Had this dream since childhood - considering making it a reality

[Tranona]

That fuel consumption is about right for that size of engine/boat at cruising speed. That is a very high quality boat and potentially very capable at sea if it is in good condition. The Gardner engine is arguably the best diesel of its type ever built and you can still get good parts and service. However, nothing about running that boat over long distances will be cheap. Very few people use purely power boats for long distance cruising, partly because of cost. That is why sail is so much more popular as not only are engines a lot smaller and more economical - a 55' sailboat will have an engine half that size or less, but obviously it is running for only a small proportion of passage time.

However, would make a good semi static liveaboard with the capability coastal passage making in comfort and style.

 

[forestboy]

Can't find for the life of me who to speak to about mooring buoy prices

 

[forestboy]

That fuel consumption is about right for that size of engine/boat at cruising speed. That is a very high quality boat and potentially very capable at sea if it is in good condition. The Gardner engine is arguably the best diesel of its type ever built and you can still get good parts and service. However, nothing about running that boat over long distances will be cheap. Very few people use purely power boats for long distance cruising, partly because of cost. That is why sail is so much more popular as not only are engines a lot smaller and more economical - a 55' sailboat will have an engine half that size or less, but obviously it is running for only a small proportion of passage time.

However, would make a good semi static liveaboard with the capability coastal passage making in comfort and style.

I was thinking the same thing. A trip to Bristol return would be roughly £300 which I could do once in a while. Going round Europe though would be so ridiculously expensive.

I really wish I had starting properly researching years ago. powerboat training, navigation, Garbage disposal, mooring buoys, sanitation, diesel, water, internet, dinghy's, outboards, marine propulsion courses, refrigeration units etc. etc. etc. This is immense.

 

[forestboy]

http://houseboats.apolloduck.co.uk/feature.phtml?id=286589

Regarding the above boat. I'd certainly get rid of the bunks and put in a small double. Make the rest of that lower area a lounge, change the lounge into a small dinning area with storage and put the frigging log burner downstairs surely. Why is the log burner on the top floor? insane!

 

[Tranona]

Can't find for the life of me who to speak to about mooring buoy prices

You will have to do a lot of hunting to find a suitable mooring for a boat that size, simply because there are so few and they do not get advertised. The seller of the boat you are looking at says he has been on the waiting list for moorings (both of which will be at the top end pricewise) in London for 2 years.

 

[forestboy]

I'm happy to not bother with a mooring and put it in the middle of a river if need be as long as several aspects are covered; I get some motorboat training for mooring up once a month for water, diesel, sanitary waste etc prior to buying anything; I get a really good dinghy with an outboard (I can drive one of those already) and the generator et al is all in perfect working order.

My business is based in Marchwood so I could theoretically just use a dinghy to get there from hamble, itchen or wherever and tow the dinghy to my workshop. I have to say that would beat the hell out of driving to and back through town in rush hour every day. 20 minutes tops if I got a decent dinghy with maybe 8hp outboard. Dog might not like it but she's dealt with worse lol.

I quite like the idea of the isolation of the middle of the river. I often look out at those boats and yearn for that kind of privacy. I'd be able to practice the sax or blast music till my heart's content.

 

[forestboy]

And I figure out a way to get internet

 

[forestboy]

Please can someone point me in the direction of where to look or who to speak to regarding hooking up to mooring buoys. I see all these massive rusty boats hooked up I just don't know who to even ask. Is it the river authority or what?

 

[maby]

Please can someone point me in the direction of where to look or who to speak to regarding hooking up to mooring buoys. I see all these massive rusty boats hooked up I just don't know who to even ask. Is it the river authority or what?

Most of the buoys you see in the river estuaries belong to yacht clubs and are leased to their members. Local councils often have some too. Many of those will not be rated for a 56 foot motor boat even if you can find one available. The bigger buoys are commercial and probably belong to the harbour authority - I doubt that any of those would be available for long term lease - they are generally there for specific purposes - waiting for something to happen.

