Red-blooded
BOATING NEW ZEALAND MARCH 2004

“You have to meet the family to understand,” designer Bill Upfold offered as an explanation for the name of his latest 15m mid-pilothouse Elite, Simply Red, which doesn’t have a bit of red anywhere.

This is the second Upfold of that name for the owner. His first boat was a 14m Upfold Sedan model.

We joined the Scott Lane-built boat at Whitianga on a torrid day characterised by torrential downpours interspersed with brighter periods. A warm, wet wind was blowing from the northeast, predicted to build as the day progressed, but we thought we might sneak a few hours’ trolling behind the Mercs before the seas picked up too much. We hoped to shoot photos between showers. Not long after 9am we slipped out of the marina and down Whitianga’s well-marked channel into Mercury Bay.

The stainless steel barbecue is the focal point of the cockpit entertainment area.	Stairs rather than a ladder connect the cockpit with the pilothouse.	Simply Red in fishing mode wide of Great Mercury Island.	Fax, phone and computer facilities are located beside the stair between the saloon and pilothouse.

Skippering the boat for the day was its designer, Bill Upfold, with builder Scott Lane acting as his able deckie.

Simply Red is a beautifully finished boat. Scott Lane Boatbuilders built her over 18 months on an hourly-rate basis, rather than working to a fixed price, which is reflected in the choice of materials, fittings and general standard of finish. The owner was prepared to spend a bit more to get the best and the end result is an outstanding motoryacht.

A good example is Simply Red’s extravagant use of sound insulation. It’s used everywhere: extensively in the engine room and under the saloon sole, as you would expect, but also under the lazarette in the form of special, sound-deadening paint, on tanks to minimise resonance – even inside hollow engine girders.

Another example is the choice of Aquadrive couplings, which deliver smooth, almost clunk-less gearshifts. Brunton five-bladed propellers are manufactured to Class One specification, guaranteeing optimum performance.

Upfold’s specifications allowed a couple of engine options. Simply Red’s owner has opted for the larger motors: two, six-cylinder, 430hp Cummins.

These engines propel Simply Red’s fullyladen 16 tonnes to around 29 knots at 2600rpm.

Simply Red doesn’t skimp in any area, so she’s not a lightweight craft. The timber, plywood, balsa wood and E-glass composite in her construction are one of the reasons Lane enjoys building Upfold designs – the boats are mostly timber construction, so, painting aside, the workshop remains clean and largely fume-free.

Lane oversaw Simply Red’s engineering, its building and painting. His influence is apparent in the well appointed and neatly laid out engine room under the saloon sole. Upfold has ensured plenty of space for the big Cummins, with room leftover for refrigeration compressors, hot water cylinder, pumps, a full-size washer-drier – even a clothes drying rack. There is room to crawl right around the engines; extensive non-slip surfaces and excellent lighting aid servicing and monitoring of vital functions.

Because the mid-pilothouse layout has the engines well forward – almost amidships – Upfold has pushed the boat’s tankage aft to help balance the boat. Holding tanks are at the aft end of the engine room beneath the toilet pumps, fuel tanks are under the galley sole and water tanks behind those again.

The boat’s layout is interesting. The emphasis is definitely on family cruising rather than sportfishing or diving, though the owner and family are keen divers and fishers – a dive bottle air compressor is part of the boat’s equipment.

Simply Red achieves a good balance between the cockpit, living space, entertaining and service areas. The flow is excellent, stepping down from the cockpit to the galley, aft cabin and heads, up into the spacious saloon, then down into the forward accommodation and heads. The pilothouse is accessed via an internal stairway from the saloon or externally via stairs from the cockpit.

The boat’s owner does a lot of work from the boat, which is well set up with fax, telephone and computer facilities, in the saloon near the staircase to the wheelhouse. The boat is air-conditioned throughout with separate regimes for the wheelhouse, saloon/galley and forward accommodation. Vents at the base of the clear, raked windscreens ensure the glass stays free of condensation at all times; three huge and highly efficient wipers keep it clear on the outside.

We needed the wipers in the occasional heavy showers and later, as we headed out into building seas wide of Red Mercury Island. In the sheltered water of Mercury Bay Upfold dialled up 2200 revs on the electronic, synchronised throttle control and Simply Red covered the ground at a no-fuss 22 knots.

Top speed is 29 knots but 20-24 knots is comfortable in most conditions – we dialled back slightly, later in the day when the sea was at its roughest, but the boat feels capable and has already made several long distance journeys between Auckland, Tauranga and Whitianga.

