Press release

for general distribution

Family boatbuilding business association breaks up for good

Burlington, New Jersey
22 June 2015


After a long, productive history, John Cherubini, Jr., and Cherubini Yachts, LLC, of Delran, NJ, have severed all professional associations, sources close to both sides report.   John, Jr., whose father designed the landmark Cherubini 44 double-headsail ketch and Cherubini 48 staysail schooner, had worked with his cousin David’s business almost since its onset in 2003.

John, Jr.’s history with the original Cherubini Boat Company began at Burlington, NJ, in 1973, with the lofting and planking of the original Cherubini 44 plug with his father, John, Sr., brother Steve, uncle Frit (Leon), and cousin Lee.  This family group remained, in spirit and in substance, the nucleus of the boatbuilding concern that hand-built 42 boats through the 1990s.  John, Jr., worked in direct labor, production control, purchasing, sales support and marketing, payroll, and especially in design and component engineering, being responsible for devising custom-made deck hardware, tanks, and brackets that made the Cherubini 44 unique.  With Lee he designed the long-popular two-stateroom interior plan, giving the C44 a spacious galley and roomy head compartment at a time when such features were reserved for much larger yachts.

After his cousin David resurrected Cherubini boat production, John, Jr. served throughout the hierarchy of the business, variously as a contractor, direct employee, and encouraging friend.  Taking on his late father’s role, he worked closely with the staff on design and engineering issues to conservatively modernize the C44 design.

David, ten years younger than John, had not the hands-on experience nor the technical education that comes from growing up with a gifted yacht designer as a father.  ‘I had hoped that Dave would want to benefit from my expertise,’ says John.  But, amid family and professional differences, the two fell out for good in spring 2015 and John was constrained to remove his own Hunter 25, Diana, from his cousin’s yard where he was always so proud to have kept it.

John’s complete departure from Cherubini Yachts marks the finale of the surviving family core who began the business in 1975.  His brother Steve and cousins Lee, Rick, Brian, and Mike have all been, to one degree or another, rendered redundant as employees, contractors, vendors or associates of their family’s legacy, leaving David the sole Cherubini at Cherubini Yachts.

John, Jr.’s future in the boating industry remains uncertain.  He has declared an intention to offer reproductions of his family’s artwork, including drafting work by John, Sr., for consumer markets.  It is doubtful if any of the Cherubini 44 and 48, as designed by his father, will ever be built again.

 

- Cherubini Art & Nautical Design

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Reverse-Mooyock technology

  My cousin Rick has a philosophy by which he believes that sometimes the best solution is the simplest.  We were talking about a C44 that was built-- because the buyer insisted-- with a sea chest, a watertight compartment with one opening to the sea and into which all through-hulls empty at once.  The theory is anti-technology-- in the question of a leak, shut off the one opening and that's all you have to worry about.  Rick's point was that, in the face of all the complexity and clutter, the easiest thing was just to add another seacock and through-hull.  It's a boat-- just check it like anything else you check and you're fine.  Why complicate anything?  So if the head sink's drain were leaking you'd shut off the engine intake?  Really?  'The best solution is the simplest.'

  My brother Steve was working out in Wisconsin recently, doing cabinetry and later restoration work on old wooden runabouts.  Apparently there are many of them out there; they don’t tend to rot in the cold dry weather the way they do in Florida or at the NJ shore.  And, this shop being the land of cordless drill/drivers. everyone had the Bosch or Makita setup with the two batteries, one of which is perpetually in the charger.  But the thing about a cordless driver is that, in production, one needs about four batteries and will need to replace them more often than most people do.  Most of us know that lithium tool batteries develop a ‘memory’-- they remember how long they went from charge to charge and if you charge them too often, say at only 40% of the way down, they will develop a working life of only 40% of capacity.  Like a lazy production drudge they will get to their frustration level and announce, ‘Break time!’ and then pack it in for the day till you recharge them.

  The general advice for those using such tools is to run the battery all the way down till the last breath of life and then give it a full, healthy (overnight) charge.  This becomes problematic for the production worker, who is caught between two undesirable extremes.  Either he exchanges the battery for a fresh one at the first hint of slowdown-- and thus costs himself in reduced productivity and replacement batteries in future, or he endures a slowly-fading battery for much too long, suffering through extremely slow and powerless work just to save the tool.

  One day Steve and his boss were trying to come to grips with this problem and Steve suggested, ‘If only we had a way to deplete this battery without having to use it on the job.  What kills 12-volt batteries really fast?’

  The boss, what we Italians would call (and politely spell as) a mooyock, contributed his idea.  ‘Well, I don’t know about tools; but what kills my car battery is when I leave the headlights on.’

  And Steve got the Eureka moment.

  Having just upgraded the high-beam headlamps on his classic BMW, he brought in the old pair, made a beautiful bracket of plywood, mounted the lights in it high on the wall over the shop area, and ran the leads down to a battery dock on the bench.  The battery de-charger will drain a half-done cordless-drill battery in about a quarter of the time actually using it will; it provides light-- for a while at least-- costs nothing to use and saves the long-term life of the battery.  No production shop should be without one.
 

  When I heard about this I laughed so hard I couldn’t see straight.  ‘It’s reverse-mooyock technology!’ I called it-- the whole concept of using a klutz’s answer to solve an intricate problem.  Sometimes the stupidest, lamest, most mooyock of suggestions really is the most elegant solution.

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