I don't know what I don't know....help

[steveghoward]

Firstly this:

My name is Steve and I own a sailing yacht.

Good, that's out of the way.

I have been spending summers out in the Ionian and have a dilemma. I like to arrive at my destination by lunchtime to ensure I can get alongside the harbour in comfort. The best wind for sailing blows up in the afternoon therefore I don't do much sailing. Perhaps I need a motorboat.

There appears to be some problems for me.

1. How long is a 36 foot boat? The reason I ask is there is serious consideration for a cruising tax here in Greece ( not DEPKA) which is reasonable for boats up to 12 metres but goes bonkers above that. The reason I ask is that I have been looking at the Fairline/Princess 36 turbo/sedan variants and lengths for these boats go from 11.5 to 12.5 metres depending which brokers details you look at. Can someone tell me what it says on any of the SSR docs for any of the above marques. Especially for the Fairline 36 sedan, my front runner at the mo.

2.All advice says go for the most powerful engine. However, having cruised at 5 knots here in Greece at just under 2 litres an hour, figures quoted for motorboar cruising scare the budget out of me! But, if I have big turbo engines but tootle along at 5knots, surely that will knacker the engines? I need a big boat with a small engine. Do they exist?

3. Would an inland/river boat be suitable for the inland sea of the Ionian? How does one cope with breakdowns with only one engine and no backup (2nd engine/sails etc?)

Sigh, so many questions....can anybody help?

 

[petem]

Can someone tell me what it says on any of the SSR docs for any of the above marques.

Whatever you put on SSR application form .

 

[rafiki_]

Firstly this:

My name is Steve and I own a sailing yacht.

Good, that's out of the way.

I have been spending summers out in the Ionian and have a dilemma. I like to arrive at my destination by lunchtime to ensure I can get alongside the harbour in comfort. The best wind for sailing blows up in the afternoon therefore I don't do much sailing. Perhaps I need a motorboat.

There appears to be some problems for me.

1. How long is a 36 foot boat? The reason I ask is there is serious consideration for a cruising tax here in Greece ( not DEPKA) which is reasonable for boats up to 12 metres but goes bonkers above that. The reason I ask is that I have been looking at the Fairline/Princess 36 turbo/sedan variants and lengths for these boats go from 11.5 to 12.5 metres depending which brokers details you look at. Can someone tell me what it says on any of the SSR docs for any of the above marques. Especially for the Fairline 36 sedan, my front runner at the mo.

2.All advice says go for the most powerful engine. However, having cruised at 5 knots here in Greece at just under 2 litres an hour, figures quoted for motorboar cruising scare the budget out of me! But, if I have big turbo engines but tootle along at 5knots, surely that will knacker the engines? I need a big boat with a small engine. Do they exist?

3. Would an inland/river boat be suitable for the inland sea of the Ionian? How does one cope with breakdowns with only one engine and no backup (2nd engine/sails etc?)

Sigh, so many questions....can anybody help?

I've just come back from a week sailing in the Ionians. Wonderful experience. We are UK based motor boaters, with a 40 ft flybridge based on the Hamble. Last week we used 65 litres, mix of sailing and motoring. In our motor boat, 65 litres wouldn't get us to Cowes and back. However a 40 ft motor boat with a tiny engine I don't think would work. As you say, the wind and swell really come up in the afternoon, enough for us to drop the sails. An underpowered boat would struggle.

 

[TheOrs]

Firstly this:

My name is Steve and I own a sailing yacht.

Good, that's out of the way.

2.All advice says go for the most powerful engine. However, having cruised at 5 knots here in Greece at just under 2 litres an hour, figures quoted for motorboar cruising scare the budget out of me! But, if I have big turbo engines but tootle along at 5knots, surely that will knacker the engines? I need a big boat with a small engine. Do they exist?

If you only want to go at 5 knots, can't you just keep the yacht and motor it? I'm confused. The Princess boats are planing boats, so they need big engines to haul themselves up on top of the water. Bigger engines can drive bigger prop's and so can actually work out to be more economical at slow speeds than smaller engines. It all depends on the particular situation.

 

[sharpness]

Fairline 36 Sedan is a great boat. Just sold mine after 5 years of ownership, with main weekend usage on river and holidays out at sea.
The boat is 40ft l.o.a including the bathing platform. But unless someone is physically measuring the boat, then tell them its 36ft long as the big stickers on the side of the boat show.
The engines in mine were the 306hp Volvos, and i found them to be just as happy pootling along at approx 6 / 7 knots (1000 rpm), or cruising at 21 knots when at sea (2300 rpm). The engines max revs were 2800 rpm. Fuel usage on the river was tiny, probably 2gph. At sea at 21 knots was approx 20gph.
The interior space on the boat was massive along with a huge cockpit space thanks to its 13ft 4in beam. A very stable, sea friendly boat. Find a nice, well maintained one, and you get a lot of boat for your money in my opinion.

