We’re buying a new boat !!

[replacing luck]

Congratulations.
I would of thought that the Galeon 500 Fly may have been a front runner for you if quality and charter-ability were your priority with a carbon fibre hard top. I'd suspect that there is as much room if not more on the 500 as there is on a 55 from Princess. Just a thought.

 

[DavidJ]

That thing on the top is truely hideous. I do apologise if it’s your boat.

 

[vas]

That thing on the top is truely hideous. I do apologise if it’s your boat.

tbh, the P55 is hideouser
h/t are a hard thing to do, otoh, the P55 three tier "wing" at the back of the non h/t version resembles Hamilton F1 Merc, not particularly a smart design.

 

[replacing luck]

A friend lost two of his fingers in a fold away Bimini on a 45Ft Sealine. This was by far the better option.
Bimini's at that size can be pretty awkward especially in a blow when they are most likely needing to be put away.
I like the hard top option.

 

[Hurricane]

tbh, the P55 is hideouser
h/t are a hard thing to do, otoh, the P55 three tier "wing" at the back of the non h/t version resembles Hamilton F1 Merc, not particularly a smart design.

You mustn't touch it though!!!!!!

 

[vas]

You mustn't touch it though!!!!!!

yeah, 50k euro for touching the thing is a bit too much, more than the cost of the whole h/t ?

 

[rafiki_]

yeah, 50k euro for touching the thing is a bit too much, more than the cost of the whole h/t ?

Not on a Princess Vas.

 

[Portofino]

Iam I missing some thing here ?
.The FB HTs shown so far inc the Priny 55 is canvas ( well material) anyhow !

So they are not really HTs just a picture frame fugly suspended in a kinda what appears aesthetically in a after thought way , with a bit of roll back canvas in .

So as well as the not inconsiderate extra pendulum effect / roll + additional weight blunting performance, you still have canvas .
A more expensive canvas to maintain than a boggo mimi .

And they make you hand over more wedge .

I must have got this all wrong , help me out .

Sell it to me someone ? Q - MapisM?

 

[henryf]

Congratulations.
I would of thought that the Galeon 500 Fly may have been a front runner for you if quality and charter-ability were your priority with a carbon fibre hard top. I'd suspect that there is as much room if not more on the 500 as there is on a 55 from Princess. Just a thought.

I’ve always felt Galeon are trying a bit too hard to build a transformer type vessel. Had a good look on a previous Cannes visit and it wasn’t for us. We also viewed (with some difficulty) a boat at Düsseldorf, maybe we were influenced by the sales prevention team but it wasn’t on the shortlist I’m afraid.

 

[henryf]

Iam I missing some thing here ?
.The FB HTs shown so far inc the Priny 55 is canvas ( well material) anyhow !

So they are not really HTs just a picture frame fugly suspended in a kinda what appears aesthetically in a after thought way , with a bit of roll back canvas in .

So as well as the not inconsiderate extra pendulum effect / roll + additional weight blunting performance, you still have canvas .
A more expensive canvas to maintain than a boggo mimi .

And they make you hand over more wedge .

I must have got this all wrong , help me out .

Sell it to me someone ? Q - MapisM?

Princess offer a solid hard top or a solid hard top with sliding section. List price is currently £38,400 for the solid hardtop, £54,500 for the solid hardtop with electric slide section. Both options include lighting. Prices are approx and subject to change.

By comparison a manual Bimini is £5,100 with electro hydraulic motor an additional £9,500 approx. Lighting additional. So the figure of £18,000 quoted by someone earlier was massively over inflated.

I like the idea of a hard top and what it offers, it’s just coming to terms with the visual impact, the weight and the cost. Ultimately if I was offered a stock boat with a hard top I’d take it, I wouldn’t reject it but in this case we’re being offered the chance to build a bespoke boat to our specific requirements. In some ways I’d rather just buy a stock boat as we’ve done in the past, it saves all the hassle but putting a positive slant on things lets see if it actually becomes a joyous experience which further warms me to the Princess brand.

I have currently just arrived in Plymouth…….

 

[MapisM]

I’m sorry but I wouldn’t champion them as world leaders

Well, that's what they are whether you and I like it or not. That's a matter of numbers, not of opinions.
BTW, I wrote that with a bit of a toungue in cheek, quoting also your comment about the UK being "home to the best boat builders".
I mean, if by "best" you mean your personal best, fair enough.
But the last time I checked a chart with some hard figures on the boatbuilding industry by Country, the UK didn't even make it to the top 5, which together accounted for 75% of the market.
Not sure of the exact ranking - it must have ben somewhere within the "others" that made the last 25%...

As for the hard top and resale I’m hoping someone else likes the concept of light weight high up to reduce roll momentum and a good sized gyro stabiliser.

