Moving from mobo to pilothouse yacht

[PaulGooch]

We've decided to sell our current motorboat and buy a sail boat. We know pretty much nothing about the saily bits, other than they don't need diesel to make them push the boat along We've had a look around and a good think and decided on what we "think" we want/don't want and concluded that a motor sailor or pilothouse yacht fits our requirements.

So far, we've only really looked online. Looked at Colvic Watsons, Colvic Victors, Fishers, Nauticats, Jeanneau Espaces, Moody Eclipses and a few other odd ones. A close look has weeded several out for one reason or another and we seem to be left with the Colvic Victor 40, Jeanneau Espace and possibly the Moody Eclipse.

We are UK based and like to use the boat all year round, to some extent, currently East Coast based, but a move the the South Coast (Dover/Ramsgate area) wouldn't be ruled out in a year or so. Our requirements are :

Able to helm from inside or out.
Pilothouse/wheelhouse design to avoid the "cave" as much as possible.
A powerful enough engine to sensibly motor.
Possible to be sailed by couple in their 50's.

We like the odd days fishing, so would need to be able to either motor sensibly, or sail in light winds and sit at anchor nicely.

My current thought are that the Colvic Victor 40 looks good value and seems to fit the above, provided the typical 60HP engine is big enough to push the boat at something like hull speed.

The Jeanneau Espace also looks to tick all the boxes and also being typically fitted with 50/60HP engines, should be powerful enough ?

The Moody Eclipse 33 is a touch smaller than i had in mind, but looks a nice boat. I'm a bit put of by the small engines that seem to be fitted to these, circa 30HP.

Any feedback on the above three would be appreciated, as would any suggestions of others to look at. We're looking for something around 35-40 feet, with a budget of £50k-£60k

 

[Seajet]

The Jeanneau & Moody are quite a lot better at sailing; I'm not talking as a pure sailing or performance nut here, but beware buying a boat so stodgy that she needs a big engine most of the time to get anywhere, the worst of both worlds...

 

[PaulGooch]

The Jeanneau & Moody are quite a lot better at sailing; I'm not talking as a pure sailing or performance nut here, but beware buying a boat so stodgy that she needs a big engine most of the time to get anywhere, the worst of both worlds...

Don't want to be getting unduly involved in the finer points of squeezing the last .0001 knot out of the sails, was kind of thinking of doing as little as possible and being happy to be blown along at some sort of respectable speed, type of thing.

 

[aquaplane]

My parents have had an Espace 1000 (35' ish) since 1984 and it seems OK, still trying to decide whether to keep it.

Theirs has a 50 Hp motor. It gets to hull speed in flat water with loads to spare for when it gets lumpy, not that they do lumpy much, but it's nice to know you can. That should hold for most of the motor sailers though.

Dad thinks they spoilt the layout with the 1100 when they added the aft cabin but I've not seen one so couldn't say. He may be biased though.

HTH

With the original main, just to let you know how performance orientated they are, the Espace tacks through 110°, but they don't do tacking. On a reach they sail very well

 

[FullCircle]

Eclipses come in several sizes, including a 38.....

The Jeanneau Espace is a nice compromise and comes in 10 to 13m sizes too.

Southerly 105/115?

 

[davidej]

You say you "want to sail in light winds".

Many of these will only get moving in strongish breezes ie F4/5

 

[LadyInBed]

Our requirements are :

Able to helm from inside or out.

This is something that you may find to be unnecessary because:
A good autopilot with remote control allows steering from inside.
An internal wheel takes up a fair bit of space
It's not easy to sail from inside if you can't see the sails and trim them.

You have looked at Colvics, have you looked at the Colvic Countess 33 or 37?

 

[Seajet]

Paul,

I was commenting with that sort of sailing in mind, not squeezing the last tweak out of the rig !

Sailing a brick is a very disheartening experience, as I say I am not talking as a purist or performance nut...

 

[Tranona]

The Victor is a big heavy boat - although it looks quite streamlined. Normally it would have a bigger engine than a 60. Many (most?) are home completed and a bit of a rarity in the UK - many end up in the Med. Your budget does not allow you into most Nauticats, but an older 33 is in and sails better than you imagine. An Endurance 35/7 is worth consideration, as is a Voyager 35. Eclipse 33 is very popular as it is one of the few wheelhouse cruisers that actually hit the spot and prices are high in relation to what you get. Southerly 105 and 115 would also fit the brief. Others to consider are the wheel shelter boats such as Moody Halberdier, Neptunian, Barbary, Altantic 40.

The problem with this style of boat is that it is difficult to make it work successfully under 40ft, which makes it expensive, and as a consequence few are sold, even though many people like the idea. So, although the number of individual designs is quite large, the choice actually on the market is more limted.

 

[chinita]

This is something that you may find to be unnecessary because:
A good autopilot with remote control allows steering from inside.
An internal wheel takes up a fair bit of space
It's not easy to sail from inside if you can't see the sails and trim them.
7?

I agree. I have had two yachts with inside (wheel) helm positions. I only once tried to 'sail' them from that position. It just does not work.

