Advice on buying Virgo Voyager ?

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alldownwind

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A friend of mine is going to look at a Virgo Voyager (sloop rig) shortly. He's a dinghy sailor and this would be his first yacht. He's asked me if I'd go along and cast an eye over it to help him decide whether or not to make an offer. He would be getting it surveyed if he went ahead.
Any advice, please, on what specifically to look out for with one of these?
 
Hi there
If it is twin keel, look for movement in the keel recesses and movement of the plywood supports there, they are a bit lightly built there. Fin keels not so bad.
The rudders on the Voyagers are slightly poor design and often show splitting of the two halves allowing water to corrode the mild steel tangs on the rudder stock, big problem sometimes, Look for sidedeck stressing where the U bolts are fitted, occassionally decayed plywood under sidedeck but linings obscure this, all the usual suspects for any grp boat over fifteen years old.
Good luck
John Lilley
 
I don't want to upset anyone who has one but the bilge keeler is one of the slowest yachts I have ever sailed and makes a huge amount of leeway. Standing headroom and fairly seaworthy though.
 
Check the rudder bearing in the cockpit, many previous owners have modified this to prevent excess wear at the top of the bearing. Yes, there were problems with the tangs rusting in the rudder, but I believe that many were modified and fixed.

There are 4 types of keel, Fin, Twin Bilge, Triple and Lifting (although lifting keesl are quite rare). The triple keel is basically a short fin with two bilge keels attached. Which keel is dependant on sailing area. Bilge and Triple keels will take the ground.

Below decks the space is reasonable for 2/3 adults with standing headroom, heads and galley. Later models had a chart table on the port forward bulkhead but that moved the hanging locker aft, which intrudes into the cockpit locker. The quarter berth on the starboard makes a good sea berth.

The side decks are narrow, which is a pity as IMO they could have been 50% wider without impinging on the interior too much. However the foredeck is a good size, big eneough to inflate/deflate a tender. ther is also a proper anchor locker and chain locker below.

Yep, it won't sail as well as a dinghy, and there will be some leeway, and you do have to reef early but in a F4 I can easily get 5 knots through the water.
 
Whatever the awful sailing performance he'll be noticed everywhere - for owning one of the ugliest little mishaps on the water.
(Mind you, folks said that about my Frog-eye Healey . . .)
 
Thanks for the responses so far.
He has sailed one, in a blow too, and what's very important to him is that his missus thought it was OK.
 
That's a consideration of course. However I had a tubby bilge keeler that was a slug in light airs, and downwind it was hopeless. He'll end up motorsailing.
 
I have had a fin keep version for a number of years.

Check where the rigging attaches to the deck - too light at build although many have been modified.

Check keep attachment carefully - can look ok on the surface but still have problems. The hull where the keel attached has ply wood between 2 pieces of laminate and if any water has got in it will go soft making it weak. Clues here are stress cracking in the gel coat in that area.

Regarding sailing - the fin version I think sails very well for a boat of that size. You also get a massive amount of accommodation from the size of boat.

I would avoid the bilge keel version unless you don’t mind it sailing badly. Nothing like a modern bilge keeler, you really do pay a price with these boats.

Steve
 
Rule number 1. Never buy a boat because someone else likes it. Chances are they wont go sailing anyway - and you end up with a boat you don't like. (Painful experience!)
 
Cant really add much to J. Lilley and Malcb ......

except to say - don't worry too much about the anti-bilge-keel stuff ....... look all over, try and have a day-out in it ... then see how it fit's into plans ...

the advantages of BK's often outweigh the disadvantages ...... especially when its a family boat and not for racing round cans etc.
 
Thanks for the all the comments. It really is for a friend of mine, by the way, not for me!
I figure we mostly get our first boat a bit wrong, it's just something that happens. However if the Virgo does the trick in winning his (very cautious) wife over to sailing with him, which as I said earlier is very important to him, then it's got to be a good move on his part. If it pans out another way, then so be it.
 
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