 

[duncan99210]

If you're talking about the buoys to the north of Marchwood Military Port, they used to belong to the ship breakers yard (Kemps I think) but I seem to recall that they went bust a few years back.

 

[saltylegs]

Why not go for the liveaboard in a fixed place first of all and find out if you like the lifestyle, then while doing this you can improve your skills on boat maintenance and decide if this is the life for you.
The initial outlay would be less as you don't then need a sea going vessel and you still have an asset that you can upgrade from later as your need to wander grows.

 

[prv]

I assume he ran off of a generator.

He had a real mishmash of stuff. If I remember rightly there was a 48v alternator on the main engine, a massive but ancient and temperamental 110v generator, a modern 240v generator for power tools etc, and a large wind turbine on top of the mast. Not sure if he had solar as well.

Wouldn't a reverse osmosis filtration system be sufficient to process seawater to potable water?

Nice clean mid-oceanic seawater, yup. The Itchen, no way. Not because it will harm you, but because the impurities will harm the watermaker. The core of a watermaker is a very delicate membrane which can deal with salt and pretty much nothing else. Run dirty water through it and you ruin it pretty quickly, and they're not cheap. I've never had one myself, but I've read plenty of accounts from people who don't turn it on within a day's sail of land.

Unfortunately Southampton has got to be the most expensive place in Britain to moor a boat - probably amongst the most expensive places in Europe. We have a berth in an East Coast MDL marina - costs us around £3.5k per annum - we briefly had the boat on the Hamble and would have been looking at well over £10k in an MDL marina there.

Yeah, but, that's the Hamble - its own crazy little world. Look at Southampton itself and the headline marina prices are lower; find yourself a grimy little industrial jetty or half-forgotten mooring and you can get cheaper still. It's never going to be Northumberland or Wales, but it could be doable.

I'm happy to not bother with a mooring and put it in the middle of a river

You still need a mooring to tie it to!

The terminology gets a little complicated when you're considering canal boats, houseboats, and seagoing boats. I think the first two use "mooring" to mean a stretch of bank to tie up to, but at sea it generally means a buoy floating in the middle of a harbour or river. If you're tied to a jetty or pontoon or quay wall, that would normally be a "berth". Not hard and fast, most terms to do with the sea are a bit fluid, but that's the common usage.

You can still drop anchor almost anywhere (though various eco-hippies and busybodies are doing their best to end this...) but that's for temporary stops. Permanently basing yourself at anchor anywhere near civilisation is likely to end in trouble.

My business is based in Marchwood so I could theoretically just use a dinghy to get there from hamble, itchen or wherever

Surely from the Test would make more sense? There are a slew of moorings up the Marchwood shore. Not intended for living on, but I don't know if there are any rules against it. The two main outfits I know about are the Marchwood sailing club and the Cracknore Hard sailing club. The former is a real club with a clubhouse etc, the latter is more of an umbrella organisation to manage a bunch of moorings. You could talk to them about mooring availability and prices, though the size of some of the boats you've brought up might be a problem. They really are massive by seagoing standards.

Please can someone point me in the direction of where to look or who to speak to regarding hooking up to mooring buoys. I see all these massive rusty boats hooked up I just don't know who to even ask. Is it the river authority or what?

Different organisations in different places. As I said, the ones off Marchwood are mostly either Marchwood Sailing Club or Cracknore Hard, though perhaps there are others. The ones on the corner opposite Dock Head belong to Southampton Sailing Club, though they're probably too exposed to consider living on anyway. The pontoons in the middle of the Itchen belong to various places - the ones at the top are Kemp's, the next I'm not sure about but probably Shamrock Quay, and the ones just near the Itchen Bridge again I don't know about but would guess Itchen Marine Towage.

