Asking fir a friend..

[Norman_E]

A few years back I was friendly with the owner of a company that carried out yacht repairs. Someone had a Grand Soleil on the hard, with keel damage after a grounding and he was asked to quote for repairs. He told me that he had refused to quote because the internal damage to the yacht's structure was quite severe from what looked from the outside like quite a minor grounding. Anyone looking at such a yacht would need a surveyor to examine it. I would walk (run) away from that yacht unless the owner paid for a survey of the damage.

 

[Tranona]

He is new to big boats after a lifetime of small boats. But you make a valid point I will introduce him to these venerable pages..

These 2 links may help your friend. The first shows the sort of internal damage that can happen. The boat is a Bav 36 but essentially the same basic design bavariayacht.org/forum/index.php/topic,3095.0.html

This one is a slightly newer 46, but again the same basic design bavariayacht.org/forum/index.php/topic,3828.0.html As you can see from the discussion, removing the keel and repairing the damage is quite possible and no reason why the boat should not as good or better than original after the work is done. Of course doing it properly is not cheap as it requires serious boat handling gear and a repair yard that knows what it is doing.

A Grand Soleil of that age is worth around £80k in decent condition so the repair would represent a fair amount of the value. an insurer would pay if the claim is valid, but often groundings go unreported and the full extent of the damage only shows up later.

A Grand Soleil of that age is worth around £80k in average condition so the repair cost (if it needs the full job) will be high in relation to its value. an is

 

[Concerto]

I know of a Jenneau about 38ft long that ran aground hard and dislodged the keel matrix. It was a major rebuild and about 7 years ago it cost £32,000 to repair. This should give an idea as to the magnitude of what it will cost as a repair if there is keel damage.

It does seem strange that it may have keel damage, so why has it not been repaired by an insurance company?

Personally Tomahawk, I would advise your friend to find another boat and leave the problems with the current owner. Even if sold at £40,000 it could still be a money pit to repair.

 

[doug748]

The Youtube people at "Expedition Evans" undertook this type of keel repair, for those that may not have seen it this is an overview:

I have not followed it closely but think it was a success. It was tough work and they are an exceptional couple of grafters.

.

 

[zoidberg]

The op sails a triple hulled boat…….so maybe has a friend?

For the arithmetically-challenged, I have it on VERY good authority that the 'Tomahawk' which disguises the OP's Sunday name is one hull short of a trio.

 

[zoidberg]

Once upon a time I was roped in to help deliver an Oyster 565 from Oyster Central Office at Ipswichto their 'outstation' at Palma.

Down along the way it emerged in little fragments that the 'near-new' boat had been taken on a shakedown to the Scottish Isles, prior to joining the Oyster World Tour, and while there had an unplanned keel encounter with some quite stubborn Scottish granite.

The lovely boat returned to Ipswich on a low-loader, shrouded in tarpaulins, where the 'cosmetic damage' was 'polished out'. There was more secrecy surrounding that boat's movements than I remember there used to be about 'laden' Vulcan V-bombers deploying.

I note that, a couple of months back, it was still For Sale.