26m | M/S Hendrika

It’s one thing being able to offer first class facilities for maintenance, refit and rebuild projects, but it’s quite another to be able to back that up with an experienced team for whom the demands of design and the pressures of time are just two more things to be taken in their stride. For Amsterdam Yacht Services – which caters to a broad swathe of customers from commercial vessels to tour boats, classic yachts and superyachts – MS Hendrika is a perfect example of the application of talent to an element of restoration that demanded a sensitive touch and a sophisticated approach to problem-solving.

MS Hendrika is a classic 26-metre Dutch barge that was originally built in 1915. Like many of her sisters, she has been converted to run as a motorised vessel, but she retains her key classic features. “She came to Amsterdam Yacht Services for regular maintenance, but she also still carried her original oak rudder – a very large appendage at roughly 2.5 by 1.5 metres,” explains Robert Binnekade, managing director and Amsterdam Yacht Services.

“Unfortunately the oak rudder was rotten to the core, and it was obvious there was no point trying to salvage it,” Binnekade continues. “So we set out to build a new one in steel, but designed and styled to exactly match the original.”

The AYS team faced the challenge of time, with less than a month to design the new rudder, engineer it and order a pre-cut package, then assemble it in-house and fit it on the ship. “It was a very short turnaround, but we achieved it all in just over three weeks,” Binnekade enthuses.

“The end result is a modern steel rudder that we hope will last another 100 years, onto which we have transposed all the details of the original oak rudder. It’s testament to what the team here is capable of when it comes to refit and, in particular, to the refit and restoration of classic yachts and superyachts,” he concludes. “With MS Hendrika’s new steel rudder, if you didn’t know you’d think simply that the old oak one had just been repainted!”