Buy British campaign

[halcyon]

I think to be a good marine designer you have to use and live aboard boats. Then, and only then can you get a feel for what is needed.

We all drive cars on a daily basis so a designer is far more likely to understand what is required.

Agree with you , but at Sealine from the 90's on, you had a differant setup. Tom who had setup the firm, and designed all the original boats was a boater himself, so the built boats to a user's requirement. Then when you added Roger, you had the designer, working with a production engineer / boat user, so you had a very useable mix.

I find a big differance between the 80's and today. Then it was new design, new style, always looking for something different, push the boundry. To-day it must look like something that exists elsewhere, follow the Italians, follow the Germans, music follows the 60's. or the 70's, or the 80's and so on. We as a Nation cannot look for to-morrow, we do not have a vision, just what can we copy.

We have this knock the past, look at Sealine from the 90's they have a beak, what is wrong with it ? The other boats had an anchor sticking out the front, Sealine enclosed it within the deck moulding. It looks neater, safer to someone walking down the marina, yet the number of people that poke fun at it on this forum.

The problem the British boat builder have reading the forum, is that qaulity must be as good as Sweeden, design must be Italian, and cost must be Chineese, and preferably not made in the UK.

Brian

 

[henryf]

When you say boats have to look like someone else's I'm not sure that's the case. Sealine at the moment are producing very individual designs. Now there is a danger people will walk away because of that. It's all well and good for some multi trillion pound industrial magnate to throw relative peanuts (to them) at a way out and wacky folly, but at our level a boat represents a sizeable investment so we want to make sure it's not going to plummet in value. That means making sure it appeals to as many people as possible come re-sale time.

As for having to be as good as it comes. Yes they do. No one is going to say, "oh bless, look at that they've tried to build and it's terrible but let's buy it anyway because it's British". Our boats have to compete in an open market. Some builders are better than others and some models within the line up better than others. But within British motorboat manufacturers we do have some world class superstars.

Henry

 

[oldgit]

" look at Sealine from the 90's they have a beak, what is wrong with it ? The other boats had an anchor sticking out the front, Sealine enclosed it within the deck moulding"


Think Bayliner may have got there first? Not sure the critics were moaning about the big hooter itself,would have helped if that "beak" had not been suddenly added into the boats alleged overall length by the marketing dept,along also with the bathing platform.
Fairline were a prime example of this when the Fairline 40 (Phantom ? )suddenly morphed into the new model 43 over night.........
Their previous classic the Turbo 36 was into fact a 38ft boat.

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

We have this knock the past, look at Sealine from the 90's they have a beak, what is wrong with it ? The other boats had an anchor sticking out the front, Sealine enclosed it within the deck moulding. It looks neater, safer to someone walking down the marina, yet the number of people that poke fun at it on this forum.

Sealine shot themselves in the foot with the anchor beak because the beak made it impossible to increase the size of the anchor which meant that many charter co's in the Med were reluctant to take on Sealines. My F43, for example, was fitted with a ridiculously small 10kg anchor which dragged in the slightest breeze but I was unable to increase it's size because of the beak.
Actually I dont think that the beak itself was any kind of a stylistic issue for buyers; it was more the organic curvy styling which came straight out of the Ford Sierra design school. This contrasted with the sharp edged styling of other British and Italian marques. It wasn't a problem for me personally as I bought both a F43 and S37 but Sealines of that era could hardly be described as objects of beauty. Where I dont think that Sealine received as much credit as they deserved was the way they maximised accomodation volume and storage on their boats. IMHO the 410/F43 and the 450/T46 were brilliant designs in the way that they incorporated both aft cabin and aft cockpit with substantial protective flybridge overhangs and the way movement around the boat was made so easy. I'm still surprised that nobody else copied this at the time

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

Not sure the critics were moaning about the big hooter itself,would have helped if that "beak" had not been suddenly added into the boats alleged overall length by the marketing dept,along also with the bathing platform.

Yup, I think that both Fairline and Sealine are particularly guilty of this although in Fairline's defence, their hulls generally extend to the extremity of the bathing platform, unline many Sealines. I remember wondering why the interior of a Fairline Phantom 46 was so much smaller than an Azimut 46 or Ferretti 46; its only when I looked at the detailed drawings of the Phantom 46 did I realise that the dimensions of the boat excluding the pulpit/bathing platform were much smaller.
You have to be very carefully comparing boat models; many US boats, for example, are generally designated according to their hull length excluding pulpit and bathing platform so they are actually bigger than many European boats, model for model