Columbia University
R/V Marcus G. Langseth
Fabrication, repair, and class work for Columbia University's ocean-research ship since 2018.
Scope of work
Piping, doors, foundations, and fittings built to the ship's drawings — in our San Diego shop, aboard in Newport, Oregon and San Diego, and shipped to wherever the ship is calling.
R/V Marcus G. Langseth is Columbia University's ocean-research ship. Her port engineer, Marty Klein, had relied on Sam Reyes Sr. and his crew, including welder Gilbert Sanchez, for more than a decade — first at Scripps, then aboard research ships on both coasts, in Hawaiʻi, and in Guam. In 2018 he brought that trust to the shop Sam had just opened, and the work has followed the ship from port to port ever since.
How the work grew
Eight years, port to port.
2018–19
Small parts, done right
The first calls were small: a stainless sea-chest strainer basket and new stack tips for the ship's exhausts, built to the vessel's drawings.
Spring 2020 · Newport, Oregon
The crew drives north
With the ship in Newport and COVID closing everything, Marty got Nautilus set up as a Columbia vendor, and the crew drove north. His closing notes list the extras the crew absorbed along the way.
- Fabricated three satellite-antenna foundations
- Re-piped the compressor's fifth-stage coolers
- Built a stair to the streamer deck
- Repaired vent wastage, fire-main hangers, and pad eyes
Winter 2020 · Newport, Oregon
Doors and the ABS survey
After Thanksgiving the crew went back to Newport to replace two watertight doors, four weathertight doors, and three fire-screen doors. Nautilus's weld procedures and welder qualifications let Marty close the ABS survey.
2021–22 · San Diego
Designs and a port call
First, a crane foundation quoted to the naval architect's drawing. Then, with the ship at Scripps in San Diego: new spools, a pinger-pole modification, and the Dynacon winch installed and removed.
2025–26
Nautilus changes hands, same ship
After Nautilus changed hands, the calls kept coming:
- Copper-nickel and 316L spools
- Windlass anchor pipes, compressor and oil piping
- Stanchions, bridles, and dampers
- September 2026: a rescue-boat bridle pintle built to drawing and shipped to Norfolk, Virginia
What it shows
The Langseth didn't stay because of price. It stayed because the same people kept showing up wherever the ship was — working to the ship's drawings and handling the class paperwork.
From the client
“They make my job easy by doing their job well, the first time and at reasonable rates.”
Marty Klein
Port Engineer, Columbia University
Recommending Nautilus to Columbia University, April 2020