Stella Blue a Mainship 400 Trawler

Lower Helm Chair

Mainship provided a free standing wooden stool for a helm seat in my boat. It was totally inadequate and damaged the wood work and floors everytime it flipped over. It was uncomfortable, as well as being dangerous.

I don't normally pilot the boat from the lower station, but I do spend a lot of time there working on the computer. I find the keyboard fits nicely in front of the instrument panel when we are not underway and I'm surfing the internet. I decided to get a more comfortable chair, but the options were limited. There isn't much space between the helm and galley cabinet. The chair has to be movable to access the trash compartment door, and the depth of the seat needs to be short enough to allow passage through the side door.

I ended up buying a nice upholstered chair and base from Arrigoni Design, located in Clinton, CT. The base has a much broader footprint than the wooden stool and should be much more stable.

I bought the Mark 3 Captain's Chair, which has swing up arm rests, and is very comfortable, but the depth of the seat leaves only about 8 inches between the helm and the seat. I can still get around the chair but more room would be better. I still use a strap to keep the chair from knocking down when we are exposed to large waves. Below is a picture of the MK-3

Since I bought this chair, Arrigoni has come out with a new chair that has a flip up bolster cushion. The flip up bolster acts as a leaning post when standing behind the helm. This would be a much better fit for the space in the 400. The chair may not be as comfortable as the MK-3, but would be much better than the wood stool and with the bolster flipped up, passage between the helm and chair would be just fine. The chair is also much less money. You can find the chair at the bottom of the page at this link: http://www.arrigonidesign.com/capchairs.htm

Email - srcyr@sbcglobal.net