While Royal Huisman is best known for building sailing superyachts, its Huisfit refit and repair division is increasingly attracting a variety of power and sail projects. It recently completed work on a few significant projects, including the famed 231’10” (70.7-meter) Skat, which arrived late last fall.
Skat may have gained fame upon delivery by Lürssen 11 years ago due to her LOA and militaristic looks, but she maintains distinction because of pursuing one of the busiest cruising schedules of any yacht, period. Every year the megayacht makes her way around the Med, northern European and Scandinavian waters, the United States, the Bahamas, and the Caribbean. Suffice it to say that Skat barely sits still. She therefore has specific, and short, windows of opportunity in which to get classification society surveys, updates, and more completed.
Typically megayachts don’t venture to colder-weather countries like The Netherlands for service work taking place in autumn and winter months. But, Royal Huisman’s Huisfit won the contract for a few reasons. A primary one: The captain previously worked aboard two Royal Huisman megayachts, both while they were being refitted at another shipyard and after the work was completed. He says he found both the build quality and the attitude of the staff at Royal Huisman to be excellent. Another big influence was a Huisfit project going on when he was reviewing his options—which just so happened to be another Lürssen, the sailing yacht Eos. Between the feedback from Eos’ crew and a subsequent inspection of the Huisfit facilities in Harlingen, Skat’s captain believed the team would do the proper job.
So what did that job entail? Upgrading Skat’s two tender garages, reconfiguring the upper-deck layout to remove a bar and replace it with sunpads, completing a Lloyd’s Register survey for equipment ranging from the gensets to black-water pipes (including replacing some of it), repairing cosmetic paint, and installing new furnishings for alfresco areas on the main and bridge decks.
As sometimes happens during refits, logistical conflicts arose, but the captain says that due to them being discovered early on and addressed swiftly, they did not cause any problems. “In the end, Royal Huisman completed our work list, the budget was respected, the standard of work exceptional, and our departure deadline met to the day,” he explains. “The time and cost to relocate to the Netherlands was easily overcome by these results.” He further says, “They make a serious investment in their employees and enjoy loyalty, quality work, and extra effort in kind. Happy people do the best work. …Royal Huisman has also invested in long term relationships with specialist subcontractors supplying expanded expertise or labor. The yard and their subcontractors work so closely together, we often mistook subs for long-term Royal Huisman employees.”
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