richardbayle
Well-Known Member
Sorry should have said, currently sitting in the Caribbean after coming over last year. So you don't have to worry about the big pond.
What do you want out of a blue water boat?
- Thread starter geem
- Start date
geem
Well-Known Member
My post didn't say that displacement had anything to do with spade rudders and bolt on keels. it said that that these modern attributes were not on the list of desirable features of a blue water boat as seems to be the general response. Nobody said money was an issue. The responses have been based purely on the attributes that were desirable in a blue water boat. Passages have been done in lots of craft that were not ideal and these choices may have been made due to lack of funds for something more suitable. The point is that given the choice most people would choose something resilient to impact so a lead encapsulated keel would make sense as would a skeg hung rudder. A strong hull would also make sense. There are lots of other features that make an ideal blue water boat but most current production boats are not intended for blue water, will never cross an ocean or be out in weather over a F6. If you are choosing something to cross oceans and you had a blank sheet of paper and lots of cash, you might choose something different.
Neil_Y
Well-Known Member
I wanted what a Bavaria 390 gave me, from Biscay in a November storm to light wind fast progress and plenty of sail area. Comfortable in ice on the decks live aboard in the Higher latitudes to tropical heat and good ventilation.
Tranona
Well-Known Member
It is not "most people" - just those who are posting here. Most people choosing a boat now do not seem to choose particular designs of boats advocated by some here. For example, the number of boats built with lead encapsulated keels is tiny, so desirable though it may be from the perspective you identify, few can actually choose that.
The point I am trying to make is that while some people see these characteristics as desirable, an awful lot of people faced with the same choices - independent of funds available do not. In the future even less people will make those same choices, just as few people choose old working boat derived designs now. Money is however an issue. You can easily buy boats with those characteristics as they are cheap and available. So given that few can afford a new boat it is a self fulfilling prophecy that they will be chosen.
Must stress, I am not saying such characteristics do not lead to a good boat for the purpose, just that some (majority?) find other types of boat equally satisfactory or even (based on some current designs) superior.
geem
Well-Known Member
Ok. If you were after a 45ft boat to sail around the world in, what would you choose from available current production boats? 45 ft because that is about average size for an around the world trip.
doug748
Well-Known Member
What can you say but, spot on.
Fashion also plays it's part. Plus, despite their manifest shortcomings, you got to admit that a lot of modern designs are cheap and cheap sells.
Koeketiene
Well-Known Member
sailorman
Well-Known Member
Well at least your not the poorest Oyster owner are youGreat -so, I have the boat I have because I'm a pauper?
ip485
Well-Known Member
It is an interesting view and got me thinking.
I agree if you consider Oysters, HRs, IPs etc a significant part of the cost is on the fine cabinet work and expensive materials. The difference between these and a Beneteau are oceans apart and even if you produced the former in volume there is a very significant difference in the cost of the materials. As but one example compare the cost of a teak interior, in the case of IPs using signifciant amounts of solid teak, take account of the current price of teak and you can partly understand the difference in cost. However none of this makes means Beneteau couldnt build a "traditional" long keel for a significantly lower cost, and you dont need all the fine cabinet work, even if you possibly do need a more "refined" interior if only because most production boats I have been on creak all the time. Only this week a friend was saying the one thing he didnt like about his boat on long passages was it creaked all night and the crew often couldnt sleep. He asked if this was the norm. Well actually, no, it isnt.
Moving on to the the important items I think there are areas where again the price would significantly increase if Beneteau were building a blue water yacht in the style of an Oyster for example. An IP rig will cost +£8K to replace, significantly less for the same sized Beneteau. Why - twice the number of wires, at least a 1/3rd greater diameter. Then there is the hull. Most of the traditional blue water vessels are solid fibreglass - no balsa - no foam core. It is a very signifcant difference in cost. Try and route any cables or ducts on an IP and every single bulkhead, is three times the thickness of a Beneteau. The list goes on - the winches are a size or two larger, more of the winches are powered etc.
All of this translates to a yacht that will still look good after 20 years, and will perhaps look after itself better.
I think the other aspect is that we all make judgements based on our personal experience - after all how else can you go about it. In another arena, light aircraft, twin engine aircraft have become unpopular for all sorts of reasons. In consequence very few pilots have any experience flying a twin. A whole culture now exists of why twins arent as good as singles, but that culture is based to a significant extent on the views of pilots that have never flown a twin. In just the same way unless you have taken a Beneteau, an Oyster, or whatever it maybe across oceans its difficult to make an informative comparison.
I dont mean to suggest that any of these yachts arent capable - simply that there maybe a difference between one yacht costing £100K and another £200K. The margin in the £100K yacht might be less, and its value for money greater, but the £200K yacht designed and built as a blue water cruiser will almost certainly have been bulit to a higher spec. which is how they justify (at least in part) the difference in price.
Then again we might all have been taken for a ride!
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Jamesuk
Well-Known Member
Sounds like you need a Hallberg Rassy in the first few lines
Koeketiene
Well-Known Member
Fashion comes and goes - style and class are eternal
Their relative cheapness is their one redeeming feature.
Lada sells more and cheaper cars than Volvo. Would you argue that Ladas are better cars because more of them are sold?
