FOR THOSE LOOKING FOR A MORE ECO-FRIENDLY TENDER, PETER MINDER REMINDS US THAT THERE IS NOW NO NEED TO COMPROMISE
For a long time, electric boats have had the aftertaste of slow, sluggish, complicated and impractical. But today, modern boats that have been consistently developed and designed with electric propulsion in mind have a performance comparable to that of combustion engines. The great and continuing progress in battery technology has also resulted in ranges that are sufficient for most of the usual applications.
And with regard to safety, the batteries, which are now specialised for marine applications, convince with all kinds of safety features.
Many years ago, ‘designboats switzerland ltd’ took a pioneering role in the development of modern, ultra-light sports boats and tenders. These boats, known under the label ‘tender by designboats’ and awarded with various design awards, have quickly found a large and loyal following and are in use on many inland and coastal areas. In the recent past, an ever-increasing proportion of the electric versions available for almost all types of boats has been ordered.
In addition to the models of the ‘tender by designboats’ (www.designboats.ch), their sister company ‘compositeworx’ (www.compositeworx.ch) has been offering custom-made boats based on their many years of experience and comprehensive know-how for some time now.
The focus is mainly on custom-made individual products as exclusive dayboats or as tender for a luxury yacht. These boats are developed and manufactured according to the individual specifications of the yacht owner or his designer. The infrastructure is ideal for boats up to 12m in length – but projects up to 15m in length have also been realised. Whether diesel propulsion or electric drive is solely the decision of the customer – the company compositeworx masters both tasks and knows exactly what is important for which drive variant.
Especially in the megayacht sector, the use of an electric drive is predestined for the tenders. In most cases, these tenders only have to cover short distances. In between the missions they are stored on board the mother yacht – where an appropriate charging infrastructure is available. On the other hand, the almost silent and above all exhaust-free and vibration-free drives spoil the guests with a driving experience in a class of its own.
Electric megayacht tenders are thus suitable for everyday use and comfortable. As the electric boats are also almost completely maintenance-free, they are also convincing in terms of maintenance and operating costs.
With the usual warranty periods for the batteries (up to ten years) and the extremely low maintenance and operating costs of an electric boat, the additional one-time extra costs can be recouped after only a short period of use.
However, experience has shown that for an efficient and smoothly functioning electric boat/tender, this boat must be designed from the ground up to meet the special requirements of a battery-powered electric boat. The mere conversion of an existing boat concept into an electric version will most likely not achieve the desired result and thus not be able to give the customer unlimited pleasure.
DESIGNBOATS SWITZERLAND & COMPOSITEWORX
Designboats Switzerland and compositeworx have many years of know-how in the development and construction of high-quality sports boats and yacht tenders. Together with the modern composite production infrastructure and the experience gained from many custom-made projects, this ensures that the boats made by designboats.ch and the custom-made one-offs developed and built by compositeworx.ch deliver the agreed result and that clients know that their project is in experienced and reliable hands. It is therefore not surprising that an exclusive and luxury ‘Owner’s Tender’ for a mega yacht is currently being built in the production halls of compositeworx. After thorough evaluation, yacht owner and the project team appointed by him decided in favour of the renowned Swiss shipyard situated on Lake Constance just next to the German border.
