About the Norseman 4300

ABOUT THE NORSEMAN 4300:

The Voyage Norseman is designed by Alex Simonis and was in production, with only minor modifications, for 10yrs until  2007.  Norseman introduced the  targa bar, the walk through transom and bigger engines in 1999. The extra weight was found to effect performance so the stern/bows were stretched 1 ft. The Norseman 4300 was then re-branded the  Voyage 440 when the yard was taken over by Voyage yachts. The vessel won multiple awards and, in consequence,  few changes have been made over the years. The Norseman 4300 is virtually identical in style and performance to the Voyage 440.

The vessel is comparable to the Leopard and Moorings series of cats, also designed by Simonis and built in South Africa. The lines and bridge deck clearance are similar but the Leopard , designed specifically for the charter market  is much bulkier with lower performance.

The Voyage (Norseman)  in contrast is a true blue water cruising catamaran. She is lean and low with a wipe down interior and minimal use of high maintenance wood trims. The narrow hulls provide for both the roomiest saloon of any cat in her class and a wide bridge deck reducing wave slam.  The 25’1” "wide body” is exceptionally stable both at sea and at anchor. She has a low windage and a low center of buoyancy  while still maintaining over 6ft headroom throughout.

My Muse is hand laid fibre glass laid over a foam core. She has water tight compartments fore and aft and a series of reinforced bulkheads. Her keels are fully reinforced for beaching and the shallow bilge keels act as both sealed holding tanks and another bouancy chamber. Even when holed the separate, sealed, chambers of the Norseman 4300 ensure continued seaworthiness. The engines are in the aft bouyancy chamber eliminating fumes inside the living quarters and isolating engine noise.

.

Other features unique to the Norseman 4300 are:

·         Reinforced keels designed to allow safe beaching for maintenance, hull cleaning, antifouling etc. when access to a haul out facility is not available.

·         Skeg rudder : assists in beaching but also gives added security against failure of the unprotected spade rudders common on most modern cats. From personal experience, during our Pacific crossing, 3 catamarans in the 2012 fleet lost rudders. There is a lot of debate about what’s best… for performance go spade but for reliability offshore I was very pleased we had the security of the skeg!

·         Running backstays : not commonly found on cats. With the mast pumping downwind and shrouds humming it was comforting to have the extra security of  backstays. The typical cat mast is held at only 3 points, the forestay and the port and starboard shrouds. A failure in any one of these loses the mast. “My Muse” not only has the additional backstays but also an extra, inner, forestay. Consequently a rigging failure is not necessarily a catastrophe ! The inner forestay is rigged to accept a staysail but is not carried on “My Muse”.

·         The retracting boom for dingy haul.  A line from the primary winch extends an auxiliary boom from the main boom. The main halyard is laid over the blocks at the end of this boom and is used to raise and lower the tender from the back transom. An elegant alternative to davits.

·         The aft transom: stows the tender at sea and provides a loading platform, swim deck and casual seating area when at anchor.. A favorite spot on board.