What happened to the "small" "Affordable" cruisers?

[bensolomon]

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

Oh my god
Otter, look at that boat
Its so big
She looks like one of those production boats
Who understands those production boats
They only sail her because she is like like a floating condo
I mean her stern, length and beam
It's just so big
I can't believe it's so proud
It's just out there
I mean, it's gross
Look, she's just so HUGE

*rap*
I like big boats and I can not lie
You other sailors can't deny
That when a boat sails in with an itty bitty bow
And a round thing in your face
You get sprung
Wanna pull up tough
Cuz you notice that boat is stuffed
Deep in the beam she's wearing
I'm hooked and I can't stop staring
Oh, baby I wanna get with ya
And take your picture
My yachties tried to warn me
But that stern you got
Make Me so horney
Ooh, rump of smooth hull
You say you wanna get in my slip
Well use me, use me, cuz you aint that average cruisy

I've seen them sailin
To hell with a trimin
She's Sweat, Wet, got it goin like a turbo vette

I'm tired of CF and magazines
Saying narrow sterns are the thing
Take the average sailor and ask him that
She gotta pack much in back

So Fellas (yeah) Fellas(yeah)
Has your boat got the butt (hell yeah)
Well sail it, sail it, sail it, sail it, sail that healthy butt

Baby got back

I like'em round and big
And when I'm throwin a gig
I just can't help myself
I'm actin like an animal
Now here's my scandal

I wanna get you home
And UH, double up UH UH
I aint talkin bout This Old Boat
Cuz wooden parts were made for toys
I want em real thick and juicy
So find that juicy double
SB1's in trouble
Beggin for a piece of that bubble
So I'm lookin' at sailin’ videos
Knockin those Hunters sailin like hoes
You can have them J-boats
I'll keep my boat like Flo Jo
A word to the thick soul boats
I wanna get with ya
I won't cus or hit ya
But I gotta be straight when I say I wanna --
Til the break of dawn
Baby Got it sailin on
Alot of sailors won't like this song
Cuz them punks lie to hit it and quit it
But I'd rather sail and play
Cuz I'm long and I'm strong
And I'm down to get the wind on

So ladies (yeah), Ladies (yeah)
Do you wanna roll in my boat (yeah)
Then turn around
Check it out
Even Swan boys got to shout
Baby got back

Yeah baby
When it comes to boats
Cruiser Forum ain't got nothin to do with my selection
11’ beam and 5’ draft
Only if she's 22’

So your boat throws a single spreader
Playin narrow boat lists by boat writers
But they ain't got any sail power to drive the bun
My anaconda don't want none unless you've got buns hun
You can do cutters or ketches, but please don't lose that butt
Some sailors wanna play that hard role
And tell you that the stern beam and length ain't gold
So they toss it and leave it
And I pull up quick to retrieve it
So CF says you're fat
Well I ain't down with that
Cuz your volume is large and your curves are kickin
And I'm thinkin bout stickin

To the short narrow beam boats in the magazines
You be missin the cruiser thing
Give me a Hunter I can't resist her
Narrow berths and small cockpits did miss her
Some knucklehead tried to dis
Cuz his boat was on someone's list
He had game but he chose to hit 'em
And pulled up quick to get with 'em
So sailors if the butt is round
And you wanna triple X throw down
Dial 1-900-SAILBOY and kick them nasty thoughts
Baby got back
Baby got back
Big in tha middle and she got much back x4

Go sir mix a lot!!!

[jpendoley]

Originally Posted by Tillsbury

You've mentioned pretty much every area where there's significantly more cost, and we're still talking only thousands. Pricing for sails and engines when you place an order of 100 at a time is very different indeed from one-offs, and also doesn't include the "you have a big boat so can afford to pay more for your sails" factor.

By far the bigger cost is the installation of these things. Installing a 100hp engine takes pretty much the same time as installing a 29hp one. Same with pretty much every component of a boat. Some things are even easier because there's more space to work.

I doubt there's more than $50k in cost difference between a 35 and 45 foot boat (and probably a significant part of that is in the volume of glass fibre and epoxy.

Another element to the game, though, is that it's a lot easier to upsell a higher-end customer. A buyer of a 45-footer is in the market for a generator, watermaker, downwind sails, and Uncle Tom Cobbly. You don't get those high-margin add-on sales with a low-end boat.

