Building yachts others do not dare to build


Dutch superyacht builder Feadship has been a customer of MARIN for many decades. Feadship’s iconic yachts are entirely custom-built to the best quality and have always pushed the boundaries of naval archi tecture to its very limits. MARIN has been alongside this unique yacht builder on many of its inspiring journeys, where nothing is deemed impossible. Report interviews Ronno Schouten, Head of Design.


Ronno Schouten


Every year Feadship launches a new design concept at the Monaco Yacht Show. Given the nature of its clientele, confidentiality is highly prized and its designs are always kept under wrap. But the new concept gives Feadship the chance to show clients what is possible and what R&D work it has been doing.


O


wned by two families, Feadship’s engineering office De Voogt Naval Architects, celebrated their 100th


Anniversary in July 2013. Having built more than 400 yachts, the company typically builds four to five boats a year, ranging from 35 m to more than 100 m. Feadship employs some 1,500 people and everything from design, engineering, building the hulls and superstructures, to finishing is carried out in the Netherlands.


6 report


Although Feadship cannot reveal any details of the yachts it is working on it can talk freely about its Future Concepts. One extremely special concept is the “Feadship Royale”. As the name suggests, this yacht is designed for the Dutch Royal family and as the official State vessel, it will show the world what this unique Dutch yacht building company is capable of.


Mr Schouten comments: “As the Feadship Royale will demonstrate, we build exactly to our client’s wishes. This yacht is simply not suitable for anyone else. Other builders claim that they make custom-made vessels but we truly do. For example, with the new


propulsion system on this yacht, the blades point inwards so they are more efficient and quiet, there is no electric motor inside and no pod outside. It is very, very quiet and extremely comfortable. Our boats are fully customised. There are not even a handful of yacht builders out there that do what we do.”


A recent example, the “Breathe” concept, certainly inspired one client and it high- lights the partnership with MARIN. Breathe emerged when Feadship considered how superyachts can have improved propulsion and as a consequence, better fuel efficiency. With typical yachts having two propellers for easy manoeuvrability and reliability, Feadship took an unusual approach and considered what would happen if a yacht has only one propeller.


Mr Schouten says: “We considered that if there is one propeller there is better inflow and higher efficiency, but at the same time we wanted to have redundancy and


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24