We visited the Fountaine Pajot shipyard in Aigrefeuille-d’Aunis, France, and got our very first look of our new catamaran.
Fountaine Pajot, our boat builder, has a number of factories spread around this part of France. The factory that is building our boat is about 30 minutes drive inland from La Rochelle. It’s responsible for producing the following sailing catamaran models: 40, 42, 45, 47 and 51. The larger sailing catamarans, power catamarans and monohulls are all built elsewhere.
This factory has 2 production lines: 1 unique line for the model 40, and a second universal line for all the other models. Unfortunately, we weren’t allowed to take any photo or video of the production process; and without any visuals it’s quite difficult to explain how they build the boat. So, I’ll only give a very brief overview of the highlights.
We got to see how they moulded the hulls, deck and cockpit bimini, and saw some boats being laid up into their moulds. The fibreglass cloth and core material is laid up dry into the mould and then sealed over with either plastic or another mould. All the air is vacuumed out and the resin is then injected. When dry the component is removed from the mould, and the process restarts for the next one.
The wiring and plumbing is laid into the hulls. The cabins and bathrooms are pre-assembled elsewhere in the factory as a “pod” and are then lifted and fixed into the hulls. The engineering is then installed. When the hulls are as complete as they can be, the top is lifted on and glued into place. At this stage the boat is about 70% complete. The remaining components are installed and the boat is finished.
It then leaves that part of the factory and is moved on a trolley to the test pool. It’s put into the pool and sprayed with water (rain) for a few hours, and the engines are tested. If necessary, any leaks or engine issues are fixed and it goes through the pool again.
After completing the pool test and any minor finishing, the boat is ready to leave the factory. The entire production takes 6-8 weeks. When we were there on the Friday afternoon, Songa was already finished and sitting in the yard waiting to be transported by truck on the Monday. The drive that took us about 30 minutes will take the truck about 2.5 hours. We were allowed to climb up into the cockpit for a brief look before the rain chased us away.
Sailing Songa 