TUVA II is not (at least at this point) a finished design, but just a preliminary to a design that I would love to build for myself. The purpose would be for cruising the coast of Maine and further north in the summers, and heading south during the winters for the US East and Gulf coasts, and the Bahamas. She is a compilation of mymusings during parts of such trips in a variety of other boats, so I am pretty sure of what I want this new one to be.
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Robert Whitehouse says:
Doug, great design. I built your Bowler, and there is no prettier 27′ cruiser on the water. Alas, she didn’t fit the family. However, she has a new life with a loving owner who will keep her bristol.
This boat is a dream. I think the twin 50hp a bit extreme, and twin 25-30hp four strokes would work just fine in my opinion. Narrow and long, a bow thruster would help with those awkward dockings in a contrary wind. Bowler could get quite difficult with a breeze astern at low speed- no stern in the water to hold it true. Yup, strip planked with fabric & epoxy inside and outside will keep the weight down and the strength up.
If Hylan & Brown builds one, then I will be dropping in to see her!
Robert Maes says:
The original story page here dates back to 2013 but here I am enjoying it in 2024.
A comment by Gibby Conrad on May 2, 2013 refers to a 38 foot tour boat with twin 75 hp Honda outboards that gets on plane with 32 passengers on board. I’m very interested to know what kind of boat Gibby Conrad is talking about here. Is there any way to reach out and ask Gibby about it? I would possibly love to adapt such a vessel to a cruising boat if it truly gets on plane with that kind of weight aboard.
David Hagler says:
Love this design and as I am kicking of my 5 year plan for a coastal cruiser, I am just wondering if there is any progress on the detailed design.
David Tew says:
While they are currently expensive, Yanmar is coming out with 50 hp turbo-diesel outboard motors. Another option for a Tuva II. http://www.yanmarmarine.com/News-detail/YANMAR-LAUNCHES-THE-DTORQUE-111-TURBO-DIESEL-OUTBOARD/
David Ryan says:
Doug
Love the concept, and am sold on modern outboards as an easy and economical way to power. I do have a concern about outboards as power though. They tend to be at or very near the stern. In a displacement boat as the sea state builds they tend to pitch out of water. My experience is from sailboats where a transom mounted outboard became progressively less useful the more you wanted it
Doug Hylan says:
David, a valid point — please see my response to Chris Chadbourne’s similar question on my BERET post.
Andrew Taylor says:
Doug, are your intentions to offer the plans for TUVA II for sale? At 45′ she’ll just fit into my new workshop. The kids and I will be building your Point Comfort 18 for launch next summer, and I’ll be starting Top Hat shortly after. I think I have more fun building them than using them.
I really like this concept for a “coastal cruiser” or ICW boat. One question I have is about the raised pilothouse. Looks like that’s where the diesel inboard would go, but if using the twin outboards (which I’d likely do), could some of that space be reclaimed for interior headroom? My family are all tall, and a few extra inches wouldn’t go unnoticed.
Andrew Taylor says:
Just thought of another question. Do the twin outboards work with the single transom cutout as shown? I can’t tell from the plan view how far apart the motors are mounted…
Doug Hylan says:
Hi Andrew,
The headroom in the pilothouse is 75″ under the beams as shown. The deck in this area could certainly be lowered to get extra headroom. You wouldn’t want the helmsman’s eyeballs to be any lower or visibility over the bow could be a problem. As shown, the motors are spaced 26″ on centers, the minimum for motors 85 HP and up. Some people might like to increase that spacing a bit for better low speed maneuvering.
As for finishing the plans, I’d love to do it, but a boat of this size requires quite a bit of work and the cost could be high. For stock plans, I usually figure that I can pay for my time if I sell about 40 sets of plans. Some boats do, others don’t. With a boat the size of TUVA II, I would be very unlikely to sell 40 sets, so the price would have to be a higher fraction of the cost of finishing the drawings.
Andrew Taylor says:
How about a Kickstarter-style campaign? You could come up with a number to finish the stock plans – say, $10,000 (wild-a** guess). Then we could sign up to purchase a set of stock plans at, say, $1,000 apiece, paid in advance. If you get 10+ buyers, bam! you’re off and running. If not, you either return the pledges, or get buyers to agree to a larger purchase price based on 10,000 divided by X number of purchasers.
Just a thought, but I’d be curious to see whether there would be a market for this kind of arrangement. Not sure there are enough eyeballs here (based on unique user names in this comment thread) to swing it, but maybe if OCH promoted it on the front page and/or with an email blast? Again, just curious about the potential market for this kind of thing. Literally just came to me as I was reading your reply.
