Survey, Survey, Survey

No, you are not.
Ken

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.canongrange.co.uk>Bed and Breakfast, cathedral Green Wells, Somerset Canon Grange</A>
 
No you're not. I also find the sight of people with more money than sense climbing the high topsides of their giant boats rather pathetic. Here's a rule, if you need a step ladder from the pontoon it's too bloody high!

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Re: Jeremey Clarkson

yeh why not a JC of the yacht world, at least we might get some truth on some of the AWB's

Where have all the tests on the standard marques gone? I know we dont have a Yacht building industry to take on the Bav,Bens et all, but some tests on the slightly older well built yachts with sensible prices would surely go down well with most of the.... Sadler, Moody, Sigma, Westerly owners & potential owners?

poter


<hr width=100% size=1> /forums/images/icons/crazy.gif Gonna buy a new boat
 
Re: Aged 50 to 75? Blame yourselves

Survey, Survey is one of my favourites each month. The average budget seems high to me but don't forget the recent issue with a young couple looking for a Ramus or similar at around £40k.

No one aged between 50 and 75 has a right to complain here about the gross yachting budgets featured in the series. The ARC entry lists prove this is the type of boat many people can indulge in as part of their early retirement. You are the generation that created the bubble economics of the late 20th century with obscene real-estate inflation, compensation culture and unsustainable pension entitlements. My generation will have to pick up the pieces over the next 30 years.

On a separate thread I do not understand the allegation that Ad revenues dictate editorial sentiment. The jorno's in most UK mags drooled over the British Hunter Mystery 35 yet when reviewing an YWB they make predictable complaints about mid boom sheeting and grudingly accept that the yacht might not fall apart for five years.

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Re: Jeremey Clarkson

Have you read any UK yachting magazines in the last 3 years? I suspect not.

They regularly feature a pair of yacht reviews, one new and one second hand. The "standard marques" you refer to get lots of praise in the secondhand slots.

> JC of the yacht world

Oh spare us. The man is a hugely entertaining, politically uncorrect, buffoon. JC's utterings have no effect on my car selection process.

<hr width=100% size=1><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by jonjo on 12/12/2004 13:56 (server time).</FONT></P>
 
Re: Aged 50 to 75? Blame yourselves

Hmm! As one of your 50 to 75'ers I must take issue with your statement

<No one aged between 50 and 75 has a right to complain here about the gross yachting budgets featured in the series. The ARC entry lists prove this is the type of boat many people can indulge in as part of their early retirement. You are the generation that created the bubble economics of the late 20th century with obscene real-estate inflation, compensation culture and unsustainable pension entitlements. My generation will have to pick up the pieces over the next 30 years.>

First I most certainly can take issue with the gross yachting budgets. If I had any intention of entering the ARC it would be in a seaworthy 32/34 footer of early construction, because that would be the budget I would be able to sustain, & I suspect more than 90% of the other elderlies would be able to as well!
Second; I personally had nothing to do with the obscene real-estate inflation & what has it got to do with anything anyway? my house maybe worth more but its only inflation busting value, is if I sell it & live on the street!
Compensation Culture... nothing like blaming everything on the senior's. You will actually find that the compensation culture alongside crimewaves et-all is a load of Bo**##ks, the total nos of compensation claims is at its lowest for 20 years.
Unsustainable pensions! I love it. I have been paying (well not quite true as I was overseas for 25 yrs) loads a dosh to HMG and will I get it back? your jocking the only people who get final salry schemes are HMG employees & of course your local MP.

Yeah Yeah go pick up the pieces....this was a wind up & I went for it!!

poter

<hr width=100% size=1> /forums/images/icons/crazy.gif Gonna buy a new boat
 
Re: Jeremey Clarkson

As it happens I have a sub to the popular YM & PBO mags but will now drop YM as its not catering for my yachting experience.

JC entertaining? yes.

Buffoon? Well you have obviously seen enough to make that judgement

Effect on your car buying? Maybe after your other posts I can see that you are not in that league, as you need to save your dosh for the outrageous costs of all the elderly.
/forums/images/icons/shocked.gif

poter


<hr width=100% size=1> /forums/images/icons/crazy.gif Gonna buy a new boat
 
Re: Aged 50 to 75? Blame yourselves

> this was a wind up & I went for it

No, it was mostly serious. Inter generational politics will be arriving at a polling station near you in the next 15 years for sure.

