Acceptable new boat defects

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Daydream believer

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Excel LB show is coming & the current boat is looking a bit tired after 9 years
I was chatting to the owner of a Maxi 1100 & said that whilst they are beautiful boats they are expensive. Problem with the cheaper boats , like my Hanse, are the number of faults new owners sometimes get. At least this would not happen with an "upper class" boat. To my surprise he told me he had a list as long as his arm. Ranged from leaking anchor well & leaking windows to lesser, but niggly, problems. Oddly enough my first brand new wooden yacht had zero defect & my new Hanse 315 had only 2 minor defects. One after 2 years was a split mast base & the other was a kink in the water inlet hose. Neither really a problem

My question is-
If one orders a new 34-36 ft yacht what could one expect as reasonable after sales defects. Should I expect a running battle with the sales team or should I expect a perfect yacht hot off the press. Do owners of new yachts have many problems or are such problems often blown out of proportion. Are more expensive yachts less prone to defects or not
 
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Zero defects should be the expectation. Reality is that few boats irrespective of cost are defect free. My only new boat a Bavaria in 2001 had only one defect of any consequence leaky deck hatches.

Think you have to recognize it will not be perfect but the important thing is how the supplier deals with it.
 
Boats are still largely hand-made, so the predictability of automated production-line assembly can't be achieved. So it's inevitable that there will be a "snagging list" with any new boat. I don't think more expensive boats escape this scenario - possibly because the owners are likely to have higher expectations.
 
pvb said:
I don't think more expensive boats escape this scenario - possibly because the owners are likely to have higher expectations.
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Also because they're made in smaller numbers, so the semi-production-line control and process that, say, Bavaria 34s are built under does not apply.

Pete
 
I'm sure window leaks are common to nearly all boats, and are to be expected. Being new won't necessarily be an exception.

I can't think of anything else that could reasonably be expected from a boat builder / dealer with thorough PDI checks that are properly carried out.
I guess one way to assess them beforehand is to ask to see their PDI checklist. If they don't have one, that speaks volumes;)

As said above, how faults are dealt with is as important as anything else.
 
Zero defects should be the expectation with a new boat, no matter who you're buying it from.

Possibly a good reason to get your own surveyor to overse the build, or at least conduct a pre-delivery inspection so the snagging list is dealt with before you take possession.
 
Trundlebug said:
I'm sure window leaks are common to nearly all boats, and are to be expected. Being new won't necessarily be an exception.

I can't think of anything else that could reasonably be expected from a boat builder / dealer with thorough PDI checks that are properly carried out.
I guess one way to assess them beforehand is to ask to see their PDI checklist. If they don't have one, that speaks volumes;)

As said above, how faults are dealt with is as important as anything else.
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Oysters take ( depending on length) well over 4 weeks to commission. all systems "burnt-in", rigged & sea trials.
 
Well as the previous owner of a new Hanse and the current owner of a new Southerly, I possibly have the right to compare.

My experience is that while both boats have problems, the ones with the Hanse were mostly related to poor installation in the factory as well as poor building.

The ones with the Southerly have so far been minor things that could not have been forseen until you have had the boat for a while.

It is also a fair point to make that some new owners are fussier than others. I have met another Southerly 38 owner who also had a list "as long as his arm". However most of them were real minor and could have been fixed with a screwdriver or some WD40. I could never understand why he didnt do them himself. His opinion was that it was down to the boat builder to fix everything on his snag list.
I personally, just get the toolkit and get on with it.

I understand that the theory is that new boats should be perfect. But they are not.

All I would say is that both Hanse and Southerly have excellent customer service. The after sales service is what makes the boat.

With Southerly I believe the customer service is a result of what you should expect from a prestige boat builder.

With Hanse it is because they are aware that the boats leave the factory in sometimes, not the best state.

Overall however I think the service from Hanse is slightly better than the Southerly, although the boats don't compare.
 
DanBurrill said:
Zero defects should be the expectation with a new boat, no matter who you're buying it from.

