Hardy Marine have new owners

Firefly625

Firefly625

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After the sudden death of Hardy Marine owner & MD Mark Funnell the sale of Hardy Marine was never far away, so glade that it has not taken long to come under pretty safe hands of Windboats, makers of Oyster yachts (very, very fine boats indeed if you are not familiar with oysters).

I hope they keep to their principles of low volume quality motor yachts for the more discerning boat owners among us.... :rolleyes:

http://www.mby.com/news/533477/hardy-marine-bought-by-local-norfolk-yacht-maker


(BTW, currently hating this new forum layout, either my eyesight has got even worse, or everything is slightly misty and tiny..?.... I guess we will get used to it):confused:
 
Yes, it's good news for the employees of Hardy and I hope the company can continue to thrive under this new ownership. Btw I think the new 62 looks like a winner
 
oceanfroggie said:
+1

But an easy quick fix to change the template
Click to expand...

Is that something we can do as users, or is it an admin function? (I don't know anything about vbulletin). I'm finding the new layout close to impossible to read, the contrast is terrible, the white background far too dominant and the foreground font too light to read easily).

Cheers
Jimmy
 
A word to the wise; Oyster do indeed make fine boats, but their staff - especially at boat shows - have a reputation for being snobbishness personified, to the extent of putting off cash buyers !

Hopefully they may have taken note of the adverse publicity this generated; as for Hardys they seem pretty good, for mobo's... :D
 
Firefly625 said:
I can't think of any better... and they are based in Norfolk, home of Hardy Marine.

The interesting thing will be what Oyster do with their OM43....

http://www.oysteryachts.com/brokerage/previous_models/ld43/default.aspx
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Oyster OM43 has not sold well, production transferred from New Zealand, expensive boat and production re-started about the same time as World went into a tail spin..However OM43 is totally different concept.

Oyster are quality builders, and Hardy always hampered by some screwy engine choices. Sabre 225 slug in the 36, then they replace it with Steyr!! Then they put MAN into larger models and lumbered owners with the MAN R6 550, untried, unknown in our market. Shortest lived marine engine ever built, lasted for 14 months in the marine market before MAN were forced to withdraw product, super way of destroying residual value of poor smuck's investment. Finally heard at the Southamption boat show they were offering Yanmar BY in place of the lovely 4LH as this is no longer available.

Suspect Oyster more in the real World.
 
Low volume builders do seem to fit engines that shall we say mainstream builders wouldn't touch, yes why do they do it? I was always amazed why broom fitted mercruisers to the 345 and 36, heavy boats for there length, besides a great built product to be spoiled by its unsuitable power plants which resulted in owners having to fork out later in years for another pair of units at considerable cost.

Hopefully hardy will be on track now to produce some stunning boats.
 
volvopaul said:
Low volume builders do seem to fit engines that shall we say mainstream builders wouldn't touch, yes why do they do it? I was always amazed why broom fitted mercruisers to the 345 and 36, heavy boats for there length, besides a great built product to be spoiled by its unsuitable power plants which resulted in owners having to fork out later in years for another pair of units at considerable cost.
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I guess that the big boat builders have sole supply agreements with the likes of Volvo and Cat which makes it impossible for the other engine suppliers like Mercruiser and Yanmar to break in. They go to the smaller builders like Broom and Hardy, who probably don't have agreements with any engine suppliers, and offer them low prices which undercut Volvo and Cat and probably, better delivery times too. Hence the smaller builders end up with oddball engines in their boats
 
Latestarter1 said:
Oyster OM43 has not sold well, production transferred from New Zealand, expensive boat and production re-started about the same time as World went into a tail spin..However OM43 is totally different concept.

Oyster are quality builders, and Hardy always hampered by some screwy engine choices. Sabre 225 slug in the 36, then they replace it with Steyr!! Then they put MAN into larger models and lumbered owners with the MAN R6 550, untried, unknown in our market. Shortest lived marine engine ever built, lasted for 14 months in the marine market before MAN were forced to withdraw product, super way of destroying residual value of poor smuck's investment. Finally heard at the Southamption boat show they were offering Yanmar BY in place of the lovely 4LH as this is no longer available.

