Cummins Vessel Reference #691

“For most Alaskan fishermen, Dutch Harbor is out west, but for us, fishing in Adak, it is to the east,” explains Capt. Josh Trosvig as we watch the first of a pair of 200 kw gensets lowered into his new boat. When you are two days travel from Dutch, the nearest service center, quality and redundancy are essential. Three years ago, when Trosvig and his two partners decided to built a new boat, they went back to naval architect Hal Hockema who had designed the 58 by 27-foot Cynosure that they built and launched in 2009.

“That boat has been very successful so we made very few changes when we decided to build this one,” explained Trosvig, who has skippered the Cynosure longlining black cod and halibut and pot fishing Alaskan cod. He explained that they run the boat virtually year round with ten crewmembers in total with each man part of a six-man crew rotating about two months onboard for one off. As we spoke on the Seattle waterfront in early March, the engineer was running the boat in the Aleutians as Trosvig had come down to help partner Neil Anderson with the launch and engine installation of the new boat. As with the Cynosure, they rented a space on the Seattle waterfront and oversaw the building of the boat themselves. The new boat was started in May 2012 and will do sea trials in June of 2013.

The new boat will have two fish holds with a total of 3300 cubic feet as well as a 350 cu ft bail hold. A 40-ton refrigeration system will be support the frozen bait and the refrigerated saltwater fish holds. Two Cummins QSB7-DM powered 200 kW Stamford generator will support the electrical requirements of the refrigeration as well as the vessel’s hydraulics. These QSB7-DM engines are newly developed six-cylinder diesels employing high-pressure common rail injection and other refinements to offer highly efficient Tier 3 compliant engines. “We will run the port gen set for ten days and then switch to the starboard engine for ten days,” Trosvig explained.

The new boat will have the same Cummins QSK19-M main engine delivering 660 HP through a Twin Disc gear to a 70 by 57-inch propeller as they have on the Cynosure. This has proven a capable and reliable propulsion package. The gensets and refrigeration are a significant upgrade. “The Cynosure had a 30 ton refrigeration system with 100, 65 and 30 kW gensets. We have upgraded this boat to the 40-ton and the two 200 kW gensets, as well as a 40 kW hotel set,” explained Trosvig.

This will allow the same RSW system as well as coil freezer capacity should they decide to freeze onboard. There will also be a ten-ton per day ice machine for making slush ice. Rather than a mechanical power-take-off for the hydraulics they will use an electric over hydraulic system for greater flexibility. This will allow applications like the 30 HP bow thruster to be run off the hydraulics.

From the engine room to the auto baiting longline system in the fully covered working deck and to the wheelhouse, the emphasis on this boat is on redundancy, reliability and best available technology. “We have pretty much the same electronics as the big factory trawlers,” says Trosvig. “In addition to a Simrad ES70 split beam sounder we are using a multi-beam sonar. We had the third New Zealand made multi-beam WASSP sonar on the coast three years ago. Now there are 25 on the west coast.”

The combination of the two technologies allows Trosvig to identify the type of bottom and fish by species. “We can spot a 24-inch cod at depths 850 meters,” he says with a combination of boat pride and a true fisherman’s delight in his craft. As we watched the three Cummins engines being lowered into the hull of the new boat it seems that the standards of excellence in Alaskan fisheries has moved up another notch.

For more information:

Josh Trosvig
Phone: 321 501 8616
Email: jtros@aol.com

Neil Anderson
Phone: 206 669 2455
E-mail: atsea2317@comcast.net

Tony Thomas
Cummins Northwest, Inc.