> my house maybe worth more.... if I sell it & live on the street!

It is called downsizing. The generation I refer is in the most fortunate of circumstances in the sence of riding the property wave and then being in a position to free up 100k to 200k as their housing needs reduce.

> compensation culture alongside crimewaves et-all is a load of Bo**##ks

Insurance premiums and domestic alarm sales suggest otherwise.

Compensation culture takes many forms. I got angry a couple of months ago when a member of this formum bragged about how she had played the system following some medical outage during tax payer funded employment. If someone is able to prepare for blue water cruising with all the physical and mental demands implied she has no right to take a long-term sickie funded by the State.

Three year ago I nearly purchased a Rival 34 from a fireman who was trading up to a Rival 38 for long term cruising. He openly joked about the "breathing" injury sustained on the job and the financial award + early retirement.

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When I started reading yachty mags in the 70s the editors were:

1. Bernard Hayman (Yachting World) who sailed Barbican, a 32ft long keeled sloop

2. Des Sleightholme (Yachting Monthly) who sailed Tinker Liz - a 24ft Trident

3. Denny Desoutter (PBO) not sure what he sailed and then George Taylor who owned, I think, a Macwester.

Most of the reviews were of modest sized boats. In addition to big builders like Westerley and Hurley, there were independent moulders like Tyler and Halmatic offering hulls for home completion or completion by a yard of your choice. New nanny regulations have pretty well put a stop to this practice.

I stopped buying all the mags about 2 years ago. I became weary of reading bland reviews of large, unaffordable (to me) mass produced boats. Maybe I've spent too long sailing on the east coast but most boats I see are in the 25ft to 35ft range. I had enough too of reviews of 'high performance clothing' in the latest colours, seaside housing developments and guides to the Trieux river and Lezardrieux for the umpteenth time!

I'm not sure that reviews were more critical in the 70s and 80s but at least they were relevant to the average sailor. I do also like reading reviews of larger boats, say anything over 35ft but bring back a sense of proportion please IPC.





















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Re: Aged 50 to 75? Blame yourselves

Don't get too smug, Jonjo, the generation following you will find it's own bag of ills to lay at your feet. At least so far, you haven't had the consequences of a World War to grow up through and you may just find you have as little control over the state of the world as the generation you so bitterly resent.

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Boat Test

I've held off posting here until I calmed down. I haven't so here goes

I can't comment on Survey! Survey! Survey! but as far as boat tests are concerned I will say once again, though clearly no one believes me, that I have absolutely no contact with the advertising department over boats tests. I do not choose boats to please them, I do not write them to please them. They have no imput into the copy, which they see at the same time as the reader - on publication.

I couldn't give a damn whether they advertise or not and most of the time am unaware one way or the other.

I try to give a fair and accurate picture of the boat as I see it in the conditions wished upon us - coloured by my experience of over 300 previous boat tests. Since I have been writing these since the good old days when you all seem to think boat tests were much better, I will say test are every bit as thoughout and my comments probably more pithy now than they were in the 1970s. Have you actually read some of the reviews by my predecessors? 500 words of anodine nonsense very often and at best (usually by JDS, Colin Jarman or Andrew Bray) pretty sketchy by comparison to those of recent years.

When I started testing boats almost all the new models were in the 22 to 32ft bracket. Now the launch of something under 30ft by a leading builder is a major, and rare, event.

We cannot tests boats which do not exist.

Because of this we introduced, many years ago, and were the first magazine to do so, secondhand boat tests and these remain a focus of the magazine. Have some of you seen them? It would appear not.

Do you really believe Jeremy Clarkson gives a balanced and detailed review of the cars featured on his programme? How much actual fact does he spout and how much is just 'wHEEE - WAYHAY - WOW - WHAT A LOAD OF RUBBISH/GREAT 12CYLINDER MUSCLE CAR - ON TO THE NEXT ONE'

We are changing our boat tests next month and there is definitely more of the Jeremy Clarkson about them. I hope you like them.

Meanwhile I'm about to put on my leathers, mount my outrageously large motorbike a blast up to Gopsort/Hamble to do some work. How Jeremy Clarkson is that?