Good luck, because such person should like a boat that rolls more, not less.
In fact, the longer the rolling period, the more effective the stabilizers are, not the opposite.
I hope it wasn't someone at Princess that sold you such "concept"...?!

 

[MapisM]

Sell it to me someone ? Q - MapisM?

Sorry PF, I did try to understand what you're asking me, honest.
But you'll forgive me for giving up after reading your post for the third time...

PS: anyhow, see my previous post ref. your "extra pendulum effect / roll".
It never ceases to amaze me how many boaters are unaware that a longer roll period is good, not bad!

 

[henryf]

Well, that's what they are whether you and I like it or not. That's a matter of numbers, not of opinions.
BTW, I wrote that with a bit of a toungue in cheek, quoting also your comment about the UK being "home to the best boat builders".
I mean, if by "best" you mean your personal best, fair enough.
But the last time I checked a chart with some hard figures on the boatbuilding industry, the UK didn't even make it to the top 5, which together accounted for 75% of the market.
Not sure of the exact ranking - it must have ben somewhere within the "others" that made the last 25%...


Good luck, because such person should like a boat that rolls more, not less.
In fact, the longer the rolling period, the more effective the stabilizers are, not the opposite.
I hope it wasn't someone at Princess that sold you such "concept"...?!

Don’t worry, I realised you rose to my equally tongue in cheek comment

I’m not sure volume equates to quality, in fact quite the opposite. Using your metric Bayliner would leave Azimut for dust but I know which I’d rather be caught out in a force 7 with…..

No one at Princess has sold me on any concept. They would rather sell me a hard top !

I’m merely applying logic, a boat with more weight high up is going to be less stable and require more force to bring back under control once it starts rolling. It’s why you use a heavy weight on a pendulum and I believe the continued roll of a high weighted boat might be referred to as the pendulum effect.

 

[ari]

It's clever the way that they make the ensigns flutter forwards...

View attachment 125860
View attachment 125862

 

[Portofino]

It's clever the way that they make the ensigns flutter forwards...

View attachment 125860
View attachment 125862

Station wagon effect .Well known vacuum at the rear of brick moving at speed through air .
Smell those fumes sat in that cockpit , never mind the flag .

 

[MapisM]

I’m merely applying logic, a boat with more weight high up is going to be less stable and require more force to bring back under control once it starts rolling.

Nope. I appreciate that this might make sense intuitively, but I'm afraid that a proper application of logic is more tricky than that.
Not willing to derail too much into this subject, which I'm sure was done to death in the past, if you fancy searching old threads on the topic of boat stabilization.
But in a nutshell, a hull with a high inherent stability tends to copy the water surface movements faster and with more "snappy" reactions compared to top heavy boats, whose characteristic rolling period is higher.
Therefore, the former is harder to stabilize than the latter, becase its higher resistance to roll works also against any stabilizing system which is trying to correct it.
Brought to the extreme, this is the reason why catamarans are impossible to stabilize, and counterintuitively they can roll very uncomfortably, in conditions that a stabilized monohull of comparable size could handle without batting an eye.

 

[Bajansailor]

@MapisM I appreciate what you are saying above, however if I may quote from Henry's comment - "a boat with more weight high up is going to be less stable " - what Henry has said here in this one line is fundamentally correct (all else being equal).
But Henry's assertion that more force will be required to stabilise it is not necessarily correct, as you pointed out.
(Yes I know I am nitpicking re semantics! )

Your assertion that "the former is harder to stabilize than the latter" re how the former is a hull with high inherent stability is also correct - but this does not make it 'less stable' as such (ie where you have a decrease of GM).
It just makes the stablilising device work harder, as you imply above.

If you add additional weight higher up in the vessel, the overall centre of gravity of the vessel will rise, and the distance KG from the keel to the centre of gravity will hence increase.
The height of the metacentre (KM) is not going to change much, hence the GM (which is the main unit for the measure of stability) will decrease., and the roll period will increase, and the comfort factor for the crew will increase (so long as the reduction of GM is not excessive).

KM = KG + GM

 

[ari]

I'm not an expert on any of this stuff, but I'm pretty sure that attaching a half tonne weight (for example) to the top of a sailboat mast will make it less stable, not more stable.

There's a reason why sailboats have rigs made of carbon, and keels made of lead.

 

[Bouba]

If you have a flybridge boat then the problem is people weight. The hardtop is a fixed object that can be compensated for in the design stage plus it can be made from exotic materials. But when 10 people gravitate to the upper deck the weight has gone from low to high.

 

[colhel]

I've been on a sail boat with the mast removed and it was quite a juddery and jerky movement. The mast slows the movement down considerably, making it far more comfortable. Wether this is relevant to the topic discussed, I don't know ??