Survey or not?

[AllanG]

I'm interested in a 2010 Scandinavian built 'peches promenade' type 21 foot planing boat, the hull of which was Coppercoated from new, and is powered by a 135 hp Honda outboard that was last serviced in 2013.

From the photos I've seen, the boat looks in very good condition but, as it's not local to me, I haven't had a chance to view it yet.

I'm a qualified, but retired, MN marine engineer, and have previously owned both a sailing yacht and a Nimbus motorboat and, when I bought both, I was with the surveyor who carried out the pre-purchase surveys, so have some experience of what to look for when purchasing a boat.

My question is, if you were me, would you have a pre-purchase survey carried out on such a boat and, if so, would you require hull moisture readings to be taken? If so, will the surveyor still have to scrape off patches of the Coppercoat to take the moisture readings?

If the Coppercoat has to be scraped back, can the patches be easily repainted?

Alternatively, do you think on this size and type of boat, I could carry out a survey myself?

I would appreciate any advice, or experiences you may have if you've been in a similar situation.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Cathy*]

We purchased a 2008 Antares 8 3 years ago and had a survey done which said all was ok. After the purchase we found quite a few niggles, radio wasn't working properly, a leaky window, toilet not working properly, various other bits and bobs and felt really that the survey was not money well spent. 18 months ago we changed to a 2007 bigger Antares 980 (you always need another 4 ft). I found various lists off the internet and we spent 2 days doing the survey ourselves. We went over the boat with a fine tooth comb, including having it lifted so we could check out the hull and fittings etc, and picked up things which the broker dealt with. My husband was familiar with engines and cars so we concluded we'd do a better job ourselves. So far we're glad we did, there have been no surprises. Don't know anything about Coppercoat sorry. I think you definitely need to survey it so it depends on how you value your time. If we'd had to take 2 days off work it would have made more sense to pay someone else to do it. Although a boat with a single outboard would need less checking over.

 

[omega2]

Do not bother, if a surveyor does it he will find osmosis LOL

 

[Davegriff]

If you needed to ask, then I'd say yes, get it surveyed.