Here’s the thing though-that 50 K is enough to price very many folks out of boating altogether. My first boat cost $6K. Had a wonderful time for seven years learning to sail and cruised her all over New England. The second boat was 10k and at 32 feet she seemed huge. I cruised with a family of four all over-40 gallons of water and ten pound ice blocks. Lived on it for five or six years too. My current Pearson 365 cost me 18K and she could take me much further-hot showers, ice cubes and forced hot air heat-undreamed of luxuries when I was Otters age. Buying small and within my means meant more time on the water, more self reliance and in the end, greater safety because I could fix anything on her. Go small and go now Otter. When you do trade up you will be in a better position to know what you need and why.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Tillsbury

I'm not sure it was bad enough to need quotation marks around it :-) The build was in 1996 (although it felt like 1975)

The craftsmen were very competent, but manufacturing things like this requires constant injection of capital and upgrading of systems. You can't keep making things by hand and then wonder why you've been overtaken by modern manufacturing methods.

They could have kept going by moving much further upmarket into custom boats, but they were never going to compete on costs with the big guys using CNC cutters.

I'm not sure that the name was associated badly with "Centaur". No-one I knew would think that -- they were associated with all sorts from the Fulmar up to the Sealord, lots of very solid and competent if unexciting mid 30-footers.

But mainly, they needed to replace their management with people willing to accept incoming investment and spending it on the ability to make money into the future.

Ahh.. They had given up the Lloyds inspectors by then though still held on to the quality build.. Investment was a problem which led to them playing round with different models on the same hulls.. with tweaks here and there..
Centaurs were their biggest selling boat at 2400 but like the m'bike industry the French were their Japan.
Cheaper and faster..

[Tillerjockey]

I think there are two primary drivers to the trend towards larger boats.

the first is technology. Roller furlers didn't always exist. You had to drag the genoa out from below and hank it on. If you needed to reduce sail, you had to haul it down store it drag a jib up, and hank it on. This limited the practical sailboat size a couple could handle to about 30 feet. With roller furling there is no need to be a weightlifter to get a sail on deck on a larger boat.

Also with modern electronics especially the autopilot. navigating a large boat long distances can easily be handled by a small crew. No need for a sextant or learn how to use one taking a noon sight, estimating speed and drift and endless tiring hours on the helm.

People want more creature comforts, and ease of operation. Bigger is better.

[sailorboy1]

I wonder why on internet forums people are so interested in what boat others choose?

[TheLuckyone]

Originally Posted by Tillerjockey

...
People want more creature comforts, and ease of operation. Bigger is better.

Not I. Granted, I'm relatively new to sailing (let alone cruising), and am still in the process of refitting my Westerly Centaur and haven't been able to spend a significant amount of time on my boat. However, I also acknowledge that my life experiences have been far from normal, growing up a poor kid in Upstate NY. I know what hard living is like, and living on a Centaur is not it. Is it cushy? Certainly not. But I don't need cushy to get by. My standards of living are less than other folk, and the positive attributes of a shorter, smaller boat are more appealing to me.

Originally Posted by sailorboy1

I wonder why on internet forums people are so interested in what boat others choose?

It generally leads folk to discuss their own boats... and who doesn't like talking about their own boat?

[BlackHeron]

People are sometimes desperate to justify (to themselves mainly) their decisions -especially when they know deep down that have paid so dearly for too much boat which they are too afraid (or too broke) to leave the marina with more than a couple of weekends a year.

[Phantom Jim]

All you need is enough. Plus a tiny smidgen.

[hartem]

I so enjoy sailing our 24" Kent Ranger. It is short and tough and old....like me. In the early 70's she was a hot ticket, now she is full of cracks and creaks and jury rigged parts. I love sailing her with my equally old decrepit husband and life is bliss. Just celebrated our 37th wedding anniversary with a day sail on the old thing and I can't trade her for nothing...I could afford bigger too, but she feels like a part of my marriage...I guess we have a threesome. Maybe a younger bigger boat will replace the old...have a feeling I would be getting replaced at the same time!! For now we are three musketeers together.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by Tillerjockey

... Roller furlers didn't always exist. You had to drag the genoa out from below and hank it on. If you needed to reduce sail, you had to haul it down store it drag a jib up, and hank it on. This limited the practical sailboat size a couple could handle to about 30 feet. With roller furling there is no need to be a weightlifter to get a sail on deck on a larger boat.

Tillerjockey, with all due respect, you have no idea what you are talking about.

