The new Immanuel MDV-1 breaks plenty of the accepted rules of how a fishing vessel should look. It was built in a little over a year as a co-operative project by the Padmos and Hoekman shipyards and delivered last summer to Urk owners Klaas Kramer and Hendrik Romkes.
It is designed to operate with minimal fuel costs, combining twin-rig trawling and pulse fishing using a newly developed version of pulse gear to work with two trawls spread with doors.
The low running costs are achieved by using diesel-electric propulsion, with a Mitsubishi main engine driving an electric motor that is directly coupled to a 3000mm diameter propeller with no gearbox. This 500kW engine is partnered by a 117kW auxiliary that is big enough to provide power as a get-you-home solution.
“It’s a fixed pitch propeller connected directly to the electric motor. We found that we can control the propeller from zero up to 120rpm and we don’t need controllable pitch,” Leon Padmos said, commenting that the option of going for a diesel-electric system was not an easy one to take, but this has turned out to have been a very worthwhile move.
“With this system the generator is always running at the top of the efficiency curve for a diesel engine all the time,” Klaas Hoekman said. In fact, the propulsion system has been shown to be highly efficient, as well as very quiet.
There are efficiency measures everywhere, including a 5000 litre heat battery that keeps the boat warm enough between trip so a shore connection is not needed. In its dormant mode, the boat’s systems automatically turn off all lights and allows the temperature on board to drop to 14°.
Immanuel is laid out with a wide working deck after of the wheelhouse with three Padmos winches on the main deck and the pulse gear winches on the bridge wings. The substantial stern gantry holds the net two drums and has the deck crane mounted at the top.
Catches are passed to the deck below for sorting, gutting and washing on the handling deck which has a Leba plaice gutting machine, before being transferred to the fishroom to be weighed and boxed in ice.
LOA: 30 metres
Beam: 8.60 metres
Design: Padmos
Construction: CSR
Fitting out: Hoekman Shipbuilding
Main engine: Mitsubishi 500kW @ 1200rpm
Auxiliary: Mitsubishi 117kW @ 1500rpm
Alternator: 400kW
Fixed pitch propeller: Van Voorden 3000mm diameter, inside a nozzle
Steering: Tri Do
Heat battery: 5000 litres
Fishroom capacity: 900 boxes
Gutting machine: Leba
Catch handling: VCU
Winches: Padmos
Pulse modules: HFK
Trawls: Coöperatie Westvoorn
Doors: Thyborøn
Warps: Hampidjan DynIce
Electronics: De Boer Marine
Trawl sensors: Marport
