It speaks highly of a company when it prides itself in manufacturing products that provide effective platforms for a diverse menu of options based on the requirements of the customer.
A good example of such a company is Alabama-based Silver Ships which produces six series of aluminum workboats designed, built, outfitted, and suited to meet its customers’ specific operational needs.
“We have a very similar build practice for all of our boats as far as how they’re fabricated,” said Silver Ships CEO, Steven Clarke.
“Our different series are based on different hull forms that are designed to meet the particular needs of our customers.”
Those designs “utilize three-dimensional modeling and hydrodynamic design software to ensure safety and operational usage in design, development, design evaluation and calculations throughout all stages of construction,”
Silver Ships has met the need for compromise with delivery over the past several years of a number of its Explorer series workboats to a variety of diverse customers including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE); the U.S. National Park Service; the Detroit Fire Dept.; the Suffolk County (N.Y.) Public Works Dept.; the Utah Div. of Parks and Recreation; and the Spotsylvania (Va.) County Fire Dept.
For example, Miss Agnes, the custom-built USACE boat named to honor former Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway Development Authority official, Agnes G. Zaiontz, is the first of Silver Ship’s Explorer series hydrographic survey vessel that the company has built.
“With these kind of survey vessels, there is usually a lot of other builders that go into a lot of design and electrical work with the survey gear costing as much and oftentimes more than the boat and its very sensitive surveying equipment,” said Clarke.
“We spent that extra design time to make sure that everything was electrically sound and designed correctly so that the Corps of Engineer’s surveyors can accomplish their mission.”
The craft was delivered to the USACE’s Alabama District and was purposely designed as a “stable platform” to conduct shallow water hydrographic survey missions along the 234-mile Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, which connects the Tennessee River at Pickwick Lake in Tennessee to the Blake Warrior River at Demopolis, Al.
“The Corps is one of our most important customers. Every district has different characteristics and they like the fact that we take the time to work with them and customize designs to meet their needs,” said Park.
“In fact, we’re currently working on a new hydrographic survey boat arm for the Engineer’s New York district.”
Miss Agnes performs its mission propelled by a pair of 350 hp Mercury SeaPro outboard motors and a double jack plate that simultaneously controls both engines when lifting or lowering them in the water. The boat also features an enclosed center console, a three-monitor survey station, and an air conditioning unit that is paired with a generator.
Every form, said Clarke, “has its own characteristics, its own different benefits and different limitations.”
Each boat, he added, “is a compromise between stability and sea handling, and how much water you draw and how shallow the water is that you can get into. An efficient and effective workboat design is based on those compromises.”
After all, “the most stable design afloat is a barge, but you can’t cut through waves very well with that.” •