Cape Codder Marine in Lynn, Mass., started a major rebuilding job in January on the Relentless, a 46-foot Jarvis Newman lobster boat with a 5-foot stern extension that was built in the 1980s. It fished out of Boston for a number of years but is now based in Plymouth, Mass.
Cape Codder’s Bob Dobias describes the Jarvis Newman 46 “as a really cool design. A lot of times, they don’t have much shape to them, don’t have much curve to them, but they did a really good job on this boat. We’ll try to build it back the same way.”
The project will be done in two stages, Dobias says. “We’re doing everything on the front half of the boat this year,” says Dobias. That means everything forward of the first bulkhead aft of the engine, including the engine room, wheelhouse, trunk cabin, and berths. Then “the boat will go back fishing in the spring, June at the latest, hopefully sometime in May.”
“Then the next season, or maybe a couple of seasons,” they will redo the deck aft of the wheelhouse. Dobias describes the Relentless as a “very well-built boat - fiberglass over wood - all double plywood and heavy frames, but construction has a life span.” Eventually, the Relentless started soaking up water and “was leaking water everywhere. Be nice to have a nice tight, dry house.”
The engine room’s floor, bulkhead, and the deck above it are coming out. “The whole engine room is getting redone,” says Dobias. The engine itself, a 3406 Caterpillar, will remain, though, since the boat’s owner is thinking about a future repower with an engine slightly smaller but just as powerful, “we’ll try not to have anything that’s encumbering to be able to repower.”
