advantages of fwd wheelhouse longliners

can you explain me what are the advantages of forward wheelhouse longliners over after wheelhouse longliners.in forward wheelhouse longliners the length of the propeller shaft can be increased. so it may cause repair problems, heating of fish holds etc.. so why this type of vessels(forward wheelhouse) are using in more countries.are they suitable for asian countries. thank you

 

There's no legitimate reason to have either of these boats. In many countries, they're illegal. Longliners do far too much damage to fish populations (and populations of just about everything else in the water) for any rationally-thinking person to justify using them. They're an outdated, inefficient and highly irresponsible means of fishing. Same goes for bottom trawlers and gill-netters. You'd be well advised to look instead at stern trawlers and selective netting systems.

 

What in the world? I am sure you can find an intelligent answer in a text on fishing fleets or on commercial fish boat designs. A lot of these vessels were converted from other types of vessels. For instance, a mud boat from the gulf that typically hauls drill rod and dried drilling abrassive will have the house fwd to facilitate loading and unloading and loadingoff the back deck onto rigs. These vessels get sold off to commercial fishing industries for conversion when the oil industry falls flat etc and voila, a fwd houses vessel. I worked on such a conversion in New Orleans and it was sold to Fishing COmpany of Alaska. It became the worlds longest log liner and was a halter built mud boat to start with. Think in terms of the factory deck placement, the sea conditions that may dictate visibility and the over all motions of the vessels while at sea and you may figure it out yourself. Nuts and bolts.

 

hirantha;

From my perspective as a professional designer of, among other vessel types, commercial fishing boats for the past quarter-century and having grown up in an area that has a long history in commercial fisheries, I think that I can venture an opinion on your question.

I believe that two seperate developmental forces created the modern fishing boat layout of a broad, open working deck and a wheelhouse/accomodation block located far forward. Firstly, as fishing boats became more and more mechanized, working deck space became very desireable for mounting net-handling gear and for handling the ever-increasing size of nets. To gain this extra deck space, superstructures became ever more cramped. Secondly, working on an open deck in rough weather can be very dangerous, especially when a large boarding sea comes over the bow or waist and sweeps the deck. Locating the superstructure forward provides protection for the crew working on deck, and the advent of metal ships allowed the superstructures to withstand the pummeling of the seas. So the bottom line is that wheelhouses are forward to maximize fishing efficiency and keep the crews safe. Everything after that is just engineering to make it work.

Marshmat, I see from your profile that you are both young and somewhat geographically removed from the commercial fishing world. Given that you are suffering from these temporary and repairable conditions, I'll grant you the leeway to have opinions that may not be well seasoned with wisdom or fact, but your stridency in expressing your somewhat less than accurate views on subjects that you may not have an adequate level of information on, such as high L/B hull forms and modern fishing technology, may damage your credibility when you pontificate on future subjects. Cool your jets, son, and measure your responses more carefully. In particular, I suggest you do a bit of research on the by-catch percentage of longline trawls vs mid-water trawls. I think that you will find the results somewhat contradictory to your present view of the technology.

If you want to bang the gong of ecological alarm over a destructive fishing technology, focus on drift-net and bottom-trawling. To see what your own government is doing to conserve both the fisheries and the livelihoods of its fishermen, start here and then get curious.

 

MMD- Yeah, I'd be glad to have a look at some more recent data. I've studied the fisheries on both coasts quite a bit and so am somewhat more well-informed than it might appear, but reliable fisheries statistics are very difficult to come by. I've worked mainly with StatsCan, Customs and DFO data; from what I've researched longline and bottom-trawl vessels appear to be quite damaging to fish stocks and habitat. Personally I am currently a proponent of selective-trawl/seine and live-release technologies. But the data I have ready access to is not nearly as complete as I'd like; if you have any better sources I'd love to look them over. Please don't be so quick to judge that as an Ontarian I know nothing about fishing; my present place of residence should not be considered indicative of my understanding of the issue at hand. Not being a longline fisherman myself I can only base my opinions on scientific studies done by others, and if I find compelling evidence to indicate longlining is not destructive to fish populations I will certainly adapt my position accordingly. I do not mean to offend anyone, merely to present my viewpoint based on the scientific data I have access to.

 

There are many advantages with the forward wheelhouse location.

For fisherman working in northern atlantic, it provide some protection for the fisherman working on the deck. However, this is not going to make much of a difference since the Indian Oceam is much warmer than the Northen Atlantic

Also it gives a lot of deck space for working and also you have access to the rear of the boat. this means that you can have a big reel for the longline and launch and retrieve it from the rear of the boat.

Also, it will allow the skipper of the boat to have a better view of the sea and of the working deck if you install windowes at the back of the wheelhouse.

As far as the location of the engine, if the boat is long enough, you can have the wheelhouse and accomodation in the front and the engine in the rear. I have build a boat like that a few years ago. If the boat is less than 20 meter, it is often more efficient to have the engine room in front of the fish hold under the wheelhouse.

With modern pillow blocks and minimal maintenance, the propeller shaft is not going to give any problems but you will loose some fish hold space because of the propeller tunnel.

I was in Sri-lanka last july and I visited some boatyards (Cey-Nor in Colombo) and some fishing Harbout (Beruwalla and Galle), I am well aware of the boat design that you have.

I see a problem with Sri-Lanka's fiberglass boat fleet since fiberglass is very difficult to recycle. When I drove down to go to Beruwalla, I saw many boat carcasses, half broken sitting near the road. Of course, some of these boats were damaged by the Tsunami but other boats were much older.

Also there are major design difference between fishing boats of the industrialized countries and boats for the Indian Ocean. The boats from my country are very wide and they have very powerfull engine. These boats are not very fast and they use alot of fuel but they are very efficient with the type of fishing that we do here.