Working in Boat Design

[OconeePirate]

I got to wondering this morning how one goes about working in boat design. I'm ten years too late and kind of entrenched in my career now, but hey, if everything went to heck and I had to start over from scratch....

But say 15 years ago when I was still an undecided engineering major or even 10 years ago when I was graduating with my BS in ID. (Yup, BS, not a BA like most ID programs, LOL.) What would the next step have been? From reading the resumes of designers it seems most of them are almost born into it or meander into it, or is the meandering due to other jobs being done for money while still on the path to designing boats?

Is there a place for people with lower levels of schooling and experience? Do firms like that still hire draftsmen? Does anyone still learn how or even know how to draw with a board, a T-square, and a set of Rapidographs? I'm so far removed from that world now its not even funny. I see all these ideas people post using the various software available and realize that I could get something drawn faster on paper or using an -old- version of AutoCAD. I downloaded DelftShip and it doesn't make sense to me, yet.

This question is really just for curiosity's sake on my part, but there might be some impressionable 17 year old reading it that could get some good from it. I guess my question is pretty open ended, but if someone has a good rambling "how to get a job designing boats" answer, I'd love to hear it.

Thanks,
Thomas

[mmd]

An interesting question, Thomas, and one that I would like to address. However, I am pretty tied-up right now preparing a bid for a new project for a client, so I'll have to come back to this. But just to scare you a bit, consider this:

The attrition rate in this profession (small craft design) is very high. My class of Small Craft NA-wannabe's started out with a population of 38. Seven of us graduated. Only three are still working in the field - myself, Bernie, and Jerome. Bernie and Jerome do not do any design work that I know of, but are employed in shipbuilding, one in mangement of a small shipyard, the other as a boatbuilder/historian at a museum.

Big ship design statistics are a bit better. Many grads from my school in later years have gone on to careers in design and middle-management in military and commercial ship projects.

Think of it this way - about 95% of all small pleasureboats in North America are mass-produced by maybe thirty or forty companies. Very few of these companies have in-house designers; rather, they contract the design work out to "name" designers. There are maybe a couple of dozen (I'm being generous here) "name"designers active on the continent who specialize in yachts. Most are small offices employing one or two NA technicians. The employment possibilities are very, very small.

That said, I'll quote my old NA instructor: "Small craft designers are rarely wealthy, only occasionally recognized, but are mostly a happy and contented lot." I love my job and wouldn't trade it for anything, but it is a constant struggle to stay employed.

Gotta go and be employed for a few more hours. Later...

[TR]

about 95% of all small pleasureboats in North America are mass-produced by maybe thirty or forty companies. Very few of these companies have in-house designers; rather, they contract the design work out to "name" designers.

Michael.....

I would take issue with that.....I can think of 2-3 minor yacht builders in North America who use outside designers....most use in-house "no-name" designers. Companies like Hunter, Catalina, J-boats, Bayliner, SeaRay.....etc. All use in house design.....only Beneteau uses outside design, but they are not exactly NA based.

Some would suggest the "dumbing down" of yacht design is the result.....in-house designers are mostly industrial design grads working for a big corporation.

[Todd D]

You have a pretty narrow focus TR. There are three yacht builders withing 5 miles of my house that use outside designers. You may have heard of a couple of them: Hinckley, Morris and Classic Boat Shop. There are half a dozen other builders within 10 miles that use a combination of in-house and outside design. The in-house people are mostly building boats that were designed many years ago or ar variants of boats designed up to 50 years ago.

[OconeePirate]

Some would suggest the "dumbing down" of yacht design is the result.....in-house designers are mostly industrial design grads working for a big corporation.

Industrial design? Most industrial design programs don't teach you enough of the engineering end of things to be of much using designing the functional bits of a boat. They could help with the head and gimbal stove though.

