Beneteau First lost her keel, four good men lost at sea.

franksingleton said:
Apologies if the question has already been asked. Are there any statistics or analyses of catastrophic failures of yachts by manufacturer!designer? A very subjective view is that Beneteau would not show up well. Any data? Any hard facts?
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Individual cases seem to be well enough publicised, but there aren't enough, I believe, for a statistical analysis.

From memory there was a school boat in Oz where the hull laminate around the keel was way below spec (believe the builder was prosecuted).

Hooligan V was an unauthorised change to the keel design by a fabricator. I don't believe there was a prosecution.

There's the infamous Bavaria Match. Never seen an official explanation, but I know at least one Match that had their hull laminate beefed up afterwards, and I've heard it was done to others.

Polbream - keel bolts
 
JumbleDuck said:
Are the painter attachment points on a liferaft strong enough to tow it through a F8?
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Err, if in a f8 then proper safe place is in the liferaft, if on a faulty craft, not trying to out run a gale and craft , fault, life is not replaceable.
Rather like running for a garage when big ends are shot on a car, park up and get help.
 
Capt Popeye said:
Err, if in a f8 then proper safe place is in the liferaft, if on a faulty craft, not trying to out run a gale and craft , fault, life is not replaceable.
Rather like running for a garage when big ends are shot on a car, park up and get help.
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Nonsense - we learned better than that in 79. You stay with the boat until it leaves you. It is madness to think that a liferaft is safer than a yacht however badly damaged. (Unless of course the keel is about to fall off).
 
jordanbasset said:
The number of deaths due to sailing yachts sinking is tiny, let alone those due to the more specific issue of failure of keels, AWB or MAB. You are far more likely to die of accidental causes in your own home, walking, riding or being in a car. Does not mean there are no issues to be addressed but a sense of perspective is required.
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The number of deaths due to sinking is tiny because most marinas are full of boats which never go sailing.
 
bedouin said:
Nonsense - we learned better than that in 79. You stay with the boat until it leaves you. It is madness to think that a liferaft is safer than a yacht however badly damaged. (Unless of course the keel is about to fall off).
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I think it may also be madness -or at least tragically unwise - to think that a liferaft will guarantee your safety if your boat springs an inexplicable leak.
 
Capt Popeye said:
Err, if it was your way (only) of saving the situation and your lives? YES

Decamp into life raft and EPIRB assistance, stay warm n dry, and most importantly stay safe /alive, bugger the boat.
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Fat chance, force9 and20ft waves, you would spend more time in the water than in the raft. I dont think you could tow a raft in those conditions
 
lpdsn said:
Hooligan V was an unauthorised change to the keel design by a fabricator.
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It was indeed. They ended up with the weight of the keel taken by half as much weld as was originally intended: the find was supposed to be welded to the top and bottom of the plug which went into the hull but was only welded to the bottom.

It's reminiscent of the Hyatt Regency Skywalk collapse in the US. The contractors there changed the design to make it easier to build, failing to realise that they were doubling the loads on vertical supports.

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SteveSarabande said:
Fat chance, force9 and20ft waves, you would spend more time in the water than in the raft. I dont think you could tow a raft in those conditions
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Which is why I think the idea of towing an inflated liferaft across the Atlantic, like a dinghy, in case anything goes wrong, is a little ... impractical.
 
Awful lot of armchair sailors on here that know the perfect answer -- with hindsight!

All publicity is to stay with boat until you step up to the liferaft except in a fire. You can now add the if you are about to loose your keel which from my reading/info over the last 16yrs is a very rare event and up to now often in exceptional circumstances. Unless you can identify water ingress spouting up around the keel boats not sure how you would recognise that risk. Another thread has identified a Jeanneau that completed its charter and went out on another without a keel! Keel was left in the Scillies boat sailed from Falmouth!!
 
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franksingleton said:
Apologies if the question has already been asked. Are there any statistics or analyses of catastrophic failures of yachts by manufacturer!designer? A very subjective view is that Beneteau would not show up well. Any data? Any hard facts?
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Unless you have any data it would be unwise to make that sort of rash statement.

There are huge numbers of Group Beneteau yachts, many sailed very hard - near full time in charter fleets and crossing many oceans, including lots in ARC etc. There is a famous first 345 (think that is the right model) which is one of the few GRP boats to regularly go into ice strewn Artic waters.
And not aware that any others have lost their keel.

The number of HR, Malo etc are tiny by comparison. I would not be surprised if the percentage of Malo losses aren't potentially quite high, for example - nothing to do with build quality but a few have hit things and been lost.
 
I have some experience of Hull de-lamitation in the vicinity of the keel on my Bavaria 44.
From new I could not understand why the bilge was full of water after a rough journey. I checked the keel bolts by drying out the bilge and found no water seeping in over the course of the next few sailing trips so I decided it must be some kind of leak from the cockpit or the bilge pump or the intake to the engine which only happened in rough weather but never found the answer.
When I decided to sell the boat it all became clear when the surveyor discovered that the keel was flexing about, not due to the keel bolts but because the hull around the keel area had started to de-laminate. This was on a four year old Bavaria 44. I guess that in rough weather the flexing was such that a small amount of sea water could pass up the keel bolt holes when the strain was greater than usual. In normal weather everything stayed watertight.
The hull strengthening cost £6,500 and Bavaria could not care less (this was just after Opal Marine had gone bust).

I still have moments of anguish about what might have happened if we had kept the boat for another season as it was used most weeks by a full crew. You don't get many seconds to take emergency action when the keel falls off!
 
mainsail1 said:
When I decided to sell the boat it all became clear when the surveyor discovered that the keel was flexing about, not due to the keel bolts but because the hull around the keel area had started to de-laminate. This was on a four year old Bavaria 44. I guess that in rough weather the flexing was such that a small amount of sea water could pass up the keel bolt holes when the strain was greater than usual. In normal weather everything stayed watertight.
The hull strengthening cost £6,500 and Bavaria could not care less (this was just after Opal Marine had gone bust).

!
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Interesting post. Can someone explain whether dealers such as Opel acted as owners selling boat, agent or distributors for the dealer and what is the buyers legal rights as it appears to me that the manufacturers seem to be able to absolve themselves of any legal responsibility and most UK dealers/agents etc are men of straw.
 
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