Which Boat

[steve yates]

It is a very unfortunate habit that Classic & Mabby boat owers here feel licenced to pour derision, insults and cynicism on the vast majority of yachts manufactured in the past 20 years. Do these same people climb out of their 1970 LandRover in a Tesco car park, walk upto a man loading his shopping and family into a Ford Focus and publically berate the guy for being stupid enough to buy a car not capable of entering the next Paris to Dakar rally.

Nothing changes here, 10 years ago I warned that the aging Brit classic/evergreen designs were vastly overpriced, in effect prices were propped up by a ponzi scheme of irrational sentimentality. The market has since crashed as I predicted.

There are many worthy attributes in these old designs and given an expensive and thorough rebuild they can become very capable sailing vessels once more. However I hate to see new entrants to yachting, who have read the dated writtings of the Hiscocks and Pardys, suckered into the ponzi scheme of Brit Mab ownership. A yacht is just a collection of manufactured components most of which are knackered after 30 years, Jerremy Rogers knows this which is why he charges £50k to remanufacture a CO32.

Couple of things come to mind Jonjo,

It appears to me, a newcomer, that it's more of a defensiveness on your part and that you are imagining your modern boats being slated. I haven't seen that on this thread. The guy simply asked for ideas, based on his own set of preferences, I'm not sure how that's such a problem?

Hiscocks and pardey's, well the knowledge may be old, but it is vast! And I don't see how genuine knowledge goes out of date. What worked for them then will still work now in terms of design and hull form surely?
Yes there are more modern and new ideas on these things now, they may, or they may not, be better? But it certainly does not negate what did work.

The cynic in me thinks that it is perfectly possible that older designs were driven by seaworthiness, and modern designs by costs, margins and sales features to attract families and charter fleets.Of course they float, and may well fly, and can cross oceans. But so can bathtubs. If I was looking at long term passages, my u.timate criteria would be a boat I felt gave me best chances of surviving a storm, period.

Oh and if cars were made from grp, a lot of old designs would still be in use and selling

I used to work on older cruise ships in the late eighties early nineties, they were built in the thirties, and in one we rode out a hurricane for three days. Never in a million years would one of her much bigger, vastly more comfortable and much posher modern contemporaries have stayed upright, we would all be dead.

For a holiday, I would choose the latter, if working on one, the former.

And lastly, there is the point of aesthetics. I was shooting a wedding on Windermere and the low wood marina had about 20 boats all lined up. All I could read was jeanneau, benneteau, Bavaria, a huge line of all white boats all looking extremely similar to my untrained eye. I thought they looked boring as ****.
Soulless.
Now that, you understand is just a purely personal reaction, and not a slight on their owners, who probably love their boats and have a ton of fun on them. You would laugh your socks off at my ugly wee boat, BUT, these personal preferences are intrinsic to owning a boat. And the OP stated his, so why bother slating him for it?

 

[Sandgrounder]

If you really knew your Nich 38 history you would know this is not 100% true. Nicholsons took a shoal draft hull of east coast american origin and then grafted on a deeper keel configuration to create the Nich 38. The result is a hull with bulbous mid sections and a tight turn to the deep keel, as a consequence the design does not have the satifying progressive motion at sea that can be expected in hulls with a better heritage.

And are they good value for money? Only if prior owners have competently addressed the following:

£8k Osmosis treatment.
£2 Rudder rebuild.
£15k for a complete replacement of the 40 year old spars and rugging.
£2k furler.
£1k Windlas.
£10k new engine
£10k complete electrical overahul.
£5k new sails
£?k new deck fittings and windows.
200+ hours of interior upgrade.
£2k new soft furnishings and cooker.
£3k fit a bow thruster

Plus 5 years of project management to oversea all the above.

Even then you have a 1970's design sized for national service vintage man of 5ft 10". A 6 footer will not have full standing headroom and the bunks are not long enough.

Jonjo Thanks. That is the sort of info which is valuable to set against my initial instinct in favour

 

[jonjo]

Jonjo Thanks. That is the sort of info which is valuable to set against my initial instinct in favour

The fundamentals of the design make the Nick 38 a good basis for your Scottish latitude sailing plan. A walk around any UK marina exposes one common theme in DIY yacht adaptations, people create all sorts of strange supplementary structures to provide protection from the weather. I chuckle each time Dylan on one of his KTL videos passes such an example and vocalizes design distress but fails to ponder the motivation.

