help with 70s boat identification

lenseman said:
£600, very good price. :)
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Really? For that? I thought £1200 for an very smart one with a motor and a decent trailer was a much better price. Possibly get it for £1000 or so.
Never underestimate the cost of refurbishing.

Also the seller of the dog is disinterested, which is a warning signal.
 
lenseman said:
If you tow that trailer with a yacht that looks that scruffy, any Traffic Police Officer will think it worth a tug as they will assume (correctly) that if the yacht looks that bad, they trailer will also be bad.

Any trailer which has stood for any length of time with a load on it will certainly cause the tyre to become "out of round" and this can be a potential problem.

also make very sure about the GTW of your tow vehicle. If you get stopped by either VOSA or Police, they will take you to a Weigh Bridge to make sure you comply.

Good luck, £600, very good price. :)
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If its stood for many years the tyres will be rotten, not only out of round. Looking at my trailer the other day. It'll need four new tyres and new bearings before I use it again ( if I use it again!) and that's despite buying two new tyres before the last time I used it and new bearings afterwards.
 
alicat,

the Europa is a very good boat, but do beware the costs of mooring a fin keeler, as others have said most boats this size are lift or twin keel to go on much cheaper drying moorings - drying on mud not hard sand.

Also agree with comments about the trailer, will need at least new tyres, probably bearings, and do a thorough brakes check.

Comments about the cost of sails are sadly right on too.

As well as the very good and lively Hunter19 owners association which is on yahoo ( will try to look up in a sec ) there is also a section on here ' The Genius Of Oliver Lee ', go to top of page and click on ' community '.

The book ' Very Willing Griffin is about David Blagden taking his Hunter 19 ( same as Europa with slightly different, earlier coachroof ) ' Willing Griffin ' in the 1972 OSTAR transatlantic race, it's a good book but out of print and secondhand copies demand very high prices, as every Hunter owner wants one !
 
many thanks for all the comments, I think on balance that I'm going to give the shabby one a miss, as I cant even convince myself that the vendor is legally the owner (is there a register for this sort of thing?).
However, now inspired to look into getting a Europa or something similar (what might people recommend for an all round day-sailer, occasional overnights, sailing with OH and 2 kids in Hebrides etc), preferably in a similar price bracket (1-1.5k). I guess a lifting or dual bilge keel makes running cost-sense too. Need to do some homework on this, so any input from the forum appreciated.
cheers!
 
alicat said:
However, now inspired to look into getting a Europa or something similar (what might people recommend for an all round day-sailer, occasional overnights, sailing with OH and 2 kids in Hebrides etc), preferably in a similar price bracket (1-1.5k). I guess a lifting or dual bilge keel makes running cost-sense too. Need to do some homework on this, so any input from the forum appreciated.
cheers!
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If you're planning to sail in the Hebrides, there is no need to put up with the iffy sailing qualities of a bilge keeler, or at least of any bilge keeler you'll find in that price range. It might be worth considering a lifting keel if you are going to trail, otherwise fins are fine.
 
JumbleDuck said:
... there is no need to put up with the iffy sailing qualities of a bilge keeler ...
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I'm a newbie to anything bigger than a dinghy, so is there some place that balances the pros/cons of the various keel formats? I appreciate that some may be compromises to enable cheaper maintenance/storage etc., but would welcome forum opinions on this, thanks.
 
If you sail in an area of deep water with moorings where the boat is afloat all the time then a fin keel is fine. If you are trailing or sailing in areas where moorings dry and there is a general lack of depth then lift keel is a good compromise. Bilge keels come into their own if drying out regularly is part of your type of sailing, but generally less good for both sailing and trailing.
 
alicat said:
I'm a newbie to anything bigger than a dinghy, so is there some place that balances the pros/cons of the various keel formats? I appreciate that some may be compromises to enable cheaper maintenance/storage etc., but would welcome forum opinions on this, thanks.
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Generally boats with fin keels will sail closer to the wind. Same may be true of lift-keel boats. Generally fin and lift keels will sail a little faster in light airs (less junk to drag through the water). However some clever designers managed to obviate these differences with cunning twin keel designs. But not all designers were clever enough.
 
I see you decided to give it a miss, I would make a ludicrous offer and leave it with him in case he gets desperate, but then if he took the offer I would be more suspicious, I recently bought two (standard) hubs, bearings, wheels, tyres and mudguards from Peak Trailers for about £140. You could get a car recovery truck to haul the whole outfit aboard if the trailer's a worry, or even hire a car trailer and put it on that.
 
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