Is 40 foot an Ideal size Sailing Boat

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40 foot & 10t displacement is probably the upper end that is manageable by a couple without mechanical assistance (powered winches etc). Note the comment on displacement, its not just size, but the weight too.

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Age must be a factor there too /forums/images/graemlins/blush.gif

I sail Guapa (44ft -13T) on a regular basis with just my eldest (16) as crew. Don't have any powered winches, etc...
 
I do not know what is best, and I do not think there is a best, but my rule would be the biggest boat my wife and I can handle. Bigger is more comfortable, much safer and nicer in many ways, the only problem is cost and the right equipment to be able to handle it.

So in conclusion, for me, it ends up being the biggest boat I can afford!
 
Not all of us are vertically unchallenged (tall folk), and I wondered why you felt the need to be derogatory (or Dogatory?) to Dogwatch, hence why I enquired......

He didnt say anything about being able to stand up in his 26' cat......... he was just stressing the amount of room / space they have, including three double berths, a full galley and a decent sized heads.

According to this Boatshed advert http://www.boatshed.com/viewboat.php?boat=16777
for an HT, they have 5' 7" headroom - this would be in the hulls I presume (?), with a fair bit less on the bridgedeck. OK, not enough for tall people, but plenty enough for folk who are 5' 6.5" and under......
And I do like that cockpit tent on this HT for sale! The 'upstairs' living room - and it looks like it has 'full' headroom....

I think Dogwatch makes some very valid points re how he effectively has the accomodation of a 40' monohull in a 26' catamaran. OK the HT will not go to windward at the same speed as said monohull, but no boat is 'perfect'........

I refuse to take sides in mono vs multi debates, and arguments between raggies and stinkpots - I have toes in all camps, and support all enthusiastically. All have their merits and their flaws, advantages and disadvantages, and it is nice to have forums like the YBW where banter can be exchanged freely re contentious topics like these. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
It is a good point and well taken. The only place without standing headroom is the bridge deck where you sit around the table. The galley has full headroom as do the berths (not above the bunks) and the heads. Few monos (40ft) have full standing headroom in the berths.

To be honest at 5' 11" I could not stand by the table, but it never really bothered me. It was tall enough not to be a struggle and since you are either sitting or leaning over the table (navigation or filling in the log on passage) not having standing headroom here is not the be all and end all.

My galley is bigger than most monohulls, even upto the 50ft range. It is bigger than 2 of the kitchens in bed sits and a static caravan kitchen I rented as a teenager. Ok, you have steps down, but a lot easier to navigate than your average mono with a flight of steps down from the cockpit. Feeding the crew on passage is much safer, hot drinks must go flying regularly.

We will have an evening meal on passage sat at the table, proper food. We can see out from the table and dishes never go flying. I have never had a proper meal on a mono when on passage, it is always make do snacks propping yourself against something solid while eating. I will not go back to this, not ever, so uncouth.

I can sit back in the saloon and watch the world go by, nearly all around visibility.

The design is not to everyone's taste, the hulls are not 6ft up from the water with aerodeck type saloon that is just a bulge. Mine gives support when walking about the boat rather than a trip hazard. But it is a compromise, not quite tall enough for some inside, for those who need to stand by the table.

You are most welcome to come aboard and sit with us for a cuppa if you ever see us sailing your way, as is everyone. You might be surprised. My comments were not meant to be a dig at monohulls but a reinforcement of the originators points concerning large boats being expensive and too big for the usual 2 up sailing which is how they are used 95% of the time. How much was your rigging? ropework? mooring fees? How many real double beds does a 40ft mono have? Can you really cook a full roast dinner for 4 or 6 or bake without taking over the saloon table, we can!

As an addendum, unfortunately I now do have full standing headroom but that is another story..
 
We, that is just SWMBO and I, sail a 41 foot cruiser/racer which we moved to 5 years ago after 14 years of a 33 foot Westerly Ketch. Our boat is a Jeanneau Sun Legende 41, designed by Doug Peterson and the original became a French One Ton Cupper and member of the French Admiral's Cup team, so it has a good pedigree. She is easily handled, very well behaved under sail or power and we have felt no need for a bow thruster although we have room forward to fit one if we did. We can reverse out of tight berths even if needs be turning to starboard against the prop kick, lots of much smaller boats would envy that ability!

