KM Yachts, Makkum Holland

[Dockhead]

Just made a harrowing night entrance into Makkum in a pouring rain. Finding unlit channel markers with the searchlight. After a 180 mile overnight from Cuxhaven including a magical night under a bright full moon. Now we're berthed at the yard's very nice quay.

Tomorrow the owner of this yard will show us around. We might even see Noelex's and Seaworthy Lass' boat which is under construction here. Photos will follow.

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[Panope]

Be sure and bring along your checkbook!

Steve

[Dockhead]

So I spent the morning crawling around this facility with the owner, a surprisingly young guy.

I even got to crawl all over Noelex's and Seaworthy Lass' boat (sorry about the fingerprints ).

The workmanship these guys do is simply exceptional. I've never seen anything like the fairness of these hulls, and the beauty of these welds. Better than aircraft construction I've seen. They do their own structural design in-house, and you can see the passion for the structure of their boats.

Many beautiful details like standpipes, the port lights and hatches they make in-house. Very well designed autopilot ram mounts -- lots of attention paid to structural qualities.

I enjoyed very much the guy, who is exceptionally knowledgeable and interesting. He showed me his own boat, too. He uses a 90% blade jib like I do and was waxing poetic about its virtues. In fact he doesn't use any other jib; he got rid of his genoa altogether. What's interesting is that he uses it on a Hoyt boom -- with a hydraulic vang. This solves the problem of how to deal with leech tension. Looks very cool. He says it is exceptionally good downwind because with the boom, he can spread it out to present maximum surface to the wind. I'm going to have to study this system some more.


He had strong opinions about spade rudders, which he considers to be inherently stronger than skeg rudders for a lot of reasons he went on quite a while about. Of course HIS spade rudders are very different from the way they are implemented in many other boats. They look just like Steve Dashew's spade rudders, massively overbuilt, with it looked like 10mm wall thickness on the rudder tube. The rudder shafts are solid billet aluminum, some of them probably 20cm in diameter.

Also I loved (!) his tillers. The cockpits are entirely free when they are lifted out of the way. They can be notched into different positions to make them comfortable from different positions.

Another example of his approach to strength -- he said he believes that you should be able to lift a boat by its deck cleats. Right on. I really like that.

From the point of view of structure and workmanship, this is exactly what I want in my next boat, and this yard is at the top of my list now.

From the design point of view, however, there were many things I did not like. Noelex and SWL were exactly right to increase the size of their pilothouse -- his pilot houses are not nice -- too small and with no forward-facing nav station. The interiors are cave-like and I did not like the Ikea-like fitouts. Far less comfortable and pleasant than the interior of my own boat. But of course the beauty of working with a yard like this is that you get what you want, so you hire a designer who understands what that is. I think SWL and Noelex have added a bunch of deck hatches to brighten up the belowdecks space in their boat -- good move.


Now w're on passage towards Amsterdam, motoring in the Ijsselmeer against a strong wind (we can't leave the channel to tack).

[packeteer]

if only I had the money for a KM yacht

[DDabs]

I'd love to check out that yard, I can only imagine how beautiful all those boats are in person

[weavis]

I can only hope you left your CC and cheque books on your own boat....

[Sea Dreaming]

How young is this guy? We have kids in Utrecht, I wonder if we could get someone to marry into the family for a "family discount"?

[Matt Johnson]

Ikea like fitout? What interior design were you on? Their interiors are much, much higher end than Moody. Hoek and Dykstra have designed how many superyachts with the same design?


Matt

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[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by funjohnson

Ikea like fitout? What interior design were you on? Their interiors are much, much higher end than Moody. Hoek and Dykstra have designed how many superyachts with the same design?


Matt

Well, it's a matter of taste. I'm sure someone will like it, but I did not. Everything is square with loose square cushions, quite light laminate materials used, quite ordinary hardware. Looks to me very much like what you see on current Hansas, and certainly not near the level of the fitouts in higher end English boats.

But these are custom built boats -- you can design and order whatever you want. They build their own joinery and design it in CAD-CAM, so you can specify whatever you want and see it in 3D and in detail before they start cutting anything. I would simply order higher end materials and hardware, and make the designers do something other than the Ikea square throw-cushion style, and it would be fine, I'm sure.


These boats, much like Dashew's, and totally unlike something like say Oysters, are not about the fitout. These are sailing machines, with the most fabulous structure I've ever seen. In my opinion, those are the right priorities.

[Horus]

K$M Yachts, Makkum The Netherlands.
Very good builders, nice people, building very nice boats from for instance Dijkstra design.

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

I even got to crawl all over Noelex's and Seaworthy Lass' boat (sorry about the fingerprints ).

Just as long as you took your shoes off .

SWL

[DDabs]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

These boats, much like Dashew's, and totally unlike something like say Oysters, are not about the fitout. These are sailing machines, with the most fabulous structure I've ever seen. In my opinion, those are the right priorities.

Uh oh, I'm sure Kenomac will be along shortly to set you right!

[poiu]

Re Oysters: Oi! wash your mouth out with soap!

For superlative joinery as well as custom built alu, Holland is really well provided for. Try Jongert, Claasens, Royal Huisman and Holland Jachtbouw.

I won't say anything about the prices.

[barnakiel]

K&M ???

Man, you are in a boat building heaven!

I wish I could have a boat built there. I have seen one of their boats here in LP last yer.

You lucky duck, have fun, send pictures!
b.

[Kenomac]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

These boats, much like Dashew's, and totally unlike something like say Oysters, are not about the fitout. These are sailing machines, with the most fabulous structure I've ever seen. In my opinion, those are the right priorities.

I just read an article about the Oyster 72 Katharsis II, which completed 45,000 nautical miles over a three year period including a successful Northwest passage.

'Curious... What exactly do you have planned that would require a more substantial "fitout?"