Bitter-End
Member
Having just bought a new in/out yanmar diesel boat, I was a bit put off by the remark of the admiral "I though you said it had more space".
That's going from a 5 to a 7.5m boat.
Yeah, the layout is a bit weird and not what is was after exactly, but still. I only spent 1 year trying to find a replacement for our open boat, which she never complained about.
Having very little to do, here in the middle of the ocean at super eco speeds, on a trip that pretty takes me around the whole world, have turned to the Internet for a backup plan, looking ahead a few years.
Having imported my current boat from Japan, as the local used boat market is pretty small in Hong Kong, I decided to go global.
There are lots of viable diesel options in europe. But they all sort of look alike, pilot house too large for my taste and enclosed. I prefer being out in the open.
Lots of merry fishers et al, but they're pretty much the same and don't feature the large open (aft) deck I'm looking for, too cluttered, and too... Plastic looking, too fancy.
So I turned my gaze westwards, towards the US of A.
And lo and behold, beside the usual offerings of centre consoles that all look the same, cost $10000 per foot and covered in electronics bow to stern, with more outboards on a single boat than I've owned in total during my life, and consume more petrol per hour than I consume for in a whole year, they actually built, and are still building, some damn good looking boats.
I'm talking about downeasters.
Where I'm from, classic looks have always been popular, and I quite like the look of these myself. Apart from that they have generally have exactly the layout I have in mind, many of them are diesel powered, decent perdormance, and most of them are shaft driven. While generally not cheap, some of these are in my 50k usd range.
The downside is... A great many are pretty old, so are the engines and many of the traditional, affordable ones lack horsepower and are pretty heavy, with a pretty low cruise speed.
The newer ones... Well.. There are some great examples of modern downeaster style boats on the market. Some very pretty boats with good performance, right within my budget.
One of these examples ticks nearly all the boxes, only one thing would stop me considering it as an instant buy.
Volvo penta common rail, duo prop, Composite outdrive.
How afraid should I be, if at all?
I could live with a VP common rail engine alone, but what about the rest.
Googling those composite drives, the almost unanimous response is "run away".
That's going from a 5 to a 7.5m boat.
Yeah, the layout is a bit weird and not what is was after exactly, but still. I only spent 1 year trying to find a replacement for our open boat, which she never complained about.
Having very little to do, here in the middle of the ocean at super eco speeds, on a trip that pretty takes me around the whole world, have turned to the Internet for a backup plan, looking ahead a few years.
Having imported my current boat from Japan, as the local used boat market is pretty small in Hong Kong, I decided to go global.
There are lots of viable diesel options in europe. But they all sort of look alike, pilot house too large for my taste and enclosed. I prefer being out in the open.
Lots of merry fishers et al, but they're pretty much the same and don't feature the large open (aft) deck I'm looking for, too cluttered, and too... Plastic looking, too fancy.
So I turned my gaze westwards, towards the US of A.
And lo and behold, beside the usual offerings of centre consoles that all look the same, cost $10000 per foot and covered in electronics bow to stern, with more outboards on a single boat than I've owned in total during my life, and consume more petrol per hour than I consume for in a whole year, they actually built, and are still building, some damn good looking boats.
I'm talking about downeasters.
Where I'm from, classic looks have always been popular, and I quite like the look of these myself. Apart from that they have generally have exactly the layout I have in mind, many of them are diesel powered, decent perdormance, and most of them are shaft driven. While generally not cheap, some of these are in my 50k usd range.
The downside is... A great many are pretty old, so are the engines and many of the traditional, affordable ones lack horsepower and are pretty heavy, with a pretty low cruise speed.
The newer ones... Well.. There are some great examples of modern downeaster style boats on the market. Some very pretty boats with good performance, right within my budget.
One of these examples ticks nearly all the boxes, only one thing would stop me considering it as an instant buy.
Volvo penta common rail, duo prop, Composite outdrive.
How afraid should I be, if at all?
I could live with a VP common rail engine alone, but what about the rest.
Googling those composite drives, the almost unanimous response is "run away".
