Modern Dufours - Build quality.

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drude

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I',m thinking of moving up to a slightly bigger yacht and like the look of the modern Dufours. Anyone have any stories about build quality good or bad. Can I assume they are at least as good as an equivalent Beneteau ?

AC
 
I brought a new Dufour 385 in 2008 and we had it till 2015 when we sold it .
As a boat we was very happy with it Sailed well in all weather and pretty comfortable to live full time on .
The disappointed part was the dealer and Dufour when it came to back up there warranty,
Like most new boat teething problem , and every step of the way it was a battle to get things done , legal act had to threaten before they agree to do the work .
 
A friend had a Classic 385. He missed the Mid Winner buoy coming out of Chichester Harbour and ran it aground , so it shouldn't have been a huge impact but when he went to sell a few years later, the survey revealed £12K's worth of damage. On the plus side, nothing leaked, and nothing fell off.

Lots of open space below and not a lot to hold on to, but lots of modern boats are like that. It went well under sail, but the forefoot slammed in any sort of sea.
 
drude said:
I',m thinking of moving up to a slightly bigger yacht and like the look of the modern Dufours. Anyone have any stories about build quality good or bad. Can I assume they are at least as good as an equivalent Beneteau ?

AC
Click to expand...
When you say modern....do you mean "since 2000 or so" or "new"?

There's a big difference. We have a 44 Performance from the mid-2000s, which (along with the 40 and 34) have an avid following; they had a reasonable market niche in being much faster cruisers than the Oceanis or Sun Odyssey, but more comfortable than a 40.7 of similar era, and much cheaper than (sailing wise) comparable X yachts and Arcona.

I don't know much about the more recent ones.
 
Anything I’ve looked at built after the early two thousands wouldn’t be considered and even then they’d be at the quality end of the market which I can’t afford.

I was appalled at the state of new boats the last time I went to Boot 5 years ago. Cheap, nasty, shoddy was my opinion of the vast majority of what was on show - apart from Faurby which were beautifully built.
I very much doubt the ones I looked at aged well - with the surprising (to me ) exception of the Bavaria boats which were a step up in appearance and finish over the usual crop.
 
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Thanks for all of the responses. No horror stories but interesting comment on the current quality which I think applies to most boatyards now . Shiny is good but scratch away at the thin veneer and you'll miss the solid build quality of the past. I think this is a tradeoff as the other half likes the shiny look and light and airy interiors which equates to more family sailing time.

Comment on the warranty issues is duly noted!

Thanks all
 
The few late ones i've stepped across when rafted have very creaky decks. O.K its a small sample size, perhaps 3, but I haven't noticed the same for 201x BenJenBavs .
 
It might not be a worry sailing wise but the offset forepeak bunk always put me off the 375 version from around 2014 ish but they have huge fridge boxes and a chart table even if saloon table area is cramped. Also depends on liking for linear galley. Think the dealer was Marco marine but long since vanished I believe. At this age at lot depends on care and usage but I guess you can get a new headsail etc and the diesels standard size and plenty of hp I recall. Really depends on model in mind though and year . I like self tacking jibs so rather limited on that front though.
 
Can you be a bit more specific about which boats you are considering? Anything regarding build quality on the big marques can vary heavily for different models (which might have totally different construction) and even changes in management.

I can share more on my knowledge of the 2000s Dufour, but know almost nothing post 2010.
 
I was thinking of the current builds so from maybe 2014 onwards. What my wife calls the beginning of the non-orange interior era. (She's not fond of dark wood and the usual lined flooring) !
 
I visited the factory on 2014. Looked fairly standard lowish volume production line approach. Difficult to tell huge amounts about quality though.
At that time there was significant design differences between the "Grand Large", more charter oriented, and other more performance / experienced owner oriented. The GL models tended to have much less ballast and less sail area.
The Dufour 40 did have appeal - the GL's not to me.
 
I bought a new Dufour 41 in 2023 for delivery in May 2924. All I can say is that it's been a nightmare up to that day. The sequence of quality problems I have encountered is purely insane. Not sure people would believe me if i listed the number of issues I've had and continue to have. I've dealt with around 50 quality interventions by the dealer. And it's not finished, currently water is flowing through the mast (they couldn't fix it after 4 interventions).
The boat is beautifully designed, has a lot of qualities. The execution is beyond professional. It's amateur end to end. I've asked for her to be returned to Dufour and be reimbursed several times without success. The dealer - who's tried to do his best I must say - apologizes and pretend that I got bad luck... that others have a lot of problems as well, but that I got the crown. Dufour itself as a company is an absolute unprofessional crew, I wonder how they can be in business. 2/3 of their employees are part timers. I went there to visit the factory during construction, you can see that money is being saved everywhere. It's not about making good boats, but about fancy marketing and architects, while executing the mother company's Fountaine Pageot business plan and cut cut cut. I can't think of any ethical or responsible leader in this new organization, seing how terrible the customer experience is, and they continue to ship more terrible boats. Customer satisfaction must be abysmal.
What can I say? This is my fourth boat. I've had other production boats: Jeanneau (good), Hunter (OK), Catalina (awesome). I've never seen anything quite like this. It's been misery, I can't even enjoy anything at sea any longer, only think about when I'm going to sell her. And this was meant to be my retirement joy :-(
I profoundly regret to have bought her, will never buy a Dufour again for sure, and if you do buy one, let me wish you a lot more luck, because you'll need it.
 
You've added to a thread from 2022. However, we bought a new Dufour 365 in about 2007. Can't remember exact year. Everything in the boat fell apart. It sailed well. But the quality of the materials and build quality was appalling. The previous model was the Classic range. A much better boat in my opinion.
Portway, the dealer, went bust. (Deservedly) I'm just not sure if today's offerings from the main brands are much different. Last time I looked they seemed pretty generic. Much like today's cars. I just can't get excited about any of them.
 
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