Beautifully Crafted Woodwork Is Just One Reason This Beauty Is Expensive

I'm standing in the master head of Whiticar's 56, looking at the sink. How could a boat's sink be of interest? Because this one's crafted from a dozen different triangular teak wedges. Between each is an ebony – yes, real ebony – strip, running from the lip of the sink to the drain. The sections are epoxied together, sanded, shaped, and varnished. Then they're varnished again. And again, and again. The final product looks like a sink basin you'd find on display in the Louvre, something from King Louis' bedside. And it's a perfect example of why the Whiticar 56 is in many ways one of the finest creations of art ever to float in the Atlantic.

FAMILY MATTERS

The Whiticar family has been crafting boats since the 1930s, when G. Curtis Whiticar designed and built a 33-footer at age 23. By 1938 he had built his first twin-screw fishing vessel, and in 1947 Whiticar Boatworks was officially in business. Curt's son John Whiticar joined the company in 1982 and still runs it today.

When you meet John, you're immediately struck by the persona of an old sea dog. He's bearded and heavy-set, and his handshake is his contract. His boats carry the same promise of honesty and straightforwardness. What meets the eye is the real thing; no imitations, no fake-outs. Nothing goes on a Whiticar because it's cheaper than the alternative, and no corners are cut. So we might as well state the obvious right up front: These are expensive boats. Really expensive. Starting price for a 56 is $4 million, though the final figure can vary quite a bit depending on the owner's choices and materials costs, which often shift from boat to boat. Each Whiticar is hand-crafted, one at a time. There is no "production" schedule in this boat-building "plant."

The sink mentioned above provides one example of just how much care and effort goes into each part of this boat. Other examples, which also helps explain the sky-high costs, are the drawer pulls. Each drawer pull on the boat I tested was a hand-carved shell fashioned from teak, trimmed along the edges with ebony. There are none of the regular push-button positive-locking latches, brass rings, or even fancy aircraft-style latches that you'll find on virtually every other boat built today. On a Whiticar, the pulls are hand-made, in Whiticar's own woodworking shop. Designing them took hours, and crafting one little drawer pull takes days. In fact, on all the boats I've tested – and there have been a lot of them – I have yet to see any single item that was created with more attention to detail, more care, and better artistry. There are dozens of them aboard our test boat. Expensive? You bet; it costs several hundred dollars to make each one.

FISHING FOR COMPLIMENTS

The 56 is designed as a convertible fishboat, though one might be hesitant to swing a lead weight in its cockpit or take a sharp bait knife aboard. Still, it does have a large cockpit and is outfitted as though it wouldn't be a crime to get fish slime and blood on the teak cockpit deck. It has a large, circular, lit livewell integrated into the cockpit sole, Florida-style. Fresh- and raw-water washdowns with quick disconnects sit under the gunwales, and seven rocket launchers line the bridge deck. Forward cockpit units contain a bait freezer big enough to stow a summer's supply of ballyhoo, and a tackle station with six drawers.

There are a few unexpected fishing perks, too. Take the transom fishbox, for example. You'll never have to lug around 40-pound bags of ice and toss them on top of your catch. Instead, an Eskimo icemaker mounted in the engine room is plumbed to the box. Flip a switch, listen to the hum, and shaved ice shoots over your fish. Now check out the gunwale compartments. Instead of the usual open gaff and mop racks, these are enclosed with swing-down doors. And they stop just shy of the deck, so there's room to wedge your feet underneath and use 'em as toerails.

Our test boat was outfitted with a full tuna tower, though of course this is another function of the owner's choice. It had not only an upper station with controls about 25 feet over the water's surface, but also a small bimini top to ensure comfort as the owner looked for those weedlines, rips, and breaking fish. Two rod holders were welded onto the back of the tower legs, so rigger rods can be run without taking up any of the four gunwale-mounted rod holders. And of course, there's a custom fighting chair mounted in the center of the cockpit; it's made of gleaming teak, not fiberglass or (banish the thought) plastic, sitting on a polished stainless steel base and pedestal. There's also a rod holder in each armrest plus four in the backrest bait tray. Even the bridge was designed with a fisherman's foresight, and you'll find electric teaser reels integrated into the overhead and a rod stowage compartment under the forward settee.

