Please welcome the newest addition to our family - Aruna, a 2003 Kristen Yachts steel pilot house trawler. She joined our family on December 30th, 2023, a day before my 50th birthday.
Congrats!! I’m really looking forward to hearing about her electrical/electronic systems and related upgrade projects. (with lots of pics! 
)
Congrats for your new metal boat I’m sure you will enjoy the steel hull. If you need any advice for steel maintenance I build a 47 steel sailboat (stainless deck and infrastructure) in 2008 and so far no rust at all. I did a lot of research though on paint and I learned a lot from a friend who’s a NACE paint inspector. I’ll be glad to help because your previous articles on internet at sea helped me so much.
All the best !
Looks like a great boat! It will be a lot of fun hearing about the changes you make to it as time goes on. Congratulations, good luck with her, and thank you for the update.
Congrats, nice looking boat. My current boat came with the same bullfrog tender/30hp motor combo. I really liked the durability and stability but the weight to hp ratio was too high. The 30hp motor was able to get on plane with 1-2 people but 3 or more it just didn’t have the oomph to get up on plane. I replaced with a traditional inflatable w/60hp that can plane with 4 or 5 people.
Looking at Aruna anchored in Liberty Bay this morning. She is a fine looking trawler! This coming from a fellow trawler owner.
I wish you many years of calm seas and fair winds!
There will be lots of projects 
and lots of pictures 
don’t worry!
Thank you so much! This is my first steel boat, so I may take you up on that at some point. I have some small areas of rust that need attention, but it’s mostly exterior and in places that make sense as they’re hard to maintain.
This is exactly what I was wondering. 90% of the time it will be just me, and about 5% of the rest of the time it will be 2 of us, and then the last 5% it will be more people, so I am thinking it will work fine for me for now. It’s quite a tank - seems like it could handle just about anything! And, I go ashore a lot on really bad beaches, and missed my Highfield dinghy, which I had two boats ago, and had the aluminum bottom that I just drug up on shore.
Awesome write-up - can’t wait for more deep dives on the journey and upgrades!
I’m in EBM, let me know if you ever need an extra set of hands
Thanks for the offer! I moved to Shilshole back in October of 2023!
Ballard isnt far and it would be a mini apprenticeship 
Congratulations Steve! What a beautiful ship! Hope to run into you soon! Don and Jill
No wonder every time I hail your boat it has a new owner at the helm!
Did you know there is a Kristen 46 at liberty Bay marina. Blue hull next to the tolly I’m working on now.
I did know of her. I saw her there a couple of months ago and she’s got a new name. I’ve not been able to track down the owners yet. I do have pictures from when she sold a year ago and she’s quite different inside and slightly less LOA.