The big yellow mooring buoys with "massive rusty boats" on will almost certainly belong to ABP, the company that runs the whole of Southampton Docks. This might well be where you end up if you buy one of the little ships you have in mind! Tim with the trawler had one, as did someone else with another old fishing boat (which sank), so they do seem to be willing to rent to random members of the public.

Pete

 

[forestboy]

Why not go for the liveaboard in a fixed place first of all and find out if you like the lifestyle, then while doing this you can improve your skills on boat maintenance and decide if this is the life for you.
The initial outlay would be less as you don't then need a sea going vessel and you still have an asset that you can upgrade from later as your need to wander grows.

It's a possiblity worth considering. However, I do want to learn how to boat or sail because I do want to travel. Realistically all going amazing well this wont happen soon so perhaps a static boat would make the first transition a bit quicker. The problem is I want something that I'll actually want to spend money on if I can and I wont want to do that if I am planning to get a boat ASAP after living aboard if that makes sense. I wonder if I could buy a boat with a residential mooring and then sell the boat and keep the mooring? I expect that wouldn't be easily done!

 

[forestboy]

Thanks for all the great stuff Pete. It's given me a lot to think about, really appreciate it.

I'm very suprised that people wait a days sailing from shore before filtering water due to general gunk. I mean there must be a fair amount of gunk in the sea also right? What about a simple prefilter? Even if it had to be cleaned every usage surely that would sift out the physical debris? I don't know!

ABP? I'll try and find out how to contact them. I'm curious to know how much they charge. If I could get something like that for not too much money then it might make getting a larger boat more feasible.

What do you think of catamarans? I figure you get more boat for your length with a cat right? From what I'm reading you need to keep your weight down more but I really like the look of some of them. The ability to sail most of the time instead of using engines is a big plus for me also since doing some research on deisel costs. It might take me longer to actually get the boat but depending on mooring fees, sail and boat maintenance I'm figuring I could probably work seasonally and leave my bro to run the business during winter. He'd be fine with that because it'd boost his income 30-50% probably.

This looks lovely to me.... Can't afford it though by a long shot. Maybe 1 to 3 years of living frugally perhaps...

http://www.boatsandoutboards.co.uk/multihull-sailboats/lagoon-380-ALC017

He had a real mishmash of stuff. If I remember rightly there was a 48v alternator on the main engine, a massive but ancient and temperamental 110v generator, a modern 240v generator for power tools etc, and a large wind turbine on top of the mast. Not sure if he had solar as well.




Nice clean mid-oceanic seawater, yup. The Itchen, no way. Not because it will harm you, but because the impurities will harm the watermaker. The core of a watermaker is a very delicate membrane which can deal with salt and pretty much nothing else. Run dirty water through it and you ruin it pretty quickly, and they're not cheap. I've never had one myself, but I've read plenty of accounts from people who don't turn it on within a day's sail of land.



Yeah, but, that's the Hamble - its own crazy little world. Look at Southampton itself and the headline marina prices are lower; find yourself a grimy little industrial jetty or half-forgotten mooring and you can get cheaper still. It's never going to be Northumberland or Wales, but it could be doable.



You still need a mooring to tie it to!

The terminology gets a little complicated when you're considering canal boats, houseboats, and seagoing boats. I think the first two use "mooring" to mean a stretch of bank to tie up to, but at sea it generally means a buoy floating in the middle of a harbour or river. If you're tied to a jetty or pontoon or quay wall, that would normally be a "berth". Not hard and fast, most terms to do with the sea are a bit fluid, but that's the common usage.

You can still drop anchor almost anywhere (though various eco-hippies and busybodies are doing their best to end this...) but that's for temporary stops. Permanently basing yourself at anchor anywhere near civilisation is likely to end in trouble.



Surely from the Test would make more sense? There are a slew of moorings up the Marchwood shore. Not intended for living on, but I don't know if there are any rules against it. The two main outfits I know about are the Marchwood sailing club and the Cracknore Hard sailing club. The former is a real club with a clubhouse etc, the latter is more of an umbrella organisation to manage a bunch of moorings. You could talk to them about mooring availability and prices, though the size of some of the boats you've brought up might be a problem. They really are massive by seagoing standards.