 

[Tranona]

A planing boat is really not suitable for what you want, particularly the sort with an aft cabin and a high aft deck. You have to accept that if you are going to use it properly you will burn a lot of fuel, even running at 7-8 knots simply because you are hauling a lot of weight in an inefficient hull.

However a semi displacement boat with lower powered engines such as a Trader type or older style such a Nelsons have been used successfully as have Corvettes which are good for accommodation and have walkround decks. The problem is you are unlikely to find much of a choice of such boats, or even under 12m planing boats out there compared with, say the UK or the western Med as they simply are not popular except in the Athens area. This might tell you something! Buying here or in the western Med is possible, but the logistics and cost of locating it in Greece could ad £15-20k to your cost and give you a bit of a headache selling at a later date.

As to length, most boats of nominally 36' will almost certainly be registered under 12m, but as the SSR is self declaring you won't know what is on it until you see it, although you can always put in a figure that suits when you register provided it is reasonable - but just make sure that it is the same as any other "official" documents such as Bill of Sale or Builders Certificate. Part 1 is different as the length is recorded by the surveyor according to a prescribed formula.

 

[vas]

not sure what tax you're talking about but nevermind.

Are you going to register the boat in Greece? if so, forget what you declare, they are going to come and measure it!
No idea on SSRs, cannot help.

Aft decks as Tranona says above are definitely not suitable, I'd also suggest you stick with your sailing boat and only sail if and when you DONT want to stay in a marina. I'm typically 2 days on the hook, one in a marina, but I hope i'll do marinas 1 in 5 once the crew accepts it.

V.

 

[Sailorsam101]

The difference is sizes you are getting is due to the age of boats you are looking at. Around 1990 ish it was needed to show that you had a big boat so they used waterline length...LWL.

But these days it's length overall...LOA.

I have a Targa 33 which is actually 36.5 ft LOA but 33ft LWL.

 

[Murv]

If it helps, my Turbo 36 is 11.15m on the SSR, and nearly 13m LOA
Funnilly enough, we were only talking about this last night... whenever the list goes up on the club board for a cruise, the different measurements people enter for all the turbo 36's varies between 10 and 13m; for the same boat!
But, when measured with a tape, by a slightly agitated marina manager with me watching, it was 42.5' from end to end (with davits)

Fuel economy, as above, negligible when pootling, 54l/hour when on a slow planing run.

I'm not keen on running the engines at very low revs all the time, it's a necessity where we're moored (speed limit) but we do get chance to open them up fairly regularly when heading down river and out into the estuary.

 

[oldgit]

2.All advice says go for the most powerful engine. However, having cruised at 5 knots here in Greece at just under 2 litres an hour, figures quoted for motorboar cruising scare the budget out of me! But, if I have big turbo engines but tootle along at 5knots, surely that will knacker the engines?

Another olde wyves tale .... ??

The Thames has more boats,over 8000, than just about any navigation you can shake a stick at (probably) and that includes the Solent.
A good proportion of larger boats are ridiculously over powered for the sort of use they get, the engines in the Sedan 36 and the Turbo 36 would not be regarded as big enough to run a genny on todays pocket rockets.
Is there somebody making a fortune replacing knackered engines from boats with glazed bores on the Thames ?
Many of these boats will have been chugging up and down the Thames for most of their entire life and miraculously they still seem to be able to pick up their skirts and fly when the throttles are opened below the Barrier and do not appear to self destruct any time soon afterwards.
The worst that years and years of chugging around a 8 kilometres an hour on a glorified pond is usually deadly silence when the filters clog up !

 

[superheat6k]

If it helps, my Turbo 36 is 11.15m on the SSR, and nearly 13m LOA
Funnilly enough, we were only talking about this last night... whenever the list goes up on the club board for a cruise, the different measurements people enter for all the turbo 36's varies between 10 and 13m; for the same boat!
But, when measured with a tape, by a slightly agitated marina manager with me watching, it was 42.5' from end to end (with davits)

Fuel economy, as above, negligible when pootling, 54l/hour when on a slow planing run.

I'm not keen on running the engines at very low revs all the time, it's a necessity where we're moored (speed limit) but we do get chance to open them up fairly regularly when heading down river and out into the estuary.

The Turbo 36 measurement was based upon the hull length, ignoring the swim platform and any bow projection. My Turbo was listed in the Fairline manual I got with the boat at 39' 11", so 40' rounded, which I think was the back edge of the swim platform to the front edge of the pulpit rail. With the small RIB mine had hanging in some hefty davits Foulkes yard manager reckoned he measured me at 45' including all overhangs, and agreed to bill me based on 40'.

I consistently got away with it being 36' wherever I visited, although a pal once booked me in at Lymington as 34' and the berth provided was something of a squeeze to get into.

The tendency now is to boast maximum possible length, well I guess its a man thing, after all many of these toys of ours are penis extensions after all.