If you were buying a cruiser...

OR4751 said:
And it can not be denied that the fully encapsulated keel (now bolt on) and the skeg hung rudder (now spade) where abandoned purely to keep costs down.
Click to expand...

I think it can be denied. I suspect that costs were a factor - but boats with bolt on high(ish) aspect ratio keels and spade rudders are faster. Faster seems popular, especially to those time poor people who can only use their boat at weekends as it means they can travel further.
 
flaming said:
I think it can be denied. I suspect that costs were a factor - but boats with bolt on high(ish) aspect ratio keels and spade rudders are faster. Faster seems popular, especially to those time poor people who can only use their boat at weekends as it means they can travel further.
Click to expand...

It also makes both keel & rudder more vulnerable. Even more so when you're sailing at a higher speed.
Everything is a compromise, I just don't think it's a good one.
 
OR4751 said:
It also makes both keel & rudder more vulnerable. Even more so when you're sailing at a higher speed.
Everything is a compromise, I just don't think it's a good one.
Click to expand...

But it's not a compromise on cost grounds, which was your accusation.

I bet this keel cost a pretty penny:

VOR_Ericsson_3_keel_repair(2).jpg


...and you couldn't make that as part of a GRP hull.

Pete
 
flaming said:
I suspect that costs were a factor - but boats with bolt on high(ish) aspect ratio keels and spade rudders are faster.
Click to expand...

OR4751 said:
It also makes both keel & rudder more vulnerable. Even more so when you're sailing at a higher speed.
Everything is a compromise, I just don't think it's a good one.
Click to expand...

prv said:
But it's not a compromise on cost grounds, which was your accusation.
Click to expand...

Cost must have been a factor. Even Flaming agrees.


prv said:
I bet this keel cost a pretty penny:

VOR_Ericsson_3_keel_repair(2).jpg


...and you couldn't make that as part of a GRP hull.
Click to expand...

Not exactly the kind of boat your average cruiser would buy.
An Americas Cup boat costs a bloody fortune, but how many people are in the market for one of those.
 
I'd have thought a balanced spade rudder was a design choice over an unbalanced, supported rudder. Not primarily a decision based on cost, but rather on performance and handling. Wouldn't a spade rudder need a stronger shaft and bearings anyway, negating some of the supposed cost benefits?
 
OR4751 said:
Not exactly the kind of boat your average cruiser would buy.
An Americas Cup boat costs a bloody fortune, but how many people are in the market for one of those.
Click to expand...

Our modern Bene would look very similar to that from that angle.
 
OR4751 said:
Not exactly the kind of boat your average cruiser would buy.
Click to expand...

So what? You said that separate metal keels exist only as a cost-saving measure. The fact that they are used on boats where money is no object neatly demonstrates that that is not true.

Pete
 
Here's a boat that cruisers do buy - ours:

d121f989-073a-4fb9-81a4-bfea6d1a59a8_zpsac5efe0a.jpg


That keel helps her sail quite fast for her size - it's good for Channel cruising in limited holiday time. And if you want a keel that shape then bolting it on is the only feasible way to do it. Moulding it as part of the hull is not an option.

Sure, if I was going to weather ocean storms or bounce off tropical reefs, I would prefer a different kind of boat with a different kind of keel - you're quite right when you say that everything's a compromise. But it's a compromise driven by the type and usage of the boat, not by build cost.

Pete
 
prv said:
Sure, if I was going to weather ocean storms or bounce off tropical reefs, I would prefer a different kind of boat with a different kind of keel - you're quite right when you say that everything's a compromise. But it's a compromise driven by the type and usage of the boat, not by build cost.

Pete
Click to expand...

I can see your point.

Please let me explain where I'm coming from:
Years ago I got chatting (think yacht club - bar - several pints drunk) to a yacht designer (who at the time worked for the largest builder of unsinkable yachts). He explained to me that up until the mid-late 80's most boats were built to go out in any weather.
Then, builders realised that the large majority of their buyers did not go out in anything above a Force 5 - it was not longer essential brick shithouses able to take all kinds of punishment. Hence, designs changed and cost savings were made.
 
OR4751 said:
I can see your point.

Please let me explain where I'm coming from: Years ago I got chatting (think yacht club - bar - several pints drunk) to a yacht designer (who at the time worked for the largest builder of unsinkable yachts). He explained to me that up until the mid-late 80's most boats were built to go out in any weather.
Then, builders realised that the large majority of their buyers did not go out in anything above a Force 5 - it was not longer essential brick shithouses able to take all kinds of punishment. Hence, designs changed and cost savings were made.
Click to expand...

There have been boats built since the year dot that have had corners cut on the grounds of cost. It's why we have cast iron keels (encapsulated or bolted), stainless steel keel boats, brass gate valves, U-bolts for chainplates, saildrive units, interior mouldings for furniture, aluminium extruded masts, etc, etc,

"Good enough" is what a successful builder manages to convince the buyers he is providing at the price they want to pay. There are absolutely no secrets in building 'the perfect' boat, but there are precious few people out there prepared to pay for it. When people say their boat is good, they mean that they are happy with the compromises (known and unknown) that they have made.

If all the compromises in your boat meet your requirements, then be happy, and allow other people to assemble their compromises into a package (boat) that suits them. But to suggest there has been a wholesale downgrading in quality driven solely by cost is simplistic. There was no 'golden age' of yacht building - every era has built boats for a range of opinions of what constituted 'good enough'.
 
It depends on your reasons for buying the boat . I bought mine new in 2003 specifically for long distance fast cruising . I anticipated the new designs coming but knew what I wanted . Now living and sailing my dream I know my decision was the correct one . I could change boat but I see no reason . That said things move on and there are some pretty good new designs around although I do think items such as sliding glass shower doors slightly out of place on a seagoing ship
 
flaming said:
Faster seems popular, especially to those time poor people who can only use their boat at weekends as it means they can travel further.
Click to expand...

How much faster and faster enough to give a useable increase in range for a weekends cruising?

I offer no proof but suspect the only way to get a useable increase in speed short of an all out race boat for covering decent distance is to get a much longer boat...
 
I wonder if builders stopped using lumps of timber, which were inevitably going to rot and compromise integrity, in rudder construction to save costs too.
 
wully1 said:
How much faster and faster enough to give a useable increase in range for a weekends cruising?

I offer no proof but suspect the only way to get a useable increase in speed short of an all out race boat for covering decent distance is to get a much longer boat...
Click to expand...

I think "sailability" is just as important as speed
There are local sub 30 fters near me that will surf along at 15 Kts in the right conditions
What is more important to me is a boat that will go to windward in a blow, Fall easily into the " groove", Easy to handle
Perform well in very light airs, manouver predictably in tight spaces, run down wind without the " Holman roll" that my last 2 boats had
Give a comfortable ride

Oddly enough that actually makes for faster passages overall than some of those 15Kters
 
Sybarite said:
Maybe the canting wheel is the solution as used on a Sirius 35 (See p.6) http://www.sirius-werft.de/phpwcms/picture/Pressemitteilungen/YM web und mailversion final.pdf
Click to expand...

I like it but couldn't find a price mentioned anywhere in the write up - did I miss it? Looked elsewhere and not cheap at £287k for 35'. I think its one where people will bitch about the Bav/Ben/Jen offerings but when it come to parting with their money will buy the Bav/Ben/Jen equivalent at circa £110k!
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top