Doug Hylan says:
Interesting idea. I am rather behind the times on this sort of thing, so it never occurred td me. You are about right on the cost.
Rod Sipe says:
Hi, Doug, I see that there have been no additional comments since the last time I looked, but I printed this string out in 2015 and ran across it again recently. As these things usually go, I have no damn business at all asking, with a wherry in the shop and a Gartside runabout on the boards, but I am afraid I have that dreaded disease, “Tuva on the brain” and I keep coming back to Andrew Taylor’s charming idea of you enlisting subscriptions to the funding of the design. I’m getting a little long in the tooth for sailing and Lola, our ’67 Hinkley H-41 is now primarily sailed by my sons, and the raised deck and traditional look of Tuva II gets me going in the same way that the lines of Lola do. So, that’s two, is it worth the time and effort to ask your subscribers if there are 8 more starry eyed optimists out there?
Ed Vincent says:
Have loved the concept of Tuva II for a while now. Is there any progress on plans? I’d be interested in the kickstarter idea.
With the distances I have to deal with, its diesel for me and plenty of tankage at that.
Doug Hylan says:
Hi Ed,
There has been a lot of new talk lately about this design. Perhaps this winter will finally see something happen. i’m not sure that Kickstarter is appropriate for this purpose, but if a group of a half dozen folks got together, maybe they could each get a set of plans for a reasonable cost. Of course, everybody would want something a little different….
JIM GIBLIN says:
The links below present a good case for the economy of gasoline vs. diesel power. They also explain why today’s light, high speed, diesel engines do not deserve the reputation for long life and durability that was established by the heavy, slower, industrial / marine diesel engines of past years. The modern gasoline outboard engine is a remarkable machine and deserves serious consideration as a power plant for this type boat.
http://www.yachtsurvey.com/GasDiesel.htm Part 1
http://www.yachtsurvey.com/GasNdiesel.htm Part II
Christopher Chadbourne says:
It’s a real pleasure to see someone actively designing low speed motor cruisers in this day and age. I have two comments, based on several years experience with our own 40 foot low speed motor cruiser, now celebrating her 50th season. First, there is a great deal to be said for being able to reach the side deck from the wheel in one step. And, it’s wonderfully soothing to step out to the deck and look astern at her wake trailing away. Second, as Chesapeake bay cruisers, we lust for ventilation… lots of it. Centerline hatches big enough to mount fabric wind scoops on that flush foredeck AND two more on the housetop might be much appreciated on TUVA II’s first southbound cruise.
Gibby Conrad says:
I like the twin 4 strokes. I ran a 38 foot tour boat with twin 75 hp Hondas. They were quiet, fuel efficent, and very reliable and they would push the boat on plane with 32 passengers on board. They also provided the ability to spin the boat in almost its own length-something you could not do with a single diesel inboard. They had well over 4000 hours on them when I sold the boat and were running good as new.
A great power alternative and a really nice looking boat.
Robert Middleton says:
If the air draft isn’t too high, this would be a great boat for the canals of Europe. Diesel or electric/generator would be the choice because fuel cost.
Peter Poanessa says:
Hi Doug,
We met at the wooden boat show in 2011 and I loved the cruiser you brought. I also like this design a lot. Even the use of twin low power 4 stroke outboards. I built a 27′ Sam Devlin power cruiser, (Alsek) and used a Volvo diesel and outdrive. It was a good combo, allows for clearing and even changing props without getting in the water, has great slow speed control with the duo-prop and is very fuel efficient but…the noise is an issue! I want to relax aboard and that is difficult when the noise level reaches a certain point. Lets face it we wooden boat types are all non-conventional and you and I can’t be the only ones with this line of thought. I am also interested in long narrow power boats which are rare these days. This design has a little in common with a new design from Devlin that he is building for a west coast customer and it has many similar features although a different aesthetic. You can see it here http://store.devlinboat.com/bluefin48.aspx Thanks for sharing this it will allow my day dreams to go on and on.
John Hughes says:
I sailed for an afternoon a few years ago on a 30 foot boat in Switzerland of all places. Near the end of the day, the wind died and we had to motor in. I went forward to gather the sagging spinnaker and then drop the main (with instructions given to me in Swiss-German, which I do not know!)…and by the time I got back to the cockpit, the skipper had started the engine. Amazingly enough, I had no idea it was running. I was all ready to dive below and move the battery switch to “BOTH” when he pointed out that we were already under power. I believe the diesel was an Italian one and it was the quietest engine installation I’ve ever encountered. It made me rethink the range of possibilities, as I sometimes muse about replacing the Westerbeke 4-108 in my boat. Still, I like the idea of twin engines. My one concern is that in a boat like this, you’re not going to outrun the seas if it cuts up rough, and having gas engines where water can get to them is always risky. And if a following sea takes out one engine, it’s likely to take out both, eliminating the “redundancy is good” advantage.