With a Nich 38 this is elegantly built-in and combined with a deep snug cockpit, there will however be days when the large expanse of windscreen combined with heat from the undercockpit engine make for a sweltering motor sail. HRs and Malos are the best compromise in this respect with a fold up centre section to the windscreen but now we are talking about a different price bracket. I don't think Nicholson vented the engine space externally unlike superior Scandanavian design so hot engine smells add to the problem.

The hull sea motion of a Nich 38 is still very good and much kinder than modern designs, my response to an earlier post was to illustrate that his perception of classic ocean going perfection was actually a cost reducing cut & shunt design adopted by Nicholsons back in the mid 1960s.

Many of the older classic designs revered here cause liveability problems for a 6 footer because 40 years ago the 5'10" male was the target design height.

My scary list of refit costs is an extreme case and was posted to act as a warning and counter point to the strong Mabby love cult resident on Scuttlebutt and propped up by the Yachting Monthly editorial team. A Nich 38 that has benefited from 10 years of wise ownership might have 15 year old electronics but if they work that is £10k off the budget.

I sold my Nick 38 with a docmented delievery trip only rudder patch, the new owners sailed 1000+ miles for seasons with this patch. I mention this because I think it is important to keep a project classic boat in commission, enjoy the sailing even if the passage making is conservative in view of known problems. Too many Mab boat restorers get stuck in the boat yard for years and loose touch with the reality of sailing. Then in frustration they pitch up on a forum like this and tell me I own a floating caravan this is impossible to sail properly and that my boat will need to be junked soon because it is unmaintainable.

If only those AWB haters could have been aboard with me on Monday when I solo tacked up past the IOW Shingles bank against a NE wind. I am sure even the most bigoted member of the Mabby Love Cult would have smiled as we shot past Hurst with 9.7 knots SOG in a 34ft hull.

 

[Scotty_Tradewind]

the design does not have the satifying progressive motion at sea that can be expected in hulls with a better heritage.

And are they good value for money? Only if prior owners have competently addressed the following:
.

Well the list of jobs you then go on to give may apply to any boat, some no older than 5-10yrs.

I would imagine that most will have been well cared for if they command a top asking price and similar to my own 1970's boat will be a cheap option due to the amount required to do.

Not many older boats will require your list doing at one time and if surveyed and priced accordingly any boat will be a compromise between price paid and work ideally done to make the purchaser believe the deal fair.

As to the 'not having a satisfying progressive motion at sea'.... what a load of Bo88ocks! said with a
Have you ever crossed an ocean jonjo?

I'd rather that of the Nic'38 than most AWBS I've sailed! The Nic'38 will not slam at all easily and will not baulk at being sailed into a big sea as will many modern lighter faster, far more expensive yachts!

Its other terrific advantage is that it's a ketch, so the pleasure of sailing solo on a larger boat can be made easier by using more yet smaller sails if required. as/Francis Chichester on the 52' Gipsy Moth IV
The ketch also allows a crew to set far more sail on a run and the pleasures of real sailors to do that ,rather than caravaning is emmense!

S.

 

[dom]

Its other terrific advantage is that it's a ketch, so the pleasure of sailing solo on a larger boat can be made easier by using more yet smaller sails if required. as/Francis Chichester on the 52' Gypsy Moth IV
The ketch also allows a crew to set far more sail on a run and the pleasures of real sailors to do that ,rather than caravaning is emmense!

True, and Chichester would most certainly never have been interested in the ghastly modern designs, for in Gypsy Moth IV he had truly found his dream boat:

"She is cantankerous and difficult and needs a crew of three - a man to navigate, an elephant to move the tiller and a 3'6" chimpanzee with arms 8' long to get about below and work some of the gear."

​

 

[Scotty_Tradewind]

True, and Chichester would most certainly never have been interested in the ghastly modern designs, for in Gipsy Moth IV he had truly found his dream boat:

"She is cantankerous and difficult and needs a crew of three - a man to navigate, an elephant to move the tiller and a 3'6" chimpanzee with arms 8' long to get about below and work some of the gear."

​

So true, although fast through the water, the hull was, and still is, a disaster.
I followed her out of the Needles passage a few years ago. 'Is she related to a porpoise?' someone in my crew asked.

Indeed, she 'bucked' her way around the World. Even so, she was designed to make sail changes easy and that part was relatively successful although by todays standards, the equipment on board was very basic and hard to work.

I like the other quote from Francis Chichester ...
“Any damn fool can navigate the world sober. It takes a really good sailor to do it drunk.”