Suspect Oyster more in the real World.
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Very interesting as always Latestarter.... indeed lets hope a tie up will produce better buying power for mainstream lumps..
 
Deleted User said:
I guess that the big boat builders have sole supply agreements with the likes of Volvo and Cat which makes it impossible for the other engine suppliers like Mercruiser and Yanmar to break in. They go to the smaller builders like Broom and Hardy, who probably don't have agreements with any engine suppliers, and offer them low prices which undercut Volvo and Cat and probably, better delivery times too. Hence the smaller builders end up with oddball engines in their boats
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I don't know for sure but i doubt that Deleted User. Princess and Fairline have several boats where there is a choice of MAN, Volvo and Cat, and MTU in the bigger stuff, or at least 2 or 3 of those four. My suspicion is they know no-one will spec say Yanmar so they just don't even bother designing for it

Ref Hardy, it is a shame they have offered some duff engines but a shame also their customers don't have more nous and insist on the right hardware, eso as it impacts residuals. All the boats are built to order and a bit custom, afaik.

But more generally, it's nice to hear that Hardy have new owners who are long-standing quality boatbuilders
 
jfm said:
I don't know for sure but i doubt that Deleted User. Princess and Fairline have several boats where there is a choice of MAN, Volvo and Cat, and MTU in the bigger stuff, or at least 2 or 3 of those four. My suspicion is they know no-one will spec say Yanmar so they just don't even bother designing for it

Ref Hardy, it is a shame they have offered some duff engines but a shame also their customers don't have more nous and insist on the right hardware, eso as it impacts residuals. All the boats are built to order and a bit custom, afaik.

But more generally, it's nice to hear that Hardy have new owners who are long-standing quality boatbuilders
Click to expand...


actually your comments jfm on the fact they are very much custom built today does ring a bell that Hardy have stated recently they will build a boat with whatever engine the customer specifies, quoted in MBM last month when they tested the new 36 sedan.

But that's now, what they did before looks a little different.... glade when they built mine they happened upon a good Yanmar lump.
 
jfm said:
I don't know for sure but i doubt that Deleted User. Princess and Fairline have several boats where there is a choice of MAN, Volvo and Cat, and MTU in the bigger stuff, or at least 2 or 3 of those four. My suspicion is they know no-one will spec say Yanmar so they just don't even bother designing for it
Click to expand...
Yes, I'm sure there is an element of that but manufacturers are very much driven by cost and production scheduling. If boat builders are like the manufacturers I deal with, they will be commiting to rolling agreements to buy a certain number of engines to be delivered at agreed dates at agreed costs, possibly over a period of 12-18months . It's only really the bigger engine suppliers that have the range of different engine sizes that can satisfy this requirement and from the boat builder's point of view, they want to be partnering with suppliers who can be relied upon to honour these commitments plus provide all the other stuff like CAD drawings, certification, documents etc. These days, most manufacturers have realised that overall it costs them less to have mutually beneficial ongoing relationships with a few chosen suppliers rather than confrontational lowest cost relationships with many suppliers. In contrast the smaller manufacturers will be basing their purchasing decisions on whoever can supply an engine at lowest cost against irregular small volume orders which tends to mean that the engine suppliers who can't break into the bigger manufacturers are the only suppliers interested in such deals
 
jfm said:
I don't know for sure but i doubt that Deleted User. Princess and Fairline have several boats where there is a choice of MAN, Volvo and Cat, and MTU in the bigger stuff, or at least 2 or 3 of those four. My suspicion is they know no-one will spec say Yanmar so they just don't even bother designing for it

Ref Hardy, it is a shame they have offered some duff engines but a shame also their customers don't have more nous and insist on the right hardware, eso as it impacts residuals. All the boats are built to order and a bit custom, afaik.



But more generally, it's nice to hear that Hardy have new owners who are long-standing quality boatbuilders
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I agree with the fact that future of a quality builder has been secured.

Unlike US many customers in Europe neither know nor care, boaters in the America are very savvy about their mechanical stuff.

However with RCD, offering different engine options has cost impact on RCD drive by noise test.

Options cost $$

Having spoken to people at Hardy years ago, sensed a 'we know best' attitude.
 
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