Twister_Ken
Well-Known Member
That would take a lot of thought, but the Rustler 44 would certainly be on the longlist.
dslittle
Well-Known Member
Glad you made it back safely. We are still heading North in our totally inappropriate AWB that we have been living on for the last five years...
Gerry
Well-Known Member
Self steering gear tops my requirements, followed by strong hull, cutter rig, shallow draft- makes more anchorages available.
AIS is great to have, strong dinghy ( we like the Caribe as it's very stable and has a solid bottom) and a wind generator.
We also choose low power useage to enable longer 'off-grid' voyages. Simple systems (for the same reason).
Things that have proved nice to have but not vital include great water tankage plus a small watermaker, pipe cots, ssb radio, arope cutter on the prop and lots of storage capacity.
AIS is great to have, strong dinghy ( we like the Caribe as it's very stable and has a solid bottom) and a wind generator.
We also choose low power useage to enable longer 'off-grid' voyages. Simple systems (for the same reason).
Things that have proved nice to have but not vital include great water tankage plus a small watermaker, pipe cots, ssb radio, arope cutter on the prop and lots of storage capacity.
Neil
Well-Known Member
I've been following this thread with some interest; while I have no plans to blue-water, it's nice to dream. The cost vs age argument on the type of boat design favoured is interesting but I don't think the affordability of older designs is the only factor. For example, a 20-year old Moody (going by current offerings on Apolloduck) will set you back as much as a new or nearly new BenJenBav. Are the former overpriced? Is there such sufficient market for older designed 'Blue water' boats? Would you buy a 20-25 year old boat instead of a newish boat for a cross-pond or cross Biscay trip to then cruise around the locale when you get there? Or are you going to be on permanent wanderlust?
rotrax
Well-Known Member
Which just goes to show that there is no universal panacea with boats.
IIRC when RKJ was planning his circumnavigation he would have preffered a larger steel boat-but finances were not available.
So he went with what he had-Suhali-and the rest is history.
Dave-your lovely boat is NOT inapropriate at all-it would be the envy of many!
laika
Well-Known Member
I think you're right that Mooderlies (to coin a term) are relatively expensive. Perhaps partly because many people shop for boats by making a short list of models rather than looking for a yacht with certain characteristics so well-known, relatively mass market boats from a couple of decades ago will feature on those lists.
I'm not so sure about the "as much as" statement. What figures are you assuming? If I remember the signs at boat shows correctly, bottom end of the new 12m AWB range is £160-ish k? Presumably a decent on-the-water (not even on-the-blue-water) package more. Although I see that late 90s Moody 40 mk2s are advertised in the £90-something k bracket, very tidy re-engined, re-rigged Oceanlords are £70-something k (tatty ones less) and going to 25-30 years, Moody 41cc and 40 mk1 are advertised at way below that, as are Westerly Sealords. Plus of course advertised price is not the same as sale price.
I got my Oceanlord (which was bought with blue water cruising in mind) relatively cheaply (although prices have dropped a lot since then) but even after re-rigging, re-engining an electronics upgrade and brand new sails it was still less than half what I would have had to pay for a new AWB of similar size.
Tim Good
Well-Known Member
You can't put a price on safety and I think a lot of that drives 2nd hand sales of well built boats even if the lower cost production boats can be boat nearly new at the same cost. Obviously safety is subjective and where someone might be happy doing an Atlantic circuit on a Ben, others would not and opt for a Moody.
I have to say I too paid a lot for a 13 year old well built boat and could have paid less for a 3 year old Jeanneau. 1 year on and I am still working on the refit so my time plus refit costs makes my option twice as expensive. Is it worth it. I don't know.
One thing I hear a lot though is that from the late 90's boats simply were not built the same. Same as prestige cars. They all took a turn to cheaper production around then, especially Mercedes. Even Rustler who arguably builds to best practice in the UK, are not building their hulls to the same standards as was the norm in Falmouth 15 years ago.
In my case the Ian Anderson boat I now have, I don't think you can actually go out and buy a boat built to the same spec any more. I was reliably informed that HR or Rustler won't be going to the same lengths as Mr Anderson did back then. I assume the same is the case with old Moodys or Westerlys maybe.
rotrax
Well-Known Member
If the core of what you say is correct-and I have no reason to doubt it-it makes an Island Packet even more attractive. Their build quality is better now due to technical improvements in the factory than it was when the first ones were laid down.
Bottom line is-its all been said before. As a previous poster said earlier, and I am in complete agreement, safety is subjective.
Could First Mate and I have carried out our last two seasons cruising in a Bavaria 30 Cruiser instead of our Island Packet 350-of course we could.
Would we have felt the same about crossing the Irish Sea in late September in F4-7 winds? The Bavaria would make the trip safely but, I suspect less comfortably.
We are happy with our choice, and if a change is in the wind it will be for more of the same but bigger, probably the IP SP Cruiser Motor Sailer.
First Mate says we could do without a house if we had one of them.................................
pmagowan
Well-Known Member
One problem with a new boat is that you don't know it very well. With an older boat and refit you get experience of every part of it so that when the inevitable faults occur you are already familiar with it and a solution is easier to find. If I was doing significant extended cruising I would want a boat that my hand had been all over. I don't think it is the same thing just familiarising yourself with all the mod cons you have. I am talking about the nitty gritty, taking stuff apart and putting it back together again. You need to be pretty practical if you have a problem in the middle of the Atlantic.