If anyone hasn't read it, Gipsy Moth circles the World is a good read.
https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sour...spv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=gipsy+moth+circles+the+world

S.

 

[jonjo]

Well the list of jobs you then go on to give may apply to any boat, some no older than 5-10yrs.

I would imagine that most will have been well cared for if they command a top asking price and similar to my own 1970's boat will be a cheap option due to the amount required to do.

There is no sanity in old boat asking prices which is why it is such a minefield for a newbee who has succumbed to the cult of Mabby love.

About 12 years ago I stated here that Amercians know how to price old yachts whereas British buyers get lost in subjective romantic notions of "classic" "evergreen" and Little Englander delusions about continental rubbish. An even worse fate might befall a new entrant to yachting, namely membership of the Westerly Owners Association which would be better described as The Worshipful Company Of Delusional Yacht Valuers.

The proper way to buy say a 35ft classic yacht is to start with an assumed price of £50k and then go through a greatly expanded list of my refit costs reducing the value by two thirds of the refit cost for each item requiring attention. In truth most 30 year classics are worth between minus £5k and + £10k unless they have been cherished by a knowledgable and wealthy owner.

As to the 'not having a satisfying progressive motion at sea'.... what a load of Bo88ocks! said with a
Have you ever crossed an ocean jonjo?

No just something with a more challenging wave pattern known as the English Channel.

I'd rather that of the Nic'38 than most AWBS I've sailed! The Nic'38 will not slam at all easily and will not baulk at being sailed into a big sea as will many modern lighter faster, far more expensive yachts!

I posted earlier that a Nich 38 would behave better in a nasty seaway than an AWB. My point was you believe it is a definiative blue water cruiser. It is not, a trained eye can spot where the profile of the deep long keel was grafted onto the hull lines of a shoal draft east cost Yankee yacht. It is still a lovely hull but my observation illustrates that todays revered classic was once just a production yacht made subject to economic constrains, shortcuts and sometimes manufacturing ignorance. The osmosis record of most mainstream British yachts built between 1970 and and 1985 can only be described as appaling.

 

[pvb]

... my observation illustrates that todays revered classic was once just a production yacht made subject to economic constrains, shortcuts and sometimes manufacturing ignorance. The osmosis record of most mainstream British yachts built between 1970 and and 1985 can only be described as appaling.

Very true. Boat manufacturing in those days, even with the bigger builders, was very shabby. I bought 3 new Westerly yachts between 76 and 86, and visited the factory on a few occasions. To say it was thinly-disguised chaos would be flattering. Unfortunately, at that time, there were few alternatives at prices I'd have found affordable.

 

[doug748]

Before this endless new v old debate goes further can I just say that while I appreciate the sense of what the AWB folk have to say; I will not be buying one because they don't appeal to me either aesthetically, emotionally of practically. It seems to me that as I am going to be spending my money on a boat for me, I might as well buy a boat that I like, whatever anyone else thinks.
Thanks for your contributions

Bravo that man.

This is an example of the yacht in question, I have no doubt you have spotted it Sandgrounder:

http://www.theyachtmarket.com/boats_for_sale/1200631/

I must say they do scrub up rather well.

 

[pvb]

Bravo that man.

This is an example of the yacht in question, I have no doubt you have spotted it Sandgrounder:

http://www.theyachtmarket.com/boats_for_sale/1200631/

I must say they do scrub up rather well.

Looks like a museum exhibit. :nonchalance:

 

[jonjo]

Bravo that man.

This is an example of the yacht in question, I have no doubt you have spotted it Sandgrounder:

http://www.theyachtmarket.com/boats_for_sale/1200631/

I must say they do scrub up rather well.

That's a good looking example, however:

Note the low water tank capacity, not exactly a blue water number @ 175 l. My tank has osmosis blisters in it as it was moulded into the hull bilge.
The gas bottle arrangement is very basic as the bottle lives under the hob in the galley and screws directly into the underside of the hob (unless upgraded by now).
The aft heads is hoplessly small.
Gold coloured spars, they look orginal i.e. 40+ years old. When did gold anodised spars go out of fashion, 1975?

All the extra stays for the mizzen create an obstacle course when moving around the deck and all for a poxy 100 sq ft of extra sail.

I never found where Nicholsons hid the Hostess Trolley.