PS, Thanks Snowleopard, Pragmatist and Pessimist for a good meet in the Crooker Spaniard last night

<hr width=100% size=1>JJ
 
Re: Boat Test

Now then, now then, calm down, calm down . . .

My post was NOT originally about boat tests - some else started that. Of course you can't test the sort of boats that were being built new 30 years ago.

My post was about 'Survey Survey Survey' - and hence not directed at you, James, or at any of you concerned with testing new boats. 'Survey Survey Survey' is about second hand boats, so boats of any age / size / value could be chosen; in spite of this, generally the target price /spec is extremely high - I don't see how you can deny that, and in fact you said you were unable to comment.

Must have been a good dinner Clarkson had with the VW chairman - he gave the Golf GTi car of the year last night!

- Nick





<hr width=100% size=1><font size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.bluemoment.com>http://www.bluemoment.com</A></font size=1>
 
Re: Boat Test

>> Since I have been writing these since the good old days when you all seem to think boat tests were much better, I will say test are every bit as thoughout and my comments probably more pithy now than they were in the 1970s.>>

James, I have just read through all the above posts and I'm not sure that anyone has said the tests were better in 'the good old days' and I was certainly anxious not to give that impression in my post. Maybe some of us feel that the reviews could be harder hitting though, which is a different matter.

That apart, it seems there is a concensus that reviews of large, unaffordable (to many) boats is a disincentive to buy the magazines. I also think it gives the wrong impression, to those who are new to sailing, of what constitutes a suitable boat. They could be forgiven for thinking they need to spend at least £30,000 just to get started. 30 years ago Yachting Monthly would have been extolling the virtues of the Hurley 22 for the same task. Larger boats don't necessarily mean more enjoyment or safety anyway. Look at the fate of the Beneteau Oceanis 390, Ocean Madam, that inverted in Biscay and stayed that way with loss of life and compare it with the excellent record of the Contessa 26.

Are there really so few boats under 30ft being built nowadays? Sad if that's true.


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Having read through all these postings (Very enjoyable) I must agree that we need more on the smaller seaworthy yachts. Yes I am biased as I also sail an Albin Vega but when you think that a top of the range (new engine etc) refitted Vega is £15000 then this is a feasible choice. We know these yachts are good but how about IPC trying these seaworthy yachts and writing the truth..........

Biased Vega owner....

<hr width=100% size=1>Albin Vega "Southern Comfort" V1703
 
Re: Boat Test

> Of course you can't test the sort of boats that were being built
> new 30 years ago.

They do in the second hand series, this is why I questioned whether another contributor to this thread ever read the magazine. In many respects the 2nd hand reviews are more interesting because the boats have been owner enhanced and we also get to hear about some structural problems that show up after a few decades.

What irritates me is the case of a reviewed example put up for sale soon after the magazine printed the owner's glowing report. This happens too often to be put down to random events.

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Re: Boat Test

James
I might have got this wrong but I thought the criticism was being aimed at Paul Jeffes' column where the 3 boats are surveyed/reviewed.
I didn't think your boat tests were being put under the lamp of scrutiny - and as far as the insinuation that there's some kind of shady advertising deals - sound a bit like Cash for Adverts - well there are some very bad people on here who just revel in the opportunity to make mischief.
Keep on trucking but if you want Claymore to buy one of your tested boats you'll need to come down in price and size!

<hr width=100% size=1><font color=purple>regards
Claymore<font color=purple>
/forums/images/icons/smile.gif
http://www.whoi.edu/services/facilities/CLAYMORE/
 
a soft-gloved man on his outrageously large moped

not the intention to get you on your highpowered horse again, but on comparison between the UK mags I usually read (YW,YM,PBO .... no thanks needed for paying one loaf of bread on your table each month, /forums/images/icons/wink.gif) and the ones overhere (Zeilen, Varen, the odd froglish yottimag) yours are indeed the most softgloved and superficial , that's an honest impression so I'm not going to say sorry about it..

you might get some inspiration from your collegues of Zeilen ...aren't they under the same umbrella as yours and regularly testing same yachts.... run their tests through a babelfish and see for yourself. this also applies to gear testing.

not that your testing is bad.... but it still leaves me sometimes with a feeling like just having been in a "nouvelle cuisine" restaurant.... know that feeling ??

funny, can't imagine JJ as a leatherette /forums/images/icons/laugh.gif
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