Montecarlo 55

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meracus

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hello guys
seen an interesting AB 55 Montecarlo on MAN D2840 LXE with Hamilton drives , anybody knows what's this combo power plant is like ?
reliability , fuel consumption , ease of use
the boat looks solidly built with a nice open wide beam ( what we like ) , been thinking of flogging our trusted fiart 40 genius for a larger open
any opinion ?
regards
andre
 
At 10 ft away or on paper it’s a big step for you and ( googled a few ) very reasonable € buy in . There might be a reason for that ?
Running costs could be ruinous.
The MAN V10s of that year iirc are 18 L lumps with the after cooler siting vin the V . Basic injectors so prone to sooting up if you plan on a lot of slow speed running.
1000 hr injector service and a lot of cooling stuff to remove and keep on top of . They are not DIY boats. Depending on the history you could easily drop€ 20K into them in the blink of an eye . So meticulously comb through the history. No history or deferred =walk away .

Lets assume they are well maintained.
10 /12 knots max hull speed they will burn 40/50 L each . Planing about 150 each so 300 per hr . More if you go over 30 knots maybe as much as 400/450 full chat for the pair .

The other systems will be bigger compared to the Fiat 40 , stiff like pumps etc 1000 s not 100 s .
Lift + annual haul € figure 7K .
The Hamilton s are €6K a service but I think is every 5/7 yrs or something not annually ?

They need a diver to clean then btw to dismantle the guard to get at them , although in the dark they eventually crud up like any other metal in the water .
In a word maintenance hungry .

You get less drag at speed so a bit more efficient than std props P brackets + shafts.
If you are not planning of zooming around at 30 + knots ( gobbling 400L/ hr ) then you are lugging simply a maintenance sword of Damocles around waiting to empty your bank account .
That’s why they appear good value on the used mkt. Same across the whole AB range :
 
Not sure you will get much more space from the 10foot it still is an express cruiser.

For example the primatist 41 is 4.08 meter width and that means 8 people sitting at the table and cabin access is still free.

We had a look at similar 55ish express cruiser but at the end you get 20 cm more width if any, garage for mini-tender and the 3d cramped as hell cabin.

The primatist burns 50l hour per engine but at 30kn. So for the small benefits doubling the maintenance and tripling the consumption... Not worth it.
 
prinex said:
Not sure you will get much more space from the 10foot it still is an express cruiser.

For ezanlpe
How wide it is compared to the fiart 40?
Click to expand...
It’s the beam .Even a small inc suddenly changes a lot .
For us going from 3.55 M compact stern drive S / Sker at 8/9 tonnes to a 4.2 M , so 70 cm wider was huge in terms of interior space , cabin space , bathrooms and gen moving about in the cockpit .

The AB 55 I understand from Mr Google is 4.7 M beam .Par for a performance 55 nothing exceptional really .

The L just adds more cabins or bigger tender garage etc .It the beam that makes them more usable to live on .

Obviously L add berthing + haul out and arguably a little generally seakeeping.Those AB s perform well generally but to manage jet drives they normally can’t go that deep at the deadrise , like to flatten them off for lift .It’s all a compromise.
 
Thanks guys as always very informative
Yes that makes for eye watering read
Fantasy boating question , what would you go for after a 40 genius ? We would like a sun pad at the back and a small zona pranzo / sitting area
The fiart needs conversion so it’s either or
We have d6 350 and haven’t had much trouble with them … as stated we would like a wider boat or at least same with with the added salon
 
yes , we looked at one 425 , didn't really like it as felt cramped , lusted after a uk based Baia flash 48 , but gone sadly
maybe a 50 genius
 
Itama 46 , Baia B 50 , Some early Pershings , Sunseeker Porto 46 or Camargue 50 open .

You won’t find an Itama 42/48 my boat easily .They are a bit 25 cm narrower than the 46 and run with relatively economic 6 cylinder MAN s compared to V8 s or V10 s .

Cockpits and sun pads are huge .

Maybe an older Riva open , but they have smaller cockpits .
 
To be fair that is a great boat. AB, Arnaboldi (first his father and now his son) is a genius for jet propulsion hull combos, that 80% of pleasure hulls (but not only) are done by him nowadays in one way or another.

I think in the rough stuff, they will eat most of the boats Porto mentions.

I remember having the promotional video of the AB55 back in the nineties and in some long waves high waves of about 2 to 3 meters, typical of the Ligurian sea and are also a bit Atlantic like.
A feature of the video was the dead stop from speed.

