Krogen 50′ Open (BLOG)

By Larry Polster

September 16, 2017

Enjoy these updates from Larry Polster of Kadey Krogen Yachts? See him speak on the experience of designing a boat and building the first 50′ Open at Bay Bridge Trawlerfest. Sign up here for his presentation on Thursday September 28th from 8:30am – 10am.

Over the years, I have worked with many Kadey-Krogen customers and quickly learned how a set of construction photos can be both exciting and frustrating. It would be exciting for the customer to receive photos of their new baby and frustrating for them not knowing what they were looking at! Therefore, in each of the last few updates, I have compared the artist renderings to construction photos, in order to ensure that you, the reader of these updates, clearly understood the progress.

I am excited to report that construction is now to a point that renderings are no longer required to understand how the Krogen 50’ Open will have an engaging, open and continuous main deck layout and be a worthy sibling to our raised pilothouse and expedition style yachts. In fact, she will be complete in just four weeks! In the photo above, you can see the first Krogen 50′ Open (with her classic blue sheer and top stripes) in the production line just ahead of a Krogen 48′ AE. Easily discernible at the bow is the fine entry which is found on every Kadey-Krogen and helps our vessels be the most efficient in their class.

When looking at the stern quarter in the photo tothe left, you see some features found on all Krogens, such as the large freeing ports which allow water to run off the deck, as well as the walk-thru boarding door. A noticeably different feature of the Krogen 50’ Open is a sliding entry door from the cockpit to salon which exhibits the same weather-tight capability as the double doors found on our other models.

Moving up to the flybridge and boat deck, you can see why Janet and I are really excited about this space. To the left is the summer kitchen cabinet which will contain a sink, refrigerator, prep area and grill. Forward, is the large L-shaped settee where we’ll entertain guests. The opening forward of the settee is a cavernous storage compartment that will easily swallow up fenders, lines and other miscellaneous gear. At the right of the photo is the door for access down to the pilothouse.

In the photo below, you see the steps coming down from the flybridge as well as the starboard pilothouse door and the boarding door through the starboard side of the Portuguese bridge. There are five boarding doors on the Krogen 50’ Open. Two each side, port and starboard, to make it easy to board with different dock heights, and one from the swim platform through the transom. And if you are questioning all the gray in the photo…no, we didn’t do cherry and gray! That’s just the covering used to protect the wood during the final phase of construction and during shipment.

The electronics are just about to be installed as evidenced by all the wires hanging out on the port side. Bilge pump switches are in as are the connections for the two VHF remote mounted microphones.

In the photo at right, which is looking aft, you see the pilothouse settee, but since the wall that would separate the pilothouse from the salon and galley is down, you can see all the way out the back door and window. This is what makes the 50’Open, well, open!

Just aft of the pilothouse is the galley (right) which now has the appliances installed as well as most of the drawers. I can’t wait to get my hands on the red knobs of our 30″ Wolf range and start cooking. When we had our Krogen 42′, we cooked just like we would in a land-based home, and it will be even easier in this nice, large, galley.

The easy-to-understand electrical panels are now complete. To the left is the 24VDC panel, and to the right is the AC panel which houses both 120 and 240 circuits. Oh, and look how comfortable the steps are! No tight quarters on the Krogen 50’ Open.

Since the plan is for me to work aboard while cruising, I thought it important to create a dedicated office space. The standard plans we drew up for the Krogen 50’ Open did not have an office, but we thought that if we relocated the washer and dryer (which was at the landing at the base of the steps from the pilothouse), the space vacated (and a little more taken from the guest stateroom closet) would be enough for a nice desk. The master cabin had two huge closets so I sacrificed part of what would have been my large closet to be the new location for the washer and dryer. As you can see, it was not a large sacrifice.

As I said above, I don’t think moving the washer and dryer into the master stateroom was a huge sacrifice. The washer and dryer are now neatly tucked away behind the double doors above and I still have a closet which is the single door. In addition to this closet space, Janet will have the “walk-in” closet not shown in this photo.

I love the layout of the Krogen 50′ Open as a whole, but there are four spaces that make me especially happy. I previously shared two of them with you, the flybridge and galley, but I have saved the two most amazing places for last. Drum roll, please…. The master head and the engine room. After all, on what other 50′ vessel do you find two sinks in the head AND an air conditioned engine room with seven feet of headroom!

Although the mirrors are not up yet, the master head (left) is nearly complete. For perspective, those sinks are 18 inch wide Kohler sinks, and while not terribly visible in this photo, the tile is a white penny-round tile with a copper colored banding around each piece. Once all is complete, the head should have a retro, yet contemporary, look.

Last, and certainly not least in this update, is the engine room, or the “holy place”. It will be cool and cool. Cool, as in fashionable (did I just call the engine room “fashionable”?), because of all the space, ease of getting to equipment, and the workbench. But it will also be cool, as in chilly, since we decided to put air conditioning in this space. I like to tinker, and with a workbench in the engine room, this will ensure whatever mess I make stays out of our living space!