Different organisations in different places. As I said, the ones off Marchwood are mostly either Marchwood Sailing Club or Cracknore Hard, though perhaps there are others. The ones on the corner opposite Dock Head belong to Southampton Sailing Club, though they're probably too exposed to consider living on anyway. The pontoons in the middle of the Itchen belong to various places - the ones at the top are Kemp's, the next I'm not sure about but probably Shamrock Quay, and the ones just near the Itchen Bridge again I don't know about but would guess Itchen Marine Towage.

The big yellow mooring buoys with "massive rusty boats" on will almost certainly belong to ABP, the company that runs the whole of Southampton Docks. This might well be where you end up if you buy one of the little ships you have in mind! Tim with the trawler had one, as did someone else with another old fishing boat (which sank), so they do seem to be willing to rent to random members of the public.

Pete

 

[forestboy]

OK so Kemps Quay for example on the river Itchen (not sure if beam is taken into consideration) offer the following prices on an 38 ft boat

cheapest mooring Most expensive mooring

daily £49.4 ""
monthly £304 ""
6 months £1748 £2660
Annually £2318 £3610

Those prices are doable! Of course this isn't livaboard but if I found 4 or 5 of those and spent a month here and there and kept quiet who would know? Or would that be a bit of a nightmare,,,hmmm!

 

[forestboy]

I've contacted Cracknore hard yacht club about prices. How do I ask them about "staying on board over night" without actually saying I want to live aboard do u reckon?

If I just say my business is run out of Marchwood so occasionally I might just stay on the boat and see how they respond to that?

 

[forestboy]

This is an interesting link from Hamble Point-

They charter your boat out and take a commission and you still end up paying them a small fee for mooring there. The upside is that everything gets (I would assume) properly maintained. You would also have access to your boat presumably most evenings. Still, I would think one would be better off doing all the charter management themselves, staying at a cheaper mooring and actually making a bit of cleared cash out of it.

I assume you would need a yacht master if you were to charter your boat out and perform skipper duties yourself.

http://www.yacht-charter.co.uk/yacht-management/yacht-charter-management

Damn I've gotta go to sleep...

 

[prv]

OK so Kemps Quay for example on the river Itchen
[...]
Of course this isn't livaboard but if I found 4 or 5 of those and spent a month here and there and kept quiet who would know?

We keep our boat at Kemp's and there are at least half a dozen guys (it always seems to be guys ) living on board there. I don't know what their official rules are, but the management are aware of the residents and have no issue with it - having people on site 24/7 improves security if nothing else. No need to slink around in secret

Pete

 

[prv]

They charter your boat out and take a commission and you still end up paying them a small fee for mooring there. The upside is that everything gets (I would assume) properly maintained.

This arrangement makes sense for someone living in London or the Home Counties who's bought a new or nearly-new conventional white sloop, and doesn't actually use it that often. Not for someone who wants a large "character" boat and intends to live on it.

You would also have access to your boat presumably most evenings.

Not if it was being chartered, since yacht charters are generally for multiple days.

Pete

 

[jerrytug]

Forget the coaster, it's just a houseboat. Get this one, it goes.
All big tugs, coasters, trawlers etc have plenty of room to live on, but only a few are still good to go, with the machinery intact.
This is a bargain. Snap it up. Cheers Jerry.
The website is Euroshipbrokers by the way, I can't do a link just now.

Fuel will cost a pound a minute free running (light tug) at seven knots. That's a round estimate off the top of my head.
The vessel will be jam packed with expensive saleable gear, which you can easily sell bit by bit, if you are sure she will never be towing again.
Just do it!
AND it's under 24m so easy to be legal as a private yacht, or small workboat coding for work..