Help define process from concept-->build

TANSL, You are right in some respects, some work in the design of larger boats is about the same as the work for smaller boats, so part of the design and the time it takes to do the work is the same. But that is not true with everything about the design, it is true only for a very small part. Just conceiving the boat to the liking of the client can take huge amounts of time. This involves both 2D and 3D drawings that you discuss back and forth. When style is important, it can take a lot of time to match what you are drawing to what the client really wants--you never get it right the first go around. Sometimes the client doesn't know what he wants until he sees it. Then when you tell him he can't have it for such and such a naval architectural reason, he has to compromise, and it is up to you as the designer to tell the client where he can compromise to get close to what he wants. This process increases exponentially with time as the boat gets bigger and more complicated, with more features. The bigger the boat, the more decisions that the client has to consider, decide upon, then change his mind about and go back and forth with the designer to distill to the final features--that consumes a lot of time (emails, phone calls, sketches to explain things) it all adds up, and so the price goes up.

There is the matter of the drawings--bigger boats take more drawings than smaller boats because there are more details to draw, particularly if you, as the designer, are providing the patterns for the hull, deck, keel and rudder. More drawings, more time, so the design price goes up.

I have found that it is easiest to tell people that below, say, 30' (9 Meters), design price varies directly with length. No one asks a designer to design a 10'-15' boat, so we just ignore that because the person who wants that small a boat can simply buy a kit boat--there is no way that he is going to be able to afford a naval architect. The serious inquiries start at about 20', and even there it is hard for a customer to justify a $20,000 price tag for a design, but hey, that's reflective of how much time it takes to provide everything the client needs to build the boat--clients need lots of help in the way of detailed drawings and instructions. However, some do go ahead because they realize the benefit of design and having everything laid out well on paper. Mind you, this is the very select few clients. And this is all true in my day-to-day business.

But above 30', the price for design starts rising exponentially with length, not quite the the power of 2, but perhaps by about 1.75. And this is because as boats get bigger, they get more complicated to design and they just require exponentially more work in all of the above areas. The amount of work truly is a lot more and so justifies the price of the design.

I hope that is a suitable explanation.

Eric

 

why don't you find an existing design in the size you like and adapt your sailing rig to it. than you only pay for stock plans, and perhaps some advice from the designer to use your rig.

 

Thanks for your explanations , Eric. I understand everything you say and I am sure that for ships you design things are so, no doubt, but does not seem right .
The fact that the owner is capricious does not have to increase the value of the project. We will have to make a contract , so that all these vagaries are paid by the shipowner. Otherwise I would have to do a psychological study of the customer to decide the price of his project.
You're going to say that in these luxury boats the owner is a very special person. I will tell you that when an owner is proposing a boat to make money with it, there is nothing more difficult to please than money.
There are other reasoning that I do not share but will not go into a sterile discussion. Things are certainly as you say they are, in your world, and that's it.
I am used to evaluate the project , and have also done a few, on the basis of the responsability the designer assumes with it. I appreciate the difficulty of the boat, the requirements of a good LOR perfectly clear from the beginning, although you can change, of course, operating conditions , etc. . From this point of view , the price of the project would be more related to the total value of the ship and would have nothing to do with its length.
Since then you have to count the hours delineation , but that does not increase the added value of the product .
And if we speak of the basic project, not the development project (construction drawings), no doubt that my approach is much stronger.

 

Alternatives

Many proven designs already exist.

If you start with an already existing hull, that had the same/similar sail plan as the carbon spar you want to use, then you would be many months closer to going sailing.

Changing the spar is only one modification open to you.
You don't need to "RESTORE" an older boat.

You can use it as a base hull for your own customizations.

Advice from a NA as to feasibility of changes would be wise.

I'm showing small and large popular well proven designs around your specified range (17-26 ft).

Oday Daysailor sells from a few hundred to a few thousand used.

The Colgate 26 used sells in mid 20s to 40s (thousands)

Many other designs.

A cruising hull could be retrofitted with the deck cockpit/cuddy from a daysailor.

Assuming both donor boats were cheap enough.

Reducing height and weight on deck is usually considered a safer modification than increasing either.

Have fun!

 

If the plumb bow and bowsprit is attractive to you, those are easy "ADD-ONs" to an existing fiberglass hull.

 

TANSL, As you have found, people who commission commercial designs--boats that make money--are a far different breed from the people who commission yacht designs. This is why so many commercial ship builders, at least here in the US, will not have anything to do with yacht and recreational craft customers--the degree of finish it too high, and yacht customers are too opinionated and capricious. They are very hard to work with and hard to please. So the commercial builders just don't do yachts.

I think the value of the boats is related to length in an exponential way. And, in my studies of boat values of yachts and recreational craft, valuing a boat on length, or some function of length, is the most reliable way to target its value. This is because of two things: First, of all the design parameters that a customer wants to consider, length is one of the things that he is most sure about. So we compare boats and their prices based on length. Even when you add in beam, depth, or displacement, the scatter in prices is way to wide--there is no predictable function for value, except when based on length. Second, the value of a boat is directly related to its cubic volume--the more volume, the more parts, equipment, and labor go into that volume to build it, and so the higher the cost. Volume is directly related to length cubed, so this becomes an easy tool to establish overall value.

Also, I never price a boat design based on its overall value, nor based on its construction sequence. That is because there is no guarantee of value, despite the work that may go into it, and despite how much prediction you did. A shoddily built boat will have less value than a well built boat. Also, in this world (yachts), sometimes the boat does not get built for years, and so there is no way to value it until it is built. Sometimes the designs never get built, for whatever reasons. And I can't wait around for my money for design until the boat is built--I have to eat. So I base my fees on a function of length and the amount of work that is required to produce all the engineering, data, and drawings. There are two phases in design--preliminary and final, divided roughly one third/two thirds--and the design fee schedule of payments reflects that division. All the design fee is paid by the completion of all the drawings and, ideally, before construction starts. This has proven the easiest and most assured way to get paid, and works well for both the designer and the client.

Eric

 

This is the first time I see a Colgate 26. I really appreciate her simple and clean lines. Very nice and good-looking boat.

 

Eric, it is clear that we live in different worlds, professionally speaking. I have worked in most of passenger vessels, very luxurious some of them, which have been built in Spain in the last 40 years, and I think the standard of quality and materials of a ship of this type is not inferior to those of a luxury yacht. To say nothing of the finishings.
In all the projects I've done, I've had to add a chapter to the breakdown of the price of the boat. And that value I have indicated and I signed, is used for really important issues. Of course, at first I did not know the price of the boat, but nor I knew the thickness of the deck, and I find out.

 

Daiquiri



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