Possibly a good reason to get your own surveyor to overse the build, or at least conduct a pre-delivery inspection so the snagging list is dealt with before you take possession.
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Bought a boat once that came with a document of about 50 pages of a surveyor reporting on the build process for the first owner - it was quite amusing to read as it had clearly been a sort of a running battle between the builder and the surveyor going into the yard on about 20 occasions through the build process - the yard trying to hide corners they had cut (exact make and spec of resins, types of plywoods etc). It was also obvious that they timed some bits to just after the surveyor had been, so he would not see them pour cheap Brand X resin into branded Scott Bader drums, swap Bruynzeel ply for cheapo, etc. They did have some offcuts of ply supposedly used for the bulkheads left with the good makers mark, empty branded resin drums, etc.

The builder concerned built very solid boats, and much of what was done was good, but they did have a tendency to use poor materials where it was not going to be seen or couldn't be checked once it was done. Some of the internal joinery framing was rubbish, though what you saw was lovely quality teak.

I had the same surveyor do the pre-purchase survey for me on the same boat about 15 years after the boat was built. Some of the corner-cutting was becoming clear.

As others have said, or implied, you are more likely to have fewer faults with a new Bavaria/Jeanneau/Beneteau than an expensive quality boat. Same as a Hyundai i10 or Ford Mondeo is probably going to be more reliable than a Ferrari.

What matters is the fixing or lack of it: the worst case I ever met was a friend who ordered a top-spec built to order cruising 50-footer (not any of the volume builders), and ended up taking the builder to court, following serious structural problems. Shortly afterwards the builder ceased trading.
 
We chartered a number of boats under one year old and all of them had problems that needed us to call out an engineer from the base. Once we established that we only chartered boats more than one year old. If buying another boat I would buy one around 18 months old then all the problems should have been fixed. They were Jeanneaus, Beneteaus and Maxis. I know a number of Bavaria owners who also had problems plus a Halberg Rassy owner.
 
We bought our HR new in 2000. I think this was generally a good time as it was before production expanded to meet the demand. (Ours was delivered after about 6 months, in the spring). We had rather few defects and the agents Transworld took great trouble to ask about them and look for some that we hadn't found ourselves.

I am aware that "quality" boats are not immune to problems, many of them very silly, but I do believe that they are a bit less prevalent than cheaper craft and generally of a minor character.

Our defects mostly concerned what should have been good quality fittings rather than the boat itself, such as the shower head pipe coming adrift and the mainsheet traveller block bending. As far as I can remember, the only HR faults were an autopilot socket installed upside down and a screw that some Swedish peasant had managed to put through the compass sensor cable.
 
:D 9 years "OLD"? :confused:


Crikey, I've never had one that new!

Mine's looking a bit tired now, (like me really:rolleyes:) but it is 40 years old. Planning on giving it a lick of paint this year to pep her up a bit. Bet I don't spend as much as you! :D
 
Daydream believer said:
My question is - what could one expect as reasonable after sales defects.
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None are reasonable, unless really minor and impossible to find before trial.
Every boat will have faults during production and a lot depends on how the producer deal with them.
Builder should correct any error right on spot or before the sale, after some inspection. Many parts are provided by others and the builder cannot do much about them, apart from quality control. Reputable may buy good quality parts, while some buy cheapest available...
So it's reasonable to expect less problems from a reputable company that takes more care. But nobody is perfect.
 
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All defects should be fixed under warranty, but don't expect it to be perfect from the day it is delivered. Our Jeanneau is just over a year old now and has needed attention for a leak from the binnacle into the aft cabin, a jamming companionway hatch and several GRP voids. All were fixed without question by Jeanneau.
 
maby said:
All defects should be fixed under warranty, but don't expect it to be perfect from the day it is delivered. Our Jeanneau is just over a year old now and has needed attention for a leak from the binnacle into the aft cabin, a jamming companionway hatch and several GRP voids. All were fixed without question by Jeanneau.
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When you say by Jeanneau do you mean Jeanneau or the dealer you bought the boat from
 
Tranona said:
Zero defects should be the expectation.
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+1

And if, as the thread suggests, it's not, why does anyone ever buy one?

Buying 2nd hand, as I have always done, means substantially lower price, lots of "extras" already fitted (i.e. she's truly ready to sail away, unlike the claimed sailaway deals from new boat dealers) and the built in defects have already been sorted.

This post is probably a mistake. I should be encouraging the world to buy new boats, so the supply of 2nd. hand bargains remains for my benefit.
 
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