Mini Megas: Building a first-class tender
The best things in life really can come in small packages, but designing a great small package takes significant skill.
When New York-based Hacker-Craft is preparing to build a wooden tender, it starts with owner input on hull form and aesthetics.
Space is always a concern, but working in wood, Hacker-Craft can design most of what an owner wants in a fixed footprint.
A custom limo tender takes about 6,200 hours to complete.
Hodgdon Yachts in Maine takes two to three times as long to build its fiberglass tenders as it does a 36-foot production boat.
Why? These craft feature an intricate, labor-intensive design with myriad parts that must be joined and faired by hand.
Origins: Evolution of the Rigid-bottom inflatable boat
Rigid-hull inflatable boats did not start off as large-yacht counterparts. The RIB was introduced to the boating community through the commercial sector 45-plus years ago as a rescue craft because of its combination of safety and high performance. Students at Atlantic College in South Wales, working from an inflatable boat, combined a deep-V hull form with inflatable tubes, modifying an earlier design by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution that featured a flat bottom of plywood. Zodiac Milpro presented the first commercial RIB, the Searider, through its subsidiary Avon at the 1969 London Boat Show. While RIB tender design continues to evolve, these boats have seen regular service as yacht tenders since the 1970s.