Well we have been living on Two Drifters our (new to us) L440 2008 for three months and have to say that we are really happy.
Especially with how sit lies to
anchor, we have only had to go into and pay for a marina about four times and we have had some quite punchy
wind in the Northern
Med.
Biggest problem was hooking a
mooring buoy chain one evening when lifting the
anchor to move, the
wind really got up and we had to dump the anchor and 80m of chain on the bottom, but we buoyed the chain with fenders and went back the next morning and with the aid of the dive tank soon had it all back on board.
A few questions for more seasoned owners:
We have a Quick windless which does not seem man enough for the job, any suggested upgrades, it is constantly tripping the switch at the most inopportune times and we are driving the
boat to the chain rather than using the windless to pull her up.
We also have one tab delaminated just under the port stairs below the
bilge access panel, not to worried as it is easy to fix, but at sea and when riding the anchor we get quite a bit of flex in this area and resultant squeaking. I can see the base of the steps around the floor soles moving about 2mm? Should I be worried or is a little flex pretty normal. Certainly on past boats I have not worried, but this is our first cat and I do not want the two hulls pulling against each other and damaging themselves.
Other than that we have been lucky I think, loads of stuff does not
work properly, but we are getting through the list bit by bit.
Heading further south in a few days for Ibiza and then onwards into the
Med. Just having one of our
raw water pumps repaired for the starboard
engine. Some bright spark fixed it before our time and only used one bearing and not two, end result a bit of cavitation and resultant leak. But no biggy.
Also any suggestions for the
shower drains, ours seem to have a manual override which looks to be a retro fit, but the automatic
pump is a bit sporadic.
Wishing all 440 owners a happy season
Fergus
Two Drifters
Lymington