The advantage of size is speed because nothing beats waterline length for allowing good passage speeds. We plan on averaging 6.5kts and very rarely motor, that speed happens to be the speed we cruise at under engine with no wind, under sail 7kts is as easy as 6kts was on our old boat and 8-9kts is common. Last month we did a 61ml X-Channel run in 8 hours under sail and the first hour of that was at under 6kts.

Heavy weather is MUCH less horrible on a bigger boat. We normally sail with the sprayhood folded down and stay dry going upwind up to F5 in the cockpit, above that then the hood goes up. We go upwind BTW at +/- 7kts and 28degs apparent wind angle so we are not dry from going slow!

We manage to still do all the maintenance jobs ourselves, just the two of us and we are out of the water for a maximum of 4 weeks each winter, it takes no longer than it did on our earlier 33 footer.

I don't see any real downsides. OK so the size of things like rigging, sails, running rigging etc adds to the costs but our bills haven't been horrendous and although berthing costs and insurance went up by about £700pa over the old boat.

We can usually find visitor berths easily enough at this size, indeed a couple of places even keep a few back for boats above 40ft. However I think if we were much bigger that would be a limitation, finger berths are just about useable still for us, much bigger and it really has to be alongside ones both because of the length and the beam unless you find a pair of fingers together empty.

We have a deep keel, 2.08m or 6'10" in old money. We have never found this a problem but we need to be aware that in some places some berths may be unsuitable. In St Peter Port the marina limit is 2m, we CAN go in but only on a hammerhead and anyway access times are shorter for crossing the sill, but no matter we stay on the outer mooring pontoons and can come and go anytime. We anchor a lot and have never found our draught a problem, indeed we anchor pretty well in the same spots as we did with 5'5" on our old boat.

So yes go for it. We did and after 5 years I still have wall to wall yeeeeeehah grins!
 
Okais, but you have to realise we are still work in progress, things like the galley cupboard doors are in my shed, the heads which I stripped back to bare hull, no floor etc. is nearly finished, just requires finishing touches and wooden trim here and there... If you saw how it was a few years ago she is now in marvelous condition, ok, here are the most descriptive type images I could find..

First the twins layout
00-layout.gif


The saloon from the door
01-Saloon.jpg


Walk-through to the galley
02-Galley-Entrance.jpg


Walk-through to navigation area with heads door on left
03-Navigation-station.jpg


Headroom in the galley
04-Galley-ceiling.jpg


another looking over the bench into the galley
04-Galley-Sink.jpg


galley sink and worktop
05-Galley-worktop.jpg


galley width and forward storage locker
06-Galley-width.jpg


heads
07-heads.jpg


heads sink
08-Heads-sink.jpg


centre cockpit, 2 x double cabins aft
09-Cockpit.jpg



Hope that gives a decent impression.
 
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My galley is bigger than most monohulls, even upto the 50ft range

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Looks pretty tight to me. This is our galley (37ft boat) which is by no means large

Galley1.JPG


Galley2.jpg
 
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Galley1.JPG



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You are not seeing the start of my galley, not that I am trying to get into a competition here, but our fridge is a similar if not the same size as yours, but is flat against the hull to the left (boat aft) of the oven.

I can only judge on what I have seen at boat shows, obviously many boats will have different design, your galley does look large for a 36ft boat, far larger than the benny L galleys for example.

I did not show the fridge end as it is not finished, actually, not started other than the box and fridge in place. Where we lose on high cupboards that mono's have above the work top, the front locker you see goes about 6ft into the bow. I bought one of those under-bed roller containers so we can actually use the space.

Our space is also helped by not needing fiddles on all the surfaces as we don't heel, that extra inch all around really does make a difference, IMHO.

Also, don't forget, this is only a 26ft boat, that's 2..6..
 
Dogwatch, I am seriously impressed. We only bought the current boat a year ago but a (pair of?) heavenly twins is definitely something we'll look into when we trade up - it ticks a lot of boxes.

My only concern with a cat is getting caught out in rough weather, particularly if trying to go upwind. Are my fears groundless?
 
Have a look also at Richard Woods' account on his website http://sailingcatamarans.com re how he and Eclipse were caught in a storm off Nicaragua. Go to 'Latest News', and scroll down a bit.

Richard and his crew issued a mayday and were taken off by a helicopter from a US Navy vessel not too far away. They had doubts as to if Eclipse would survive the storm - but survive she did, and she was found by a commercial fishing boat a few months later more than a 1000 miles further out in the Pacific, still right ways up, with a colony of squatters (sea birds) on board....

It is quite possible than Julian's HT catamaran would have coped equally admirably in these conditions.
 
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