Joey Rodriguez has seen the ups and downs of the boat building business at his Rodriguez Shipbuilding in Coden Alabama. For a time, there was huge demand for big steel Gulf Shrimp boats and then the oil industry ramped up and kept him busy with a variety of tugboats. Then came the crash in oil prices and the crash in demand for towboats. Joey shuttered his yard for a year and a half.

“I didn’t have anything to do,” he said recently, “Then a little over a year ago I got an order for a tow boat from L&L Marine of Louisiana, then another for Jubilee Towing of Mobile. The first of those two has been delivered and the second should be working before the end of August 2020. We are now working on building three shallow-draft boats for the dredging company Weeks Marine.”

You can’t keep a good man down. With his reputation for shallow draft tow boats, his work is well suited to building tenders for dredges. He builds his hulls upside down and plans to roll the two 62-foot tugs for Weeks upright by the first week in August 2020. These two versatile boats are built in the model-bow, Lugger style that gives space on the forward deck for some cargo. They will also be fitted with a C.M.E. Custom Design towing winch aft. This will also serve for anchor handling.

Rodriguez has built a lot of boats with the legendary 19-liter Cummins diesels. The twin-screw Luggers for Weeks have two QSK19-M engines. Each produces 750 HP at 1800 RPM. They will turn 66 by 54-inch, stainless steel, four-blade, Kahlenberg propellers through Twin Disc MGX 5222 gears with 6.10:1 reduction.

Tankage on the towboat will include 16,000 gallons of fuel oil and 12,000 gallons of potable water, as well as 350 gallons of lube oil. These large volumes indicated the boat's role as a dredge tender. It will also serve to reposition the dredge anchors and tow the dredge to new locations. 

Accommodation is provided for up to six crew members.  Auxiliary power will be provided by a pair of Cummins QSB7-DM powered 60 kW generators. Vessel design is by MiNO Marine of Jefferson, Louisiana.

The third tug for Weeks is a 78 by 30-foot model bow triple screw, which will also service the dredging operation. She will have greater tankage capacities and a larger C.M.E. towing winch on her back deck which will allow her to do more towing etc. She is slated for delivery in August of 2021.

Profile drawing courtesy of Rodriguez Shipbuilding

For more information:
 
Joseph Rodriguez 
Rodriguez Shipbuilding Inc.
14843 Alba Ave.
Coden, Alabama
36523-31623, USA
Phone: (251) 824-4067
E-mail: joserodrig@aol.com
 
David Bourg, Phd, PE
MiNO Marine
119 Causeway Blvd. 
Jefferson, LA 70121
Phone: 504 218 8162
Email: david@minomarine.com
 
Benjamin Peterson
Manager – Towing Division
Weeks Marine Inc.
Phone: 908 463 5787

Capt. Jennifer McQuilken
Global Marketing Communications Leader, Marine and Oil & Gas
Cummins Inc.
4400 Leeds Ave. Suite 300 
Charleston, SC 29405
+1 843-696-9534 (call/text/WhatsApp)
Email: Jennifer.McQuilken@Cummins.com

Alan Haig-Brown
A. Haig-Brown & Assoc. Ltd.
Bangkok, Thailand
Vancouver, Canada
Canada Phone: 604 520 7650
Thai Phone: 66 (0)8 5347 6206
E-mail: alan@haig-brown.com