The wheelhouse is the place to be when underway. There is comfortable accommodation for six people or more on two loungers inside, with another large lounging area outside on the balcony overlooking the cockpit. Clever sliding doors in timber and glass close off the wheelhouse from the sundeck and cockpit ladder. Depending on conditions, one or both can be open to provide good air flow.

Above the helmsman’s head is a small hatch for ventilation, or to accommodate his head should he want to stand to better see ahead. In good weather, the whole roof panel slides back, opening the wheelhouse to the sky. It’s a popular Upfold feature among owners.

The helmseat and huge dashboard /instrument binnacle dominate the wheelhouse. The deep, wide dashboard is upholstered in tan leather. It’s taller than intended, to accommodate a lastminute addition of the latest Simrad CP54 big-screen chartplotter. Simply Red has opted for a full Simrad electronics package.

Big enough for two, the helmseat is comfortable and plushly upholstered.

Its back contains a slide-out table and a pair of chart drawers, occupied by items of fishing tackle. Strangely, there are no drink holders in the wheelhouse.

The helmstation in the wheelhouse is the main one – there is a second station out on the balcony, which is needed if the helmsman wants to see what’s happening in the cockpit – but the helmsman never feels isolated. There’s such good flow between the saloon, wheelhouse and upstairs lounging areas that he/she is always in touch with others on the boat.

Access to the foredeck is good and the deck is large enough for lounging at anchor and to accommodate the Aquapro tender on its cradle above the master cabin. No derrick is fitted to this boat; the little RIB is easy enough for two people to manage by hand. The tender’s outboard is cleverly stored horizontally on a slide in a cockpit locker where it takes up a minimum of space.

Luxury is the theme down in the saloon. Settees face each other across the plush carpet with a large saloon table next to the starboard couch. For meals it slides in at a 45° angle so that it’s close to diners; for general socialising it slides out and away again, allowing plenty of space around the settee.

The focus of the saloon is either the view through the tinted glass side windows and tinted, raked screen forward, or the hi-tech entertainment system that occupies the middle of the aft bulkhead. The sound system is a standout with two large built-in speakers in the saloon, two more in the wheelhouse and two waterproof speakers in the cockpit.

Simply Red’s galley, aft of the saloon, is huge. Benches are long and wide and the owners have opted for a two-burner hob, rather than a four-burner, giving them even more bench space. Sliding panels conceal useful above-bench storage and help keep the area tidy; there’s plenty of cupboard, shelf and other storage space under the benches, a dishdrawer and good-sized fridge, as well as a shallow pantry recessed into the bulkhead to port. The microwave doubles as a convection oven, good enough to produce top-rate muffins, we were told. The aft cabin opens off the galley.

Equipped with a pair of tiered, single bunks, arranged at right angles to overlap at the foot end, the cabin features plenty of under-bunk storage, good natural light from sliding windows and easy access to the spacious and well-appointed head/shower immediately inside the cockpit doors.

Underway, the cockpit is not a bad place to be. Because the engines are well forward, the exhausts exit underwater, and so much attention has been paid to sound insulation, it’s relatively quiet, even at full throttle. Except when conditions get rough, it’s also dry.

At rest, the cockpit serves as another entertainment area. It’s well equipped with mod cons like a stainless steel barbecue, huge chest freezer, lots of storage, including a pair of cavernous underfloor lockers, a sink and a shower for swimmers coming aboard via the dive ladder and wide swimstep. Transom doors slide away into the gunwales, which should also make pulling gamefish aboard easy. Like the rest of the boat, there are no sharp corners, just coved joins, radiused edges and curves.

Although fishing is not the boat’s primary purpose, the cockpit is plenty big enough to accommodate some serious angling. We ran five lures. No outriggers were fitted so we ran a couple of big lures off the angled rodholders in the coamings, a medium-sized lure from the starboard corner and a deep-running Rapala and a small tuna clone close-in.

Conditions were rather unpleasant, but the big Upfold took it all in stride, though the odd beam sea sent spray cascading over the wheelhouse and into the cockpit. At trolling speed, things were a lot better, and for a while the sun even peeped out between the clouds.

Two engines at idle drive the boat along at nearly eight knots. With the wind behind us we trolled on one engine to keep the boat speed down so the lures would track properly.

No billfish came our way, but our short troll did account for a couple of small albacore, quickly consigned to the livebait tank in the swimstep, and an unidentified strike on the Rapala that emptied 200m of 15kg line from the spool before becoming disconnected.

A series of nasty-looking squalls inshore convinced us it was time to call it quits and we cleared the gear as the rain came down in earnest. The airconditioned wheelhouse was definitely the place to be, oversize wipers and window demisters ensuring visibility was as good as the conditions allowed while the huge chartplotter display ensured we had no trouble navigating in the squalls.