You can see the stop feature in this video of the 58, which was the evolution of the 55 with hard-top.

They where also very expensive boats new even more to a Riva. The AB 58 would cost close to two million in 2008 as I did a consultancy for a client, who ended up buying a Pershing 62.
 
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Did not we had a thread about boats unable to turn at speed? Looking at this video... The slide-then-stop... Amazing
 
prinex said:
Did not we had a thread about boats unable to turn at speed? Looking at this video... The slide-then-stop... Amazing
Click to expand...
Great boats no doubt , manoeuvres like a jet ski but that comes at a 25 yr old maintenance cost for the jets and MAN s of that era .
Modern ( from 2010’ Ferraris + Lamborghini have a little button on the centre console called “ launch control “
5/6 goes with that pressed and it’s a £5/6K bill for frying the clutch and scoring the flywheel.
So dropping the reversing buckets at 35 knots + on a 25 yr old partly soggy transom , partly semi corroded jet drive - transom bolts , worn drive shaft couplings etc etc is about as sensible as using “ launch control “ in those new cars .

I wouldn’t buy a AB and use that , like the cars little button .

Id go for a test drive in both and watch the principal bill payer do his party trick .

Its the same with Arno Leopards jet drive boats a lot of bang for your buck boat wise but huge on going running costs that can and do accumulate.

If you have €200 K then sure spend 1/2 say a hundred on the AB 55 and drop the rest in within 5/7<yrs as you go along .
 
It’s the very one I seen , shame , looked decent from afar
I see that your type of Itama is getting thin on the ground ( water )
Here in sa rapita , there’s a Dutch guy who restored a 38 earlish Itama named Gina
Epic looks , a bit strange as no dinette but super nice look with an angular glass windshield
 
The broker of this boat immediatly gave me another 10k to 70k euro … just for asking the location … great people ?
 
5EBCB7B0-CD41-44AC-9D0C-A88C971048B2.jpeg
meracus said:
It’s the very one I seen , shame , looked decent from afar
I see that your type of Itama is getting thin on the ground ( water )
Here in sa rapita , there’s a Dutch guy who restored a 38 earlish Itama named Gina
Epic looks , a bit strange as no dinette but super nice look with an angular glass windshield
Click to expand...
Yes a lot of guys refurb them the older ones .
There’s a Tornado 38 on outdrives that mimics the Itama 38 which is shafts + mid mounted engines etc .Tornado has the angular windshield.

It’s a bit of a moot point the Tornado founder and Amarti ( Itama founder ) who was first , who copied who ? They both were inspired by Don Aronow, Ray hunt , Soni Levy designs…..brought them , introduced them to the Med .
PYB will be along to join up the dots .
How about a Itama 40 early 2005/7 with MAN 450s ….€200 K just ?Or a 38 restored ?

Tornado pic ^^^ Outdrives + about 1/2 the weight of the Itama 38 .

Google Tornado boats they do bigger …..They have the hull the deep V the whole monty speed Ray hunt thingy
 
Looked at a flush deck 38 … similar to a sarima 38
Great but we like our long bows too
Shame I can’t post a picture or a video for that matter
I’m sure you understand as a fellow lover of Italian design ! ( or American who knows )
 
Portofino said:
View attachment 141757
Yes a lot of guys refurb them the older ones .
There’s a Tornado 38 on outdrives that mimics the Itama 38 which is shafts + mid mounted engines etc .Tornado has the angular windshield.

It’s a bit of a moot point the Tornado founder and Amarti ( Itama founder ) who was first , who copied who ? They both were inspired by Don Aronow, Ray hunt , Soni Levy designs…..brought them , introduced them to the Med .
PYB will be along to join up the dots .
How about a Itama 40 early 2005/7 with MAN 450s ….€200 K just ?Or a 38 restored ?

Tornado pic ^^^ Outdrives + about 1/2 the weight of the Itama 38 .

Google Tornado boats they do bigger …..They have the hull the deep V the whole monty speed Ray hunt thingy
Click to expand...

Tornado 38 came after and is a copy/paste of the sixties/seventies Magnum 38. A successful model 400 where built thus far. They just launched one a week ago with shafts.
They did a few like this but very few.
The Itama 38 first wood prototypes came in 1979, and while the Magnum 38/40 was a big inspiration it was not a copy paste.

Finding an Itama Forty with 200k in this market.... That was a price of 2015.
Last one I know of sold 260k, and needed 40k of works.
 
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