HEATHER

The 40’ carvel planked – Heather was built in 1965 by Doug Robb and spent her first 35 years as a commercial fishing boat. In 2000 Miller & Tunnage converted Heather to pleasure boat and installed the 1996 Gardner 6LXB, which was brand new at the time. Like all good Gardners she is very efficient e.g. at 5.5 knots, running at 800rpm, she sips 1L pnm. Normal cruise speed is 7.5 knots, but can be taken up to 9.5 knots max.

To use the old car dealer term – Heather comes with all the fruit, incredibly spec’ed and all set for some serious cruising.

Thanks to Ian McDonald for the tme heads up

04-10-2022 INPUT FROM Philip Trow

“Hi, Philip here….the present owner of Heather (2022). It is great to see a correct and largely accurate report on Heather. A couple of things to add: MV Heather was originally built by the Heberley family of the Marlborough sounds. She is named Heather after Heather Heberley (NZ author of some note). 

Heather has been a particularly reliable and forgiving vessel for myself and previous owners. I have taken her around most of the South Is and I know previous owners have also used her for some great trips around the North is. She is very economical to run (1l/nm @ 800rpm/5.8kts exactly and circa  9l/hour at 1050rpm/ 7kts average.) Large 1200l+ tanks give her a very usable range. She also has a 6kw gen set and 800watt+ solar panels to handle long periods at mooring or unattended. As of writing she has less than 3600 hours from new on the Gardner 6lxb. That is very few hours on a Gardner.

Heather was rebuilt around 2000 and a great deal of heavy duty good quality equipment was installed. All of the fittings and equipment are much more robust than you would typically find on a pleasure vessel.

MV Heather has benefited from myself and previous owners who have maintained her to a good standard and also spent significant amounts keeping her up to date with features like AIS, drip free shaft seal and Blackwater.

I have retired from aviation, and now have a larger “Bluewater boat”, hence Heather is somewhat regrettably on the market.”