Boats such as the Vancouver Pilot House give the option of an inside wheel or not. I believe most opt for no wheel.

This is not dismissing an inside 'control' position because it is very nice to sit below, with full visibility, warmth and weather protection and tweak the autopilot as you wish.

 

[PaulGooch]

You say you "want to sail in light winds".

Many of these will only get moving in strongish breezes ie F4/5

Thanks David, my point was, i don't mind sailing in a F5, but might not be best for a days fishing at anchor. On those days, it'd be nice to have an engine big enough to push the boat alone at hull speed.

 

[PaulGooch]

My parents have had an Espace 1000 (35' ish) since 1984 and it seems OK, still trying to decide whether to keep it.

Theirs has a 50 Hp motor. It gets to hull speed in flat water with loads to spare for when it gets lumpy, not that they do lumpy much, but it's nice to know you can. That should hold for most of the motor sailers though.

Dad thinks they spoilt the layout with the 1100 when they added the aft cabin but I've not seen one so couldn't say. He may be biased though.

HTH

With the original main, just to let you know how performance orientated they are, the Espace tacks through 110°, but they don't do tacking. On a reach they sail very well

The Eclipse does look a nice boat, we actually liked the idea of the aft cockpit, will have to look closer at the two layouts. Thank.

 

[PaulGooch]

Eclipses come in several sizes, including a 38.....

The Jeanneau Espace is a nice compromise and comes in 10 to 13m sizes too.

Southerly 105/115?

The Victor is a big heavy boat - although it looks quite streamlined. Normally it would have a bigger engine than a 60. Many (most?) are home completed and a bit of a rarity in the UK - many end up in the Med. Your budget does not allow you into most Nauticats, but an older 33 is in and sails better than you imagine. An Endurance 35/7 is worth consideration, as is a Voyager 35. Eclipse 33 is very popular as it is one of the few wheelhouse cruisers that actually hit the spot and prices are high in relation to what you get. Southerly 105 and 115 would also fit the brief. Others to consider are the wheel shelter boats such as Moody Halberdier, Neptunian, Barbary, Altantic 40.

The problem with this style of boat is that it is difficult to make it work successfully under 40ft, which makes it expensive, and as a consequence few are sold, even though many people like the idea. So, although the number of individual designs is quite large, the choice actually on the market is more limted.

Thanks for the suggestions, will have a look at those ones.

 

[PaulGooch]

This is something that you may find to be unnecessary because:
A good autopilot with remote control allows steering from inside.
An internal wheel takes up a fair bit of space
It's not easy to sail from inside if you can't see the sails and trim them.

You have looked at Colvics, have you looked at the Colvic Countess 33 or 37?

I noticed some of the later pilothouses had the wheel "missing", but they had a nav station and autopilot for steering.

One of main points of having the internal helm/nav station would be for the days when i chose to motor or the weather wasn't nice enough to be outside. We don't want to be sat outside in oilskins and stuff looking like Icelandic fishermen Too 'orrible outside and i'll get in the warm and use the engine.

The other reason for choosing the pilothouse style is to get away from the "cave effect". We don't fancy the style of yacht where everything except the external helm is down below with tiny little portholes.

Just looked at a Countess, http://www.theyachtmarket.com/boatimages.aspx?boatID=92378&inum=9&searchid=&page=

Nice looking boat, but a bit more "down below" than i'm hoping for.

 

[Twister_Ken]

The other reason for choosing the pilothouse style is to get away from the "cave effect". We don't fancy the style of yacht where everything except the external helm is down below with tiny little portholes.

Ah ha. What you need is...

A Moody 45 DS

 

[PaulGooch]

How realistic is it to expect to be able to sail (as in not use the engine) from the internal helm ?

Do the sails typically need to be trimmed constantly ?

(Obviously in need of some sail training)

 

[PaulGooch]

Ah ha. What you need is...

A Moody 45 DS

And another £300k in the pot Ken

 

[grumpy_o_g]

Paul,

I was commenting with that sort of sailing in mind, not squeezing the last tweak out of the rig !

Sailing a brick is a very disheartening experience, as I say I am not talking as a purist or performance nut...

I'd go along with that and qualify it a bit further - it's not how fast your going so much as how much you're enjoying making it go that fast. A Vauxhall Vectra and an MX-5 may have much the same performance but you'll have much more fun in one than the other. It's fine if you're making long passages all the time as you're probably on the A/P or a steering vane but most people spend a lot of time on the helm and the differences between boats is amazing. A slower well-balanced boat with direct steering is miles better than a faster boat with hydraulic steering to me. Tiller is even better.

 

[PaulGooch]

I'd go along with that and qualify it a bit further - it's not how fast your going so much as how much you're enjoying making it go that fast. <snip>

I think that i'd be happier blundering along at x knots without having to run around the decks tweaking sails than running around for an extra .0001 knot.

My thinking is that i don't want to be the Worlds best/fastest sailor, i just want to get where i want to go at a sensible pace, without having to keep adding up how much fuel i'll have to buy (like i do now).

What would some ballpark fuel figures be on some of the aforementioned boats, if they were motored, rather than sail ?

 

[Monique]

How about one of these??

Amel Sharki.