designer search

[kelp]

Can anyone put me in touch with Robert McMurray's designs. In "Voyaging Under Power", Robert Beebe lists his address as 427 Marin Ave., Mill Valley, CA 92663. Was not able to reach him. Specifically I,m looking for his design of a 30' steel motor cruiser with with a gaff rigged ketch sail assist. Beebe listed it in his book as a minimum seagoing long range power cruiser. Thanks for any leads

[makobuilders]

Kelp-

Have you or any other member had any luck in finding more information on this design?

[Tad]

Robert L. McMurray is another designer we know very little about. Offhand I am only aware of one other McMurray design that has been published. That is a 45' multi-chine steel ocean going power cruiser that appeared in Yachting Magazine's design section in the late 1970's or early 1980's. I believe it was the same Mill Valley address.

I have no information on the designer's history or where his work may have ended up, his name does not appear in the Encyclopedia of Yacht Designers.

The 30' steel double-ender that appears in Voyaging Under Power would be simple to re-create (with full size parts) today because the complete lines are in the book.

[makobuilders]

You're right Tad. It's easy enough to reproduce the lines, although I'm not sure about copyright issues, if you can advise on that.

There are several sheets of drawings from McMurray's 51ft cruiser in the Beebe Collection at Mystic Seaport.

Visit this link: http://library.mysticseaport.org/man.../spcoll125.cfm

[Tad]

The lines have been available in print (in the public domain) for 35+ years and you have made a good faith effort to locate the designer. I don't see any problem with using the published lines as a guide to create a new vessel if it's only one boat for your personal use. If you are building a bunch of boats to sell that's a different issue, and for many reasons I would recommend a new design (by a qualified designer) "inspired by" Mr. McMurray's work.

Actually I was aware of the McMurray drawings at Mystic but had forgotten about there existence. I would suppose McMurray submitted two designs for inclusion in VUP and just the smaller one was published.

[makobuilders]

Tad-

I was just in Aukland and saw a motorsailer that I could swear was McMurray's 30ft that we've been discussing. My copy of Cruising Under Power is at home on the other side of the Earth. Would you happen to have a copy of that page (pdf or jpeg) that I can compare it to when I return there shortly? Thanks.

Mako

[Tad]

Here are the two McMurray drawings published in Voyaging Under Power 1975, by Robert P. Beebe.