As a retired marine tech, primarily electric, but I also had to a lot of work on other systems - plumbing, toilets, some oil/filter changes, plus, plus, plus. You will be going to work on your engines more than any other part of your boat, hopefully mostly for routine maintenance, so easy access to them for that is most important. If anything is hard to get to, especially if it is hard to get there and back out, you will be tempted to not get there in the first place and thus neglect things that should not be neglected.
Every boat has its challenges but twins are usually the worst. Everything on one engine is harder to get to on the other side of the boat. Having an oil change pump is worth its weight in gold sometimes (but one more thing that can break but in general they seem to last a long time since they only are used relatively infrequently). You absolutely need to have relatively good access to the raw water impeller/pump. You have to be able to actually look inside them although sometimes a mirror will work but isn't easy or fun.
I pretty much loved most things about Nordic Tugs but I hated working on their motors if they were underneath the helm station. Other boats, especially some Bayliner models made me pretty claustrophobic especially when I had to crawl on my elbows to the front of the engines. And I had to lay across the engine mount stringers to get to the alternator on the starboard side. I almost got stuck more than a few times and hated every time. I had to take off my all-in-one belt knife and make sure I had nothing on that could catch anything.
Access to batteries is critical as well as they need more maintenance if they are FLA and get killed a lot by owners who don't do maintenance as often as they should because of how difficult it is to get to them, or work on them if the overhead space is too tight. And - replacing them can be a bear.
If I were buying a trawler right now, which I may do in the near future, engine room access would be a major factor in what boat I would consider.
Thank you for the great reply. Funny that my number one priority is the ability to get around the engine room without issue. After that, my wife can pick whatever trawler works for the family.
I hear you! Except the small Vberth is my home since the boss and the dog kick me out of her stateroom! What, you have an Admiral that cooks? If I want to eat more that rabbit food, I'm on the grill cooking it. If it's fish, then I have to sleep in the basement ER!HA!! My Admiral would take a look at my ideal boat with my stand-up engine room and tell me “It better have a bed and a TV in it because unless the boat has my perfect galley, stateroom and shower, you’re going to be sleeping there”!
From our shopping, this is what we saw: Californians in the 40+ range have huge, walk-in engine rooms. Big Defevers (47 & 49) have cavernous engine rooms. Lots of the Taiwanese 80's and 90's vintage - mostly single screws - have pretty good access through lift out floor panels. The Caver 47xx trawler have small engine rooms. You will do some belly crawling, but the floors do lift out and it does help some. Newer SeaRays and Regals (technically not trawlers) have extremely small engine spaces. Our Navigator has a meduim space. There is a little crawling, but once I am in, I have plenty of space.Most of that, however, is due to our 15' beam.
Good luck with your search.
I like that, "slither space". I'd say I'd steal it, but as forgetful as I am I'll never remember it.
I have wondered how expensive it would be to have a reasonably talented wood worker create some extra hatches in my salon floor over my "slither space".
Shouldn't your Trawler be like your house? Garage, workshop, toy yard and mancave at least 1/2 of it?
Let's get back to reality for many of us!
But yours is a great goal to aim for!
Hey Dave,
To your question: I was fine with Klee Wycks engine room until I got spoiled by the 4 guys standing engine room on Libra. So, I had a good wood/steel guy put hatches in Klee Wycks saloon to open the lid on the entire engine room. If I remember right, the ballpark for that work was 16K. Not claustrophobic now...….!
I have posted a couple of these photos before, but it never gets old. When we show people Semper Fi, they are blown away by the size of the galley and the engine room. Even more so when you tell them that they are standing in a 37' boat. Our engine room is accessed through a door in the second stateroom and there is stand-up headroom when you step inside with a workbench and a vise on the port side. There is a minimum of five feet of headroom between the engines and stand-up headroom on the inboard side of the port engine. You would have to have a much larger boat to get the same kind of access on a twin engine boat.
It certainly has a different look to it. Not your typical anything.One of the very nice things about the GH. Great choice of engines and I love that sea chest.