Purchasing an existing research ship and converting it into a world-class expedition
vessel can be a great option. The research ship Bold which was built by the US Navy is currently
for sale and Dan Stabbert who has owned and operated three of these vessels will give us a
tour today. We're back in Lake Union in Seattle at the Stabbert shipyard and it is probably the
best prospect for a yacht or expedition yacht conversion in the United States today It is
225 feet and these are some of the finest science and expedition hulls ever built in the world. The
government has just built a new model of this vessel and it's costing 160 million dollars a
copy. Ice-class diesel-electric smooth that are so quiet. Everything is built on resiliencet-mount.
They were designed to put very quiet running specially designed running propellers so that in
the 80s and the 90s they could listen for nuclear submarine sound signatures. The government didn't
spare a dime on this. Everything is built to the utmost strength and redundancy This vessel carries
about a quarter of a million gallons of fuel. They burn at 10 knots about 1,600 gal. a day.
You can go around the world. These vessels are ideal for expedition yacht conversion and they
are ice-class and you can go to the Arctic you can go up and around the Arctic and make some of
these around the full transits. These vessels would be ideal for something like that. This
would be a great area for Sky Lounge here as well or this just could be an outside seating
deck area and then still have that large Stern area. As we're standing now the pilot house
deck is you can see elevated there ahead of the stack from the main deck we're on the third deck
above the main deck and that's the fourth deck above the main deck. So lots of height great
visibility,. You can put launches on the foredeck if you want. Hydraulically driven anchor gear,
all sub-deck so all the anchor winches and the hub dolly drives and all that are below the deck. Big
pilothouse area though on the Ocean Stall with the sister ship to this- we just put a full DP station
up here and moved it forward and it turned out very nice and then we have large settees either
side so this space is large enough to have a wonderful pilot house area and then a great
lounge bar settee area here for owners you know a bimini out over the stern so you have almost 700
square feet just in this area alone great space for the guests and the crew to work together
sail the ship and to enjoy the voyage. So you have about 2,200 square feet on this deck alone. Great
overhead height. A wonderful owners stateroom. Fire rated stairways and stairwells going up and
down throughout and look at the overhead you have for ventilation and ducting look at how much space
you have almost 28 to 30 inches just for sheet metal ducting and overhead services and supplies
for these are all ingredients for a successful conversion that can be done at a reasonable price
point. These are all joiner bulkheads, so you can just strip these out of here and open this space
up. This vessel is built with very few structural bulkheads but anyway large spaces with minimal
structural interference even come in here and put an interior package in that's pre constructed out
of updated panels and your surfaces on them and do it in a way that is that can go in very quickly.
This is an access hatch - it goes right through to the engine room. You can pull your main engines
out of here you needed to. It's awful nice and they're not buried inside the ship. Not you'd ever
have to. There are 4 generators for propulsion and she runs on two and keeps two in reserve all the
time. If you ever had to put a full package out you can do it right through this hatch. These are
obviously large lab areas. You can use this space for a large upper sky lounge or you could cut it
up and remove it and replace it with all glass all the way around here. It would be interesting
to see what the designer comes up with. You can bring in a joiner company and you can
put a joiner package in this then quickly. Look at this space, look at this deck, this deck is
almost 100 feet long by itself and this is an upper deck. This isn't even on the main deck.
see if we were in a Big Sky Lounge here and then you have a set of double doors and you have your
guest staterooms off and either side with small balconies. Once again joiner bulkheads right.
This is steel on this side so these are steel the starboard side and joiner on the port so you
could take this and open this all the way up that direction. We're up in the foredeck area. This is
the second deck 300 kW emergency generator over on the side Caterpillar and then forward here is all
storage locker both of the locker lines support and there's a dumbwaiter an elevator type shaft,
it's mechanical but goes all the way down deep for procuring lots of lines in here. These ships are
made to go offshore for a year at a time. And look at the width of the halls I mean these passageways
you know almost 2 meters wide. You can see some beautiful cherry or the beautiful hardwood just
flowing down through here oh my gosh with some marble inlay. This would be a blast to convert
A big walk-in freezer and reefers - easily could take storage for months at a tim. Has a hospital.
You wouldn't want to change this there's no reason to I would keep a hospital on ship to the size.
This would be a great crew lounge it's forward of the galley and then a great great commercial
galley already and then another dining area. So once again, this could all be for crew - crew
lounge, crew galley area. Machine shop it's really nice if you're gonna have skiffs and launches and
ROV's and AUVs and submarines. Having this right adjacent to the back deck is awful nice with a
lathe and all its components. But she's got the four 398's and like I said you know you can run
anywhere from two three or four depending on your speed they live a long time they're great engines
are very inexpensive to rebuild. You can rebuild these engines for 60 to 75 thousand dollars
apiece. They have a long life and of course you know talking having to rebuild every maybe five or
ten years on something a vessel of this nature. So we're not talking much money - repair and
maintenance costs for the main engines and the propulsion would be very limited. Once again we
done have seen everything from air compressors to centrifuges for your oil and everything's pretty
much state of the art I would say in general. This is the control space the same thing that's
propulsion control one person can run everything from here without a question and then you'd have
an assistant engineer as well. Yes this vessel would be ideal for you know for that submarine
ROV AUV expedition for going halfway around the world.This boat generally runs a 9- 11 man crew,
depending on how hard you going to work and where you're going. These are the 2 drive motors.
They're 800 horsepower each, General Electric, they turn the maximum of 180 rpm and no reduction,
so they're very slow turning and most of turn time you'll be cruising at 150-160 rpm you won't be
pushing them to hard. These are your fresh water pressure tanks for your just your potable water
systems, fuel transfer, some ballast transfer lines. No gearbox. No reduction gear no nothing
it's a straight drive, the only thing you have is a thrust bearing there and a shaft brake - very
smooth. You sit down here and they're just humming like this. It's great for when you have ROV's,
AUV's, toys in the water that you're using some subsea equipment you can maneuver around
that with a large bow thruster and these two propulsion motors you can maneuver around them
very nicely. And if you want to add dynamic positioning under the ship the ship is ideal
for adding dynamic position because it's already diesel-electric so it's a matter of interfacing
the DP system with the electric control motor controls which works very well. We've done one,
it worked out beautifully but I think it's a 600 horsepower stern thruster in the keel we
already had a 500 horsepower in the bow and you that blended with these two propulsion motors
gave the vessel phenomenal maneuverability. Very inexpensive DP upgrade. It was very
reasonably priced. And this boat is just this boat has just come out of drydock had a brand
new five year class certificate on her hull and machinery. Rudders were pulled and the shafts
were pulled and inspected and all of that. She's ready to go around the world. It's a
phenomenal foundation. This hull, with a minor conversion could be one of the finest expedition
yachts in the world. From a quality capability and a holistic blend - ice-class construction,
its heavy steel construction, along with its volume. Wonderful ship to travel, take a family
on, take a group on an adventure and you could spend a lifetime on the ocean on a ship like this.