Zeppelin is a custom one-off design drawn by Stan Huntingford and built in 1979 by Stephen Ross of Nanaimo, B.C. Stan was a terrific Pacific Northwest designer whose designs include the well known Maple Leaf 42, 48 and 54, Rafiki 37, Slocum 43, Passport 42, and Liberty 49, as well as numerous other designs. All his boats have the reputation of being comfortable, fast, sea-kindly cruisers and we have owned two of them, our Maple Leaf 42 Akussa and now Zeppelin. Zeppelin was based on Stan’s design of the Pacific 40, extended originally to 45 feet with a plumb transom and then completed at 47 feet with a reverse transom to provide a swim platform and lazerette stowage.
We purchased Zeppelin in October 2000 and immediately set about completely revamping the interior of the boat to suit our vision of a comfortable live-aboard vessel. After owning six boats over 25 years and six years of living aboard our Maple Leaf 42 we knew what we wanted in our next boat and what worked for us. We redesigned the interior layout and made extensive modifications to every cabin, including completely rebuilding the entire galley and most of the aft owner’s suite. Our shipwright Bruce W. worked 40 hours a week for 5 months until the end of March 2001 and the interior was ready to move aboard! Bruce did outstanding work and the interior finishing is excellent, he helped us create our vision of a comfortable and beautiful home afloat.
At the same time we replaced all the wiring and plumbing systems in the boat with upgraded, modern equipment. All the systems on the boat were redesigned to be efficient and easily maintained and repairable or replaceable. Everything on a boat has to fixed or replaced eventually! Our shipwright friend Andreas worked with Wayne to design our fixed dodger and then he built it out of 3 inch mahogany with a cored fiberglass top, it’s truly a practical work of art.
In 2005 Canoe Cove yachts remodeled both heads and showers and Philbrooks installed Vacu-flush heads. After the dodger, these heads are quite possibly the best upgrade we have made in all the work that has been done. They use a negligible amount of fresh water to flush, no more smell from the holding tank or hoses, no more clogged heads or rebuilding every two years, the holding tank lasts 3 times longer before it is full, and I just now have to do the first maintenance on one of the pumps. We also had Blackline Marine paint the entire hull.
In 2007 we added new radar, GPS plotter and a below deck hydraulic autopilot. We had Blackline pull the mast and replace all the wiring and running rigging and inspect and replace the standing rigging as needed. In 2008 we had the diesel engine rebuilt. This year it was adding a generator; solar panels; watermaker; new deck non-skid; reinforce the lifeline stanchion bases; new lifelines; scuba compressor; dinghy davits; and a huge list of small things to get ready for offshore. At last we felt ready to go!
The Details
Zeppelin is a flush deck, centre cockpit sloop, measuring 47 feet overall with 15 feet of beam, 42 feet of waterline and 7 feet of draft. Her designed displacement is 30,000 lbs; she is about 37,500 in full cruising trim according to the Travellift operators. She has a deep fin keel with shallow bilges and a fairly flat run aft to a full skeg and rudder. From the aft end of the keel to the leading edge of the rudder is over 10 feet of open space, helping Zeppelin handle extremely well under power, in both forward and reverse, as well as under sail. The hull is very powerful, with the beam carried well aft to a transom that measures 11 feet wide. She is constructed in fiberglass with an Airex cored hull and balsa cored deck and is of immensely strong construction. This is not just my opinion but also the opinion of two different marine surveyors, both of which have sterling reputations.
The flush deck makes for a dry deck due to the high freeboard, yet the windage is no more than any comparable size cruising boat as our deck is at the same height as most coach top cabins. In fact, we have been moored next to modern 37 – 40 footers and they actually have a higher cabin profile than we do. The flush deck also provides a terrific working and playing platform and a very large volume of space inside the boat for accommodations and storage.
The centre cockpit design gives us three sleeping cabins, two heads both with showers, a large galley and spacious main saloon. We can sleep up to eight people in four private cabins while in port and have four offshore sea berths. The cockpit is partially enclosed by a custom designed fixed windshield with side glass panels and hard top and the rest can be fully enclosed by canvas, with plastic or screened panels. This combination provides excellent versatility for all weather conditions, hot or cold, wet or dry, windy or calm.
Zeppelin is sloop rigged, with a removable inner forestay for ocean passages. She has twin backstays, roller furling jib, mainsail slab reefing, lazy jacks and full spinnaker gear. All control lines for sail handling and reefing are led into the cockpit so we can easily handle the boat with just the two of us.
The main engine is a Perkins 4-236 85 HP diesel with 130 amp alternator and Alpha 3-Stage Smart Regulator. Auxiliary charging for the 900 amp-hour main battery bank is through a 2500 watt Freedom inverter with 100 amp charger, a Next Gen 5.5 KW diesel generator, and two 130 watt Kyocera solar panels with MPPT controller. Fuel tankage is 120 US gallons and provides a cruising range of about 650 miles at 6 knots, maximum speed is 8 knots.
Water tankage is 180 US gallons and we have a 20 GPH PRO reverse osmosis watermaker driven by the generator. As we are avid scuba divers, we also have a portable gas driven scuba compressor and racks for six tanks, along with two boarding ladders from the stern. Miscellaneous gear includes all the usual electronics; safety gear; liferaft; bar-b-que; rigid hull inflatable with 20 HP and 3 HP outboards; 11 foot rowing dinghy on davits; and two folding mountain bikes.