MODEL BEHAVIOR

While the Whiticar looks like a supermodel, beneath the skin, it's also a hard-body. It's cold-molded, and the hull bottom is constructed with triple-planked, 3/8-inch-thick, solid mahogany strip planking. Four-inch fir encapsulated in epoxy makes up the stringers and framing, with reinforcements in high-stress areas. The engine bearers, for example, are capped by aluminum plates that are through-bolted to the motor mounts. Hull sides are also cold-molded with mahogany planking, in two-layer diagonals that are beefed up with longitudinal battens every eight to 10 inches. Between the battens and the planking, foam is sprayed in, filling all voids, so that when the interior of the hull is layered in fiberglass (as is every inch of the exterior), it creates a two-inch-thick sandwich shell. For most builders, this wouldn't just be enough, it would be overkill. But remember, Whiticar is far from most builders. After the entire hull is glassed and epoxied inside and out, two Kevlar layers are added to the bottom.

The boat's interior construction follows suit. Bulkheads are constructed with high-tech, lightweight, super-strong composites, then capped off with raised-teak panels. The grain in the wood flows from sole to overhead, matching throughout the boat – cabinet to cabinet and counter to counter. It's made possible because the materials all come from just one massive log, cut in half. Different trees have different tones and light and dark spots. But the wood from a single teak tree maintains the same evenness, even after years of exposure to the sun or weather.

Overheads are also built to perfection, with white painted beadboards and varnished teak beams. And forget about the common teak and holly sole found on most high-end custom yachts, the Whiticar's is crafted from teak and walnut. Again, solid boards are used instead of veneers.

As you might expect, all of this adds up to an incredibly strong ocean-going machine. The Whiticar chewed up the solid three-footers we encountered on test day like it didn't care one bit. Hull design also takes rough-water capabilities into account, with a 12-degree transom deadrise, and lots of flare in the bow. My guess: five-foot seas will be fishable.

When you punch through the inlet and head for the canyons, it'll be a short run, too. Our test boat was powered by a pair of Detroit Diesel 12-V 183s, pumping out 1,150 horses per side. We cruised out of the bay at more than 36 mph, then opened it up to wide-open throttle and hit 42.2 as we flew over bluewater rollers. With this much power, of course, the fuel burn isn't exactly stingy. While running at top-end the Detroits chugged 103.8 gph.

COMFORT FACTOR

Even though the interior layout of each 56 is customized for each owner, you can bet that Whiticar designs in a cushy factor of 10. Our test boat, for example, featured Connolly leather upholstery, the same material used in Rolls Royces and Jaguars. The entertainment system features a 42-inch plasma TV that pops up out of a countertop, complemented by a CD/DVD player with a surround-sound system that has enough juice to squelch the rumbling of 2,300 diesel horses. Literally – we turned on a movie and cranked it up as we cruised, just to see if it would overpower the mechanical sounds of a 56-foot boat running through the ocean, and it did.

Even the trim in this cabin adds to the ambiance. The overhead has molding with fluting in the corners, and all bulkhead-mounted items like speakers and air-conditioning vents are integrated into the woodwork, so you don't even notice them. Naturally, there's also a teak wine rack.

The list goes on and on. In the master stateroom, I found a queen berth supported by a fluted teak pedestal, accented with rope lighting inset into the pedestal just above the sole. The galley has every conceivable appliance, but you'll have to hunt for them; every door and hatch is paneled in that flowing-grain teak mentioned earlier, so the refrigerator and microwave don't jump out and offend the eye. Now poke your head into the engine room. It's fully finished down there, too. Even the plumbing lines are hidden behind valences. The bilge floors are finished in Awlgrip, and the look is so clean that the old cliché is true: You could eat off of it.

Just don't try that with the teak and ebony sink – the museum guards would have a problem with… oh, yeah. Never mind.

Lenny Rudow was senior technical editor for Boating magazine for more than 10 years, and is currently the electronics editor for Marlin and GoBoating magazines.

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