 

[Shuggy]

What I tend to do when I am on the sofa is look at the prices of MABs in the USA. It is absolutely incredible what you can buy over the pond for about £20k. Yes, there's VAT to pay and all that, but try a search like this:

http://www.yachtworld.co.uk/core/li...=10000&fromLength=40&slim=quick&is=false&No=0

 

[jonjo]

Look at this for £13.5k.

http://www.yachtworld.co.uk/boats/1973/Soverel-Cutter-2853108/United-States#.VuyDY_mLRmM

Classic 41ft, £25k refit 10 years ago. Two Schaefer furlers.

 

[Sandgrounder]

What I tend to do when I am on the sofa is look at the prices of MABs in the USA. It is absolutely incredible what you can buy over the pond for about £20k. Yes, there's VAT to pay and all that, but try a search like this:

http://www.yachtworld.co.uk/core/li...=10000&fromLength=40&slim=quick&is=false&No=0

Shuggy,

There is indeed some remarkable value for money compared to the UK market. That is assuming that they are sound.
I recall reading a Tom Cunliffe article about buying and importing his present boat from the US. I'll have to have a look. I'm probably too chicken to attempt the same

 

[Shuggy]

Sandgrounder

You sound like a man who's done a lot of sailing. But think of the added bonus of buying a boat on the eastern seaboard of the USA and being compelled to sail her back over to the UK. Best excuse ever for a boys' trip!

 

[Sandgrounder]

Look at this for £13.5k.

http://www.yachtworld.co.uk/boats/1973/Soverel-Cutter-2853108/United-States#.VuyDY_mLRmM

Classic 41ft, £25k refit 10 years ago. Two Schaefer furlers.

Extraordinarily good value

 

[Sandgrounder]

Sandgrounder

You sound like a man who's done a lot of sailing. But think of the added bonus of buying a boat on the eastern seaboard of the USA and being compelled to sail her back over to the UK. Best excuse ever for a boys' trip!

I have done a fair bit but no more than lake sailing for the last 15 years. Maybe a bit of a big (re)starter trip!

 

[Tranona]

Extraordinarily good value

Don't get too excited! The reason they are cheap over there is because nobody wants shabby old boats (and they will be shabby) and there is no market for them in Europe partly because it cost between £8-10k to get it here - most unlikely that any boat like that would be capable of getting here under its own steam, partly because you then have to pay 20% VAT on the cost plus the shipping, so your cost on a £13k boat is now well over £25k, and finally you cannot use it legally in the EU without getting a CE mark which is probably impossible with that boat.

TCs boat is in a different league - both the much higher cost (and value) so could carry the shipping cost, but more importantly it needed minimal work to get its CE mark having just been fitted with a European spec engine and all the design data was available to do the stability calculations.

Think about, if those cheap old boat were worth having in Europe everybody would be rushing over there and buying them up - but they are not. The introduction of the RCD in 1998 plus the falling value of the £ against the $killed the small trade there was in earlier times.

 

[Shuggy]

For what it's worth, I'd rather own an old boat. In fact, I do own an old boat. For me, buying cheap and performing a rolling restoration on a beautiful old girl is the way to go. I've only been on a modern boat twice and it was fine, but I prefer my relatively cramped ancient 43 footer. Which is why I'd head state-side to pick up a cheap MAB because they really don't value old non-volume yachts - hence why they're gobsmackingly cheap.

 

[Shuggy]

Unless I'm missing something (and I could be - it's late and I can't be bothered to watch any more Sport Relief before bed) then CE marking does not apply to any of the boats I posted in my link, so they're still cheap. As a bungling amateur I would think that VAT is the only thing payable - perhaps I'm wrong? I tried to buy two boats in the states before I bought my current one, and CE marking did not feature on my To Do list, as both of them were well before '98 ('70 and '62 if you're asking).

Don't get too excited! The reason they are cheap over there is because nobody wants shabby old boats (and they will be shabby) and there is no market for them in Europe partly because it cost between £8-10k to get it here - most unlikely that any boat like that would be capable of getting here under its own steam, partly because you then have to pay 20% VAT on the cost plus the shipping, so your cost on a £13k boat is now well over £25k, and finally you cannot use it legally in the EU without getting a CE mark which is probably impossible with that boat.

TCs boat is in a different league - both the much higher cost (and value) so could carry the shipping cost, but more importantly it needed minimal work to get its CE mark having just been fitted with a European spec engine and all the design data was available to do the stability calculations.

Think about, if those cheap old boat were worth having in Europe everybody would be rushing over there and buying them up - but they are not. The introduction of the RCD in 1998 plus the falling value of the £ against the $killed the small trade there was in earlier times.