Even so, I really appreciate the well-though-out-ness of this design summary. It was a pleasure reading it.
Eric Blake says:
Doug, It is a real pleasure to read a design brief such as this. I cannot remember the last time I have read about a new design in the designers own word’s, and find it very insightful. This is a boat that makes a lot of sense to me. The true test of a boats aesthetics I learned from Havilah Hawkins and it is that if you take all the shine away and the boat is still drop dead gorgeous, then you really have something. I think that this design could easily go either way, work boat finish or yacht, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference. A real beauty, thank you.
Tiernan Roe says:
Hi Doug,
I’m with you on the raised deck and the outboards and the trad construction. 10,000 is a lot of petrol/gas and for the recreational user it doesn’t make a blind bit of difference whether petrol or diesel. Even in Europe. The maintenance of the outboards is a lot easier/quicker (read cheaper) And man are they quiet compared to high speed diesel. Resale value I’m not so sure would be affected. If they’re into wooden boats they’re not inthe mainstream.
Tiernan
David Kent says:
Great looking boat. How much would think a Tuva II would cost?
Doug Hylan says:
Generally, we can build a custom wooden boat for about the same cost/pound as a medium to high end stock fiberglass boat. That would put this boat at around $6oo,ooo.oo.
Robert Autio says:
After having the pleasure and enduring the odor of being a stern man on a Maine lobster boat for a couple teenage summers, your ideas on the pilot house and “porch” are great. Also like the idea of the sliding doors. As far as a drive system, I have wondered about a vertical wind turbine powering a sail drive motor?? I need to stand next to some turbines to hear how much hum there would be. A lovely, well-thought-out design. Thanks for sharing.
David Tew says:
Is that one of your Oonaghs in the davits? I hope to see one in the flesh some day. http://www.dhylanboats.com/oonagh_plans.html
Doug Hylan says:
Yes it is, David. You could tow a boat like OONAGH most of the time, but there are times when you would be glad to have it safely tucked up in davits. Even though she is a pretty sizable tender, being a pram she is short enough to not hang out beyond the quarters of the mother ship. Also, she could easily get her batteries charged while running along in davits.
David Tew says:
I met you and looked at your ‘first’ TUVA on my way to Nova Scotia to look at a smaller Paul Gartside raised deck motor cruiser (which we ended up buying). Has TUVA sold… and if so, where did she go?
Benjamin Mendlowitz says:
Great looking boat Doug and a very interesting power suggestion, I think the quietness of those outboards would make a huge difference to the pleasure of being aboard underway. Related to Pat’s comment below, as I read the drawing those outboards are contained in an enclosed engine well and not visible “hanging off the stern.”
Eigil Rothe says:
Wow, there isn’t anything I would change (not something I say often). There are many boats that fit this concept, but this gets it just right. Thank you so much for sharing.
Sam Temple says:
Looks wonderful Doug! I’m a fan of the raised foredeck and the galley with a view.
Pat Maundrell says:
In my opinion the inboard diesel engine win hands down, as compared to any number of outboards! I say this, not only because of fuel economy, but also for a much higher resale value as well as ease of resale. I would think the $10.000.00 off-set could easily be recouped in fuel saving and higher resale price! Also, I can’t help but think that the looks of two Outboard Motors hanging off the stern just wouldn’t look appropriate for a boat like this. If outboards are your choice, don’t forget there are Diesel Outboartds.
Doug Hylan says:
Pat, I realize that outboard power will be a hard sell for many people. Diesels are wonderfully reliable and pretty efficient, but for me the noise factor is key. The economics are very dependent on fuel prices, which I don’t think are actually going to increase that much, unless the human race gets it together and institutes a carbon tax. At the speeds I would use in a boat like this, fuel consumption would be low and it would take a long time to burn through that 10K, especially if it were earning any interest. Once that money was gone, I’d be happy to pay the difference for the peace & quiet.
You make a good point on resale value. I guess I would hope that by the time I was ready to sell, the reputation that these new outboards will have earned will reduce the difference. As with cars, unless the price of fuel is much higher (as in Europe) the fuel efficiency is not that commanding. And again, I personally would be willing to pay the price difference for quiet.
There is one other advantage to diesels that I did not mention above — their ability to make domestic hot water. There are easy work-arounds for this, but they decrease the price advantage. As far as outboard diesels, I think they would have most of the disadvantages of outboard power, and none of the advantages of inboard.