[paladin]

I really don't know of more than one or two people that still do the drawings by hand.....I do.....but in the last couple of years sent my hand drawn pages to a young fellow who does a cad cam job on one or two pages, usually the lines drawings, and I use it for a double check. I am an electronics engineer that started with aeronautical engineering and took YDI and Westlawn as hobby courses for fun and giggles, did very well with several kudos for my work, but....I was not of the discipline that would choose it as my sole career as an income producing field,....although I partnered with a cabinet maker for a few years in a boatyard in Thailand, and with me running the front office and he the shop we did well. There were other Americans, a couple of Italians and a couple or three fellows from OZ and NZ doing the same thing.....I may note that they all folded within 2-3 years while we managed to stay open....the prime reason, as far as I am concerned, is that I did not rely on the yard for subsistence for a couple of years. I enjoyed the drawing, sketches etc, did the engineering design as a necessity and treated it as a hobby....Tom, my partner, did not try to live as an American, but settled into the local lifestyle.....then after a couple of years we were established and things picked up.
I have a friend that currently is upgrading some of my work from 30-40 years ago, and we are redoing the scantlings for U.S. available materials, but it's more for fun than expectations of income. One reason for doing it is that he is a very struggling designer and needs the work. Start as a hobby.....don't rely on it as income.....perhaps poor advice.

[TR]

Todd....I think what Oconee can take from MMD's, yours, and my posting is that the yacht design business is filled with tiny niches. Design practices as such are highly specialized business's and there is no "average" office. Potential employees in the business come looking for a job with the basics, but most training is on the job as it's highly specific. Every design office that employs folks have a particular product they specialize in, and a particular way of delivering that product.

Let's look at the three builders you mention.

From what I can see Classic Boat Shop bought one design from Chuck Paine back in the 1990's....not a large consumer of design services. Hopefully Chuck still receives the odd royalty cheque from them though they don't seem to be building any new boats currently.

As it happens I worked closely with the Hinckley Company in the 1990's. At that time the design office I worked in (Bruce King Yacht Design) employed 4 yacht designers, an engineer, and a secretary. On their end Hinckley had an engineering office with 4-5 people in it. Of course we weren't doing just work for Hinckley, we were doing custom boats and the odd other production job. Today I see Hinckley has removed all mention of design from their website and it's been several years since they introduced a new model. The latest Picnic Boat (37') may well of been designed in-house.....I have no idea. I think I can safely say they have vastly reduced reliance on outside yacht designer's recently?

Morris is apparently doing okay...they have secured the contract to built a fleet of (4) new sail training boats for the naval academy. These are by an outside designer, Dave Pedrick. I would say most of their sailboats are semi-custom....ie built to order. The exception might be the M29, but they don't indicate what they are currently building. I would guess the market for the Paine designs has disappeared. So Morris are sending some royalties to S&S for the M series boats....but how many do they really produce?

My reference in my first post was to production builders, not those who produce 1-2 boats a year. Design offices which employ people (yacht designers in training) are sustained by royalties from production designs. There is no money in custom design, though you need to do it to gain recognition and prestige as a stock boat designer. Both the Bruce King and the Chuck Paine design offices are now closed......a direct result (at least partially) of builders not employing independent design offices.

[Todd D]

TR

You are tight about Classic boat shop. They do only build the one boat. Last time I chatted with Jean he had two boats building this winter.

Hinckley doesn't have any in-house design staff that I know of, particularly not now. They do have engineers though. I agree that the T37 appears to be an in-house tweak of the original picnic boat. I think they pretty much used the same hull with a lot of structural mods to accomodate twin engines. Their other boats are not in-house designs that I know of.

Morris built over 60 of the M36s and quite a few M42s. So far I believe they have built one M52 and 4-5 M29s. All of their boats are semicustom in that the buyer has a lot of input over the details, but the hulls and decks are stock. For the last few years they have been building about 30 boats a year. That came to a grinding halt last spring, but is slowly picking up again. I don't think the 4 boats for the Coast Guard Academy will tide them over for long as I doubt they will have more than basic interiors - where most of the time and money is.

[OconeePirate]

Thank you all for you responses. I am glad this actually turned into a bit of a discussion.