have to go back to the book to get the exact date) a proposal was made to connect Lake Washington to Puget Sound. This was prior to the Lake Union Ship Canal, locks, and Montlake Cut. The proposal called for digging a canal through what at the time seemed like the shortest route, from Elliot Bay immediately south of Seattle through the narrow valley that I-90 runs through today to join I-5, and through the ridge between the Rainier Valley and the lake. In essence the same route followed by I-90 today.

Work was started on this cut and it went on for some time until it began to be obvious that this route, while shorter, was way too much effort and would not be cost-effective. But quite a bit of the west end of the canal was dug before they halted the project and the spoils all went into the bay and formed a good part of what today is Harbor Island.

Over the following years other dredging and earthmoving projects like the huge Denny Regrade also resulted in dirt that was added to Harbor Island and the South Seattle industrial area. The Denny Regrade project alone resulted in hundreds if not thousands of barge-loads of what used to be Denny Hill that were towed into the south bay and dumped.

So ships calling at Seattle in ballast undoubtedly contributed to the massive landfill in the south bay, but compared to the huge earthmoving projects like the original Lake Washington-Elliot Bay canal and the Denny Regrade, their contribution would not have been much.

First photo below is the Seattle waterfront in 1881. The hill directly behind the waterfront is Denny Hill and it is where the downtown core of Seattle sits today. Next two shots are the Denny Hill Regrade in progress in the early 1900s. Almost the entire hill was removed using the same kind of hydraulic monitors that were used in mining. House owners who refused to sell their property to the city were simply bypassed and their houses isolated on vertical mounds of earth. Eventually, of course, they sold. Some of the nicer homes were moved but most of them were simply blasted to bits by the monitors.

The dirt and debris from the removal of the hill was carried to the waterfront in railcars or in long sluices where it was dumped into barges like the one in the last photo. The barges were hauled to the south end of Elliot Bay and dumped where the spoils from the earlier Lake Washington canal project had been dumped.

Eric
I agree they are cool,cute etc and thus are befitting as Character boats. I can appreciate these boats as well as the next guy. In the mid 90's I was captain of a 1914
ex railroad tug called the Saturn that I took from Boston to Orange , Texas and back.
As far as calling them "trawlers", I don't think there is any parallel. A trawler in my mind at least, implies slow, relatively seaworthy and reasonably economical in fuel.

If the tug enthusiast wants a "Tug" to live or play on I applaud them. It is the novice owner who I see that has no Idea what they are in for in a real world. "look honey, it is only $100,000 for that big beautiful tugboat! We can put 5k into it and live happily ever after." Every commercial port has one or two in sad neglect or disrepair that started in high hopes.

Well... there are some tugs with sails...

SomeSailor said:

Well... there are some tugs with sails...

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Why not? ... Interesting masts.

Her is Dorthy Jane a sister ship with sails. The 58 came with a front mast so rigging would not be to difficult. Some trawler mfg are offer sails as optiion.

Not sure this qualifies as a trawler, or a tug. Belongs to a friend here. Originally, it was a gig or workboat on a Navy cruiser, and a former owner redid it to its current configuration. My friend's been upgrading the interior, etc to make it a "character" cruising boat. Noisy 2-cycle Detriot diesel, but otherwise, a nice boat.

If the tug photos started a craving, this 85' tug just came on the market for $440K:
1941 MacKenzie Barge & Derrick Glen Class Tug Power Boat For Sale

Despite all this I think when a tug gets converted to a yacht it's a trawler type yacht. It's too different from the common conception of "yacht" and obviously a special kind of yacht and that could only be a trawler.....I think. Unless you could just call it a yacht and leave it at that.

Looks like the Union Jack has an anchor davit like the old yachts that stored their Herrishoff and Danforth anchors on deck had.

manyboats said:

Despite all this I think when a tug gets converted to a yacht it's a trawler type yacht. It's too different from the common conception of "yacht" ..

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Yes; they look like work(ing)boats, not yachts.