Magnum Marine

The beginnings of the American high-performance, deep-vee boat building industry are said to have started in 1958, when Dick Bertram first discovered Ray Hunt’s new deep-vee boat at the America Cup Trials. In his book, “The deep-vee Story”, Dick Bertram writes:

“Other boats (powerboats) had vee bottoms before, but the vee and the deadrise (the angle the bottom makes with the horizontal) diminished to a flat planing surface at the transom. Ray carried the deadrise to the transom.”

Ray Hunt‘s design had a 24-degree deadrise. Hunt rightfully deduced that such a treatment would eliminate much of the pounding of conventional hulls. An added feature of the new Hunt designed boat were longitudinal strakes on the bottom to give added lift and throw out the spray flat to help keep the boat dry. Deep-vee boats did, however, require more horsepower. Dick Bertram commissioned Ray Hunt to design a 30’ wooden boat for him. The boat was completed in 1960. This was the first of a series of Moppies and the beginning of the Bertram Boatyard. Moppie ran straight and smooth and, at 52 mph, faster than anyone had expected.

In 1962, Don Aronow, a retired real estate developer, impressed by the success of the deep-vee hull, asked Jim Wynne and Walt Walters to design a 23’ deep-vee hull for twin engine application. This was the first of the famed Aronow hulls, which in various but similar forms he promoted first under the name “Formula” (1963-64); then “Donzi” (1964-66); then “Magnum” (1966-68); then “Cigarette”.

In 1966 Don Aronow, now offshore champion and boat builder, built himself a new 27′ race boat, which he named “Maltese Magnum”. The boat became World Champion and Don Aronow built a small factory to build more boats just like it: Magnum Marine was founded.

Don Aronow built his new factory on NE 188th Street in North Miami, right next to the factory he had just built and sold called Donzi. In another two years he was to build a third factory on the street, Cigarette. Thereafter, the street was called Thunderboat Row. Don Aronow also built a 35′ race boat; both the Magnum27’ and the new 35′ were winning championships all over the world. To these two very successful models, Don Aronow added a 16′ ski boat, the Marauder, and a 16′ tunnel hull, the Missile.

In 1968, Don Aronow sold Magnum Marine to Apeco.

Clayton Rautboard from Chicago owned a very profitable photocopy company called Apeco, but his real passion was boat racing. He therefore bought Magnum Marine from Don Aronow in 1968. Apeco soon dropped the Missile and Marauder lines, which were not profitable, and continued building only the Magnum 27′ and Magnum 35′. Sales were strong.

Apeco made three different models out of the 27′ hull: the Magnum 27′ Sedan, which had a raised deck with sitting head room inside; the Magnum 28′, with a rounded deck which also gave a bit more interior space; and, of course, the original 27′ sport race boat. The Magnum 27′ sedan became the ideal Patrol Craft.

In 1969, an Italian from Rome, Marchese Filippo Theodoli, saw the Magnum 35’ at the boat show in New York. He was immediately impressed. This was exactly the boat which was needed for the Mediterranean: a boat that an owner could operate by himself; a boat which had the speed, the seaworthiness of a racing hull, and a boat which had interior headroom and accommodation. The speed added to the safety. The deep-vee hull gave a comfortable, dry and safe ride. The hull was laminated by hand in fiberglass and was strong and practically unsinkable, even if an owner ran aground. Filippo Theodoli was so enthused and convinced about the future success of this new hull that he immediately bought a Magnum 35’ and became the exclusive European Magnum dealer.

In 1976, Apeco sold Magnum Marine to Marchese Filippo Theodoli and his wife Katrin. This brought major change into the production line. Filippo had the innovative idea of transforming the race boat into a high performance luxury yacht, combining sea worthiness of the race boat with the luxurious accommodations and comforts of a yacht, which the owner could drive by himself. He also insisted on reliability and fuel efficiency and, therefore, was the first to install diesel engines in a Magnum.

Filippo Theodoli was the inventor of the open sport yacht, which soon was copied and became so successful, especially in the Mediterranean. The fact that owners could now buy a comfortable and fast boat, that they could drive themselves, in safety, with range to reach islands like Sardinia and Corsica, opened the islands for tourism, and hotels shot up everywhere, whilst before there were only a few private villas.

The first boat of this new era was the Magnum 53′, a wide beamed high performance yacht with 7′ head room and two double cabins each with separate heads, salon, galley and crew cabin, equipped with twin diesel engines. Delivered to the Mediterranean in 1977, this first Magnum yacht became an enormous success. She was fast, seaworthy and had the spacious and luxurious interiors of a yacht. Other high performance yachts followed: the Magnum 45′ in 1980, and the Magnum 40′, which replaced the Magnum 38′.

Besides the novel use of high-performance marinized diesel engines, Filippo had the new idea of installing surface drives on his Magnum performance boats. He met Howard Arneson, the inventor of the Arneson surface drive, at a boat show and was immediately convinced of the technical advantages of this new drive. Howard is one of the major innovators in the marine world. The new surface drive brought more speed, less drag and better fuel efficiency to boating and, after Filippo had met Howard and demonstrated the advantages of the surface drive to his friends and clients, every Magnum thereafter was equipped with this new drive system.

Filippo also consulted with his friend Phil Rolla to build the most efficient customized propellers for these new surface drives. The collaboration between Howard Arneson, Phil Rolla and Filippo with the Magnum hull created the fastest and most technologically advanced vessel of its time. In 1980, Filippo started working with the famous Italian designer Pininfarina of Ferrari fame and in 1983 the first Magnum 63’, designed by Pininfarina was launched. With diesel power, surface drives and Rolla propellers, the Magnum 63’ was the fastest, most fuel efficient, most seaworthy yacht in the world.