Harrison Boatworks has moved to a new location in Wanchese at 952 Old Wharf Road. It was very sad to leave Sunnyside on the north end of Roanoke Island, where I built boats for more than a dozen years. But the new shop is proving to be a very good thing for Harrison Boatworks. The shop is well-lit, well-ventilated, dry, three times the size and only a block away from the haulout, Wanchese Dock & Haul.

Immediately after moving in, I was confronted by a few challenges, the first being installing a phase converter in order to enable my three-phase machines to work in a single-phase shop. This took weeks but we got it worked out with help from Jason Turner at Beacon Electric.

Within a week of moving into the new shop in January I began design and lofting the new 19-foot tunnel skiff. This new design is a smaller of version of my 22-foot center console, with the addition of a tunnel for running in shallow water. It will live in the Currituck Sound and be used for duck hunting and fishing. Click on the images to see a larger version of the photo.

After getting that boat underway, I assembled the jig for an 18-foot flats boat for a man in Florida. This boat will be a slicked-out, fast, pure flats boat, including poling platform, recessed push pole holders, live well, pop-up console, hydraulic jackplate, tunnel, casting platform, recessed cleats, etc.

I’ll be blogging more about these boats as they progress.

Also at Harrison Boatworks, we’ve been working on a 40-foot Hinckley. With this boat we’ve had work done to the jet drives, built a stow-able teak cockpit table, stripped and revarnished all of the britework, and done the bottom work (sandblasting, BarrierCote and antifouling paint). We’ve also installed a back up Garmin GPS and thru-hull transducer, as well as a new power inverter/charger.

Meanwhile, the Harrison Boatworks 39-foot Carolina Magic has sold and will be going to Port Aransas, TX. For the new owner, we’ve been re-doing the britework, refinishing the covering boards and bridge deck, adding spreader lights and under-gunnel LED lights, and redid the bottom. The new is Patrice Marie — keep an eye for her. She’ll be traveling TX in a couple of weeks.

These are just a few of the projects we’ve worked on since the Jan. 1 move to the new location. I look forward to starting the next 22-footer upstairs on the mezzanine this summer.

Feel free to stop by and check out what we’ve got going on.