Rival 34 review, nicely diplomatic

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Greenheart

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Extract from a Rival 34 review in YBW.com:

Wild Rival has neither a fridge nor pressurised water, so you don't need to worry about drained batteries or constant refills for the water tank.

Wonderful, if sales patter always deliberately attracted attention to something missing, as a distinct advantage...

...my boat enjoys a really airy sitting area with fantastic 360º visibility...(hasn't got a cabin).
 
Dan,

They are boats from a different time when modern aids was not so common in yachts. The advert is talking sense and stating a fact as anyone who made the transition around the mid to late 1980s will know. The first electric water pumps I used were on a Moody 31, around 1986, and two of us emptied the tanks on a weekend sail — unheard of for that duration of sail. The standard built in cool box relied on having the ice packs re frozen in hotels, restaurants or even a bucket of ice from the fishermen's ice machine. Electricity was much the same as today, always in short supply because the batteries were small and charging technology was poor however, it wasn't such a big deal.

I think the comments are less sales patter and more reality. There is a market, for this type of sailing yacht as its simpler and can be very affordable. However, as with anything that is old it there are other risks that can reduce the simplicity to a complex of emotions: frustration, angst and simmering rage!

Regards,

BlowingOldBoots
 
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BlowingOldBoots said:
There is a market, for this type of sailing yacht as its simpler and can be very affordable.
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I believe you entirely, BoB, and the description of the Rival's interior. Always loved the R34.

If I ever have a yacht, I'll want a foot-pedal for the shower. And very possibly oil-lamps with an auxiliary 12v circuit. And a coolbox with 10" thick insulation.
 
Minn said:
In boats of this type, owned and sailed by people of my vintage and type, the word "shower" is spelled "Two gallon garden sprayer and boil the kettle..." .
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In my case it was spelled "canvas bucket, flannel, and boil the kettle" :)

First time I sailed to Poole I had an all-over wash, and a shave, in the sunshine in the cockpit as the tillerpilot steered us across Christchurch Bay. Done similar anchored in splendid isolation in the middle of Langstone Harbour. On the Folly pontoons, I put the boom tent up to spare the sensibilities of those moored nearby :)

Pete
 
prv said:
In my case it was spelled "canvas bucket, flannel, and boil the kettle" :)
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Pete, this seems slightly at odds with your "born in the '80s" admission. Or...1880s? My grandma was born in the '90s...though she's been gone a while...

Of course, when I said "shower", I meant that I'd thought of a use for that holey bucket I keep on board...

...and once I have my burgee halyard rigged, the showerhead height will be fully adjustable. With a foot-pedal (winding the burgee up & down). :)
 
dancrane said:
Pete, this seems slightly at odds with your "born in the '80s" admission.
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No, not at all. I was washing in a canvas bucket on board Kindred Spirit only last year. The freshwater plumbing on that boat consisted of a flexible water bladder, a length of hose, and a hand-pump. And a kettle. Anything more would have been overkill on that sized boat.

The luxurious new boat nominally has a shower, but the heads compartment is not truly waterproof (direct the spray into one corner and you'd actually rinse down the electrical bay behind the chart table!) and the water tankage is on the small side, so I don't envisage showering on board without substantial modification. Stand-up washes at the basin in the heads will be the order of the day - and even that seems rather posh compared to the canvas bucket in the cockpit :)

Pete
 
prv said:
I was washing in a canvas bucket on board Kindred Spirit only last year.
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Peter, is your surname "Duck", by any chance? :D

Sorry mate, I do see what you mean. Aboard the Osprey, I'll be lucky if ablutions extend to a bar of saltwater soap.

Funny thing, I've always disliked the pokey loo/shower appointments aboard many small yachts, and aboard many that were big enough to have more generous ones.

But in general I like the minimalist approach - I'm quite keen on tenting - although I do take a thick Viyella counterpane as wall-to-wall carpet. Very warm, very civilised. :rolleyes:
 
dancrane said:
Peter, is your surname "Duck", by any chance? :D
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What, with the saltiness of a canvas bucket?

Kindred Spirit carried two buckets, one canvas and one rubber/plastic. While both could have been used for bailing in extremis, the canvas one was otherwise kept for washing only. Choosing canvas meant it was unlikely to be selected by uninformed crew for holding dismantled gearbox parts, or rinsing mud off the decks, or even crapping into - all things for which the rubber bucket was better suited. There's a story somewhere (I think in Michael Green's Coarse Sailing) where a boat has a red bucket and a blue bucket for use as washing-up bowl and toilet respectively, and halfway through the week the two crew discover they have a differing understanding of which is which...

Plus, the canvas bucket squashed down very small for storage, yet (unlike the rubber one) was big enough for me to insert my whole head into for washing my hair.

Pete
 
Minn said:
"....In boats of this type, owned and sailed by people of my vintage and type, the word "shower" is spelled...."
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....'downpour'!

Like this one....


shower.jpg
 
prv said:
What, with the saltiness of a canvas bucket?
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I really was thinking of Arthur Ransome's Peter Duck, a thoroughly salty seagoing old fella.

But...now, I'm picturing you, thus:

View attachment 33335

That "crapping in the wash-bowl" story must be an urban myth, surely?

Given how easily unhandled buckets fit into each other, there surely needn't be any rationing of them, I hope. I got one at The Range...very rugged, only £1.
 
All a matter of balance, even nowadays perhaps? One lightning strike from oldbilbos piccy and we're all hand-raulic again

I can-and do sometimes-sail with the power turned off. Why not? I have a windvane and walker log, a leadline and a pair of binoculars blah blah, and foot pumps and oil lamps and more blah blah..
If you ever go cruising, stuff breaks, the boat in a sense gets simpler as the voyage progresses, or you pick up the satphone and say " it wasnt meant to be like this, Im insured, get me out, mwaa mwaa''. Sadly this is on the increase!
 
dancrane said:
I really was thinking of Arthur Ransome's Peter Duck, a thoroughly salty seagoing old fella.
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I know, but I wasn't sure why you equated a young-ish software engineer playing in a plastic boat at weekends, with an old shellback from the days of commercial sail. Unless it was that both have been known to wash in a canvas bucket at sea.

Buckets without handles are not especially useful on a yacht, as you can't dip water out of the sea with them.

Pete
 
prv said:
Unless it was that both have been known to wash in a canvas bucket at sea.
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That, be assured, was my comparison. True, Mr Duck had a rather old-fashioned approach to newfangled anything, so what he might have said to software engineering, I won't try to guess. But, PD always sounded like the perfect seamanlike bloke to have on board, so, no disrespect intended.

I wasn't thinking clearly, about handle-less buckets...I was imagining they don't stack if they do have handles...but they do, because I've seen it in The Range!

Oh yes, far have I travelled, and all manner of furrin' stuff have I seen. :)
 
dancrane said:
Extract from a Rival 34 review in YBW.com:

Wild Rival has neither a fridge nor pressurised water, so you don't need to worry about drained batteries or constant refills for the water tank.

Wonderful, if sales patter always deliberately attracted attention to something missing, as a distinct advantage...
Click to expand...

Agree entirely, KISS, unless you are not physically able to pump water, wind up a window, adjust your car seat, and now even close a car boot or door :rolleyes: WHY the hell do you need heavy electric motors and the complication to go wrong to do a simple task for you - largely just sales gimmicks that we are all mostly now encumbered with. They'll be putting air conditioning in cockpits next :rolleyes:
 
This thread reminds me of a TV sketch.....Grew up in cardboard box in central reservation of M1, got up an hour before we went to bed by ek lad, we was appy!
 
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