It was a busy week for both Christine and me but nothing too blogworthy so this week’s Möbius update will be short for a change.

I just returned to Möbius last night after spending most of the week in England.  This was my first trip for 2022 and a nice change of pace for me.  It has proven to take a LOT of time, energy and $$ to get parts shipped from England to us here in Turkey so I decided it was best to go pick up the new parts I needed for Mr. Gee in person from Gardner Marine Diesel and bring them back with me.  To be honest, I will take just about any reason to make a trip to GMD and see Michael, James and David there so it was an easy decision.  To make it even more compelling, Pegasus Airlines has very cheap flights twice a week between Antalya and London so my entire trip would cost less than the customs duties to ship the parts to me and would take at least a month, sometimes two to get here.  The icing on the cake for me was the chance to get in a visit with a very good friend Robin and his wonderful wife Jayne.  Robin and I first met when we were both fairly new to Autodesk back in about 1990 and have continue to grow our friendship over all those years.  My thanks to Robin and Jayne for opening their home and hearts in welcoming me to stay with them and we had a delightful three days hanging out and catching up.

My outbound flight was very early in the morning so we decided to rent a car and spend the night in a fun little hotel not far from the airport and enjoyed a nice “date night” out at a great little family restaurant right across from the hotel.  Christine was then able to do some shopping for groceries and other items that are much more available at the larger stores and malls in Antalya and then drive back to our small town of Finike so it all worked out very well..

XPM78-02 Vanguard

We also took advantage of being back in Antalya to stop by the Free Zone and Naval Yachts to see the progress on the several new builds they have underway.  XPM78-02 mv Vanguard is now looking very much like a boat now that the superstructure for the Pilot House is in place.
The other build is for the larger XPM85-01 which is in the early stages of the ‘hotworks’ and after a long wait due to supply chain and other issues, all the aluminium plates and parts have been delivered.  These boats are built upside down in this first stage until all the hull plating is welded in place and then the hull is flipped right way up.
The upside down deck plates are first put together in the steel framework bolted to the floor and then frames and bulkheads are tacked in place.
Meanwhile, over on Vanguard, Uğur and Nihat,  who did most of the AL work on Möbius are now busy welding the hundreds of Al pieces in place.  You can see some of the cut and rolled plates for the keels setting on the floor to the Left.
XPM78-02 is based on the same design as Möbius but will have twin JD engines as you can see from the dual prop tunnels in these two photos.
The aft deck will be slightly larger and the Owners have decided to build some of the furniture into the boat such as this L-shaped dining area.  Large window behind it, WT door into the SuperSalon in the middle and stairs up to the SkyBridge on the Right.

Here is the view from inside the SuperSalon looking back out onto the Aft Deck.

Going up those stairs the SkyBridge is starting to take shape and more built in furniture with an other L-shaped settee at the Aft end.
Peering down from the very Aft end of the FlyBridge and roof overtop of the Aft Deck you can see the same arrangement as on Möbius with the doghouse for walking into the Engine Room on the Left and matching winding stairs on both sides.
Looking up and aft lets you see another view of the upside down XPM85.
Back down to Deck level on Vanguard, you can see another owner driven change with the addition of these bulwarks running most of the length of the side decks.

Bulwarks run all the way up to and around the Anchor Deck and bow.
Up at the Bow the “sidewinder” anchor setup is the same as we designed for Möbius along with the Samson Post in the center and nose cone in the very front.  This setup has proven to work out eXtremely well on Möbius so has been replicated here on hull #2.  You can see how Dennis has nicely designed the Bow and anchoring arrangements to now include the wrap around bulwarks.

XPM78-01 Möbius

Lest we should forget the Mighty Möbius, I will leave you with THIS LINK to a series of photos that Captain Christine put together while I was off in Gardner Land in the UK this past week. 
Christine went through some of our archives of thousands of photos over the past 6 months or so and put the ones she liked into this album.
So if you’ve been Jonesing to see less of the Engine Room and all the detailed technical shots that I post and more of the interior and exterior of Möbius, click the link above and enjoy your tour through this collection.
Thanks for taking time to join us here again this week and hope you’ll be back again next Sunday for the latest weekly update on what’s been going on in Möbius.World. 

Special thanks to all of you who have been contributing your questions and comments in the “Join the Discussion” box below and please keep them coming!

-Wayne