Removable bulkheads and renovating interiors
“What lasts even less well is the interior as it gets used by people or gets to be old fashioned, dirty and tired looking.
Interestingly the interiors of airplanes and buses wear out and are replaced several times before the structure or chassis wears out.”
I find that an interesting concept to replace whole interiors while the super structure stays in tact.
I always wondered that about boats. I know it might sound a bit fickle but I like my surroundings to look good.
John and I have looked at many boats and I feel bad if I cannot feel excited about a boat that has served her owners for such a long time and yet looks awfully passé inside.
I shudder at the looks of fifties upholstery, storage underneath seating and the small cupboards with hard to get at shelves in the galleys instead of drawers.
I would love to change the interior radically from time to time.
But now I know that is all easier said than done.
“Most furniture is built in to give the boat its structural strength”, I have been told.
What would it take to have the furniture NOT being built in or the bulkheads not fixed and NOT have the strength of the hull compromised?
Hmmm.
A severe example of NO structural interior would be an Open 60. Take a look at the old Santa Cruz 50’s and 40’s. Very minimal but handsome interiors where the plywood panels do give some stiffness to the hull, but could be ignored. The traditional heavy interior is not really needed in a well-engineered steel yacht, for example. It’s an aesthetic, tradition- and comfort-driven choice. How about designing the interior mechanical areas for easy maintenance and re-fit, then leaving the rest of the volume uncluttered by shelves, as you say, and designing inflatable furniture from dinghy fabric covered in something easy on the user? You could easily reconfigure a large salon “hold” for solo or family cruising, or use for cargo. The furniture would also provide some buoyancy. The popularity of a feature is in the hands of the buyers and brokers. I want to know who started the trend to provide us with floating dormitories full of flat wide bunks? It’s cheaper to build a double bunk (unuseable at sea) than a good navigation area. Forepeak bunks are certainly a good example of wasted plywood: they’re there to make the owner in the aft stateroom feel more important than their crew. This is a place better used for sails, stores, and a tool bench with a good vise. The aft stateroom is also often an irrational status symbol, waves slapping the stern in a rough anchorage and flushing the owner towards amidships. The stern is also a place better reserved for dinghy hoisting (like Crusoe); a stern “garage” is th place for dive gear, folding bicycles. Real innovations creep in slowly, based on mass acceptance. In 1970, no yachty sailor had dive tanks aboard, and there was maybe a flimsy overboard ladder useable only by trained chimps. Today stern swim and dive platforms on sailboats are common. This is a great improvement, and a super safety feature, if you’ve ever found yourself tired from a dive, trying to bring your gear back aboard.
Thanks Mark for your comments.
I so agree that the popularity of innovation is in the hands of market forces. And I can’t agree more with your comment about the obsessive abundance of berths in modern boats, and the cost that means in useful space.
I like your idea of inflatable furniture, as I have a theory that with the use of light construction materials, inflatable being lightest of all and water tight lockers, having a keeler positively buoyant while full of water could become the norm.
I too love the feeling of openness that a design without lots of bulkheads give.