We do not have roller furling. Our sails, genoa or jib, are tossed on deck and run up the head foil as easy as pie. To reduce sail we drop one on deck and run up a smaller one, often we run the new one up before dropping the old one.

Our boat is 43'. We are two old people, in our 70's. IT IS NOT TOUGH.

And actually, I've sailed on boats the size of ours with roller furling. It isn't that easy.

AND THEN, how do you get a smaller sail up? Do you propose to sail with a partially furled genoa?

Roller furling hasn't made bigger boats possible. It has made lazy sailors possible.

[Secondshift]

Originally Posted by wingssail

Tillerjockey, with all due respect, you have no idea what you are talking about.

We do not have roller furling. Our sails, genoa or jib, are tossed on deck and run up the head foil as easy as pie. To reduce sail we drop one on deck and run up a smaller one, often we run the new one up before dropping the old one.

Our boat is 43'. We are two old people, in our 70's. IT IS NOT TOUGH.

And actually, I've sailed on boats the size of ours with roller furling. It isn't that easy.

AND THEN, how do you get a smaller sail up? Do you propose to sail with a partially furled genoa?

Roller furling hasn't made bigger boats possible. It has made lazy sailors possible.

You simply run one down and the other up much like changing a hank on cept it slides in the track. We have a furler on our 26' and our 33' and I may add one to our 14.2. On the 26 we use a partially furled foam luff genny then usually go to reefed main only though we have used a storm jib on a removable solent rig .

The point was the tech makes it more practical and safer for less people to man a larger boat and it's a fact.

Do you use a windlass or is that for the lazy folk too? But certainly not an ELECTRIC one it has to be a manual. Am I right??

I just don't agree that the convenience is the lead driving factor in the absence of new build small cruisers. I stand by my original response in post #70. I'd opt for economics and diminished interest. If there was enough of a market someone would start punching them out. Catalina once closed the line for the C22 only later to be reissued as the 22 Sport. A modified plan on the same hull so she could race with her sisters. I think a furler was offered as an upgrade.

Best Regards

[boatman61]

The jib furler was invented to save the faint of heart having to make their way to the foredeck..
This has since expanded to furling mains for the even more faint hearted..

[nortonscove]

As with automobiles and houses the availability of financing and the lack of fear about having debt seems to be the biggest change. These companies know this and use it to their advantage. We all remember a time when buying something meant saving your money for at the least a downpayment. Contrast this with credit card companies offering university students their services while they are still in school. Once on the hook it's just to reel them in.

Even those with great salaries had mid twenties boats in the boomer days and they made do just like those of us that slept in the same bed as our siblings. Attitudes about a lot of things has changed including how we buy stuff.

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by jpendoley

Sails for one-1/3 to 1/2 as much. New engine-8k vs 15 k. Canvas-Dodger, basically everything is scaled down. No bow thruster which all big boats seem to have these days.
It’s absolutely nonsense to claim there is not a big difference in price. Go price an engine for a 45 footer vs a 35 and tell me what you come up with. Same for sails, windlass, ground tackle etc. It’s probably true that the hull construction costs are not to far apart, but that’s only a fraction of the cost of new or used.
Bu FYI

If you are going from a 30ft to a 50ft, yeah, the scale of the fiddly bits can easily eat up $50k.

Going from a 35-40ft, that might mean a 25hp to a 35hp. Installation cost on a new boat will not change in the least and I don't see a 7k cost for the upgrade. Particularly when talking about a builder who is buying in bulk. I would be surprised if it's a $3k increase for the engine.

Likewise, sails will be a a little more but again, nothing drastic unless you get into high end racing sails. Maybe a grand or two extra.

Bow thrusters are almost always add on items not figured into the base price.

I would bet all told to move up from 35-40ft, you are looking at $10-15k. But it's common to see prices jump by $50k or more.

If you want to argue it's $50 for a 35ft to a 45ft...maybe but I still think you are estimating too high for the cost...but that's balanced with the 45ft boat often going for something on the order of a $100k more. As long as they find buyers, the 45ft boat is more profitable.

[djousset]

""Was it just "keeping up with the Jones's" and "I want a bigger boat syndrome" that made everyone want these 40'+ behemoths? Or was there some other more "Scientific" reason behind it?""

Seems in our culture there's a never-ending drive for bigger, newer, more. Our heads swiveling about to see what everyone else is getting, making certain we are not missing out or left behind. I am happy to be left behind. For me smaller and simpler is better, certainly at the start. Moving up incrementally affords you the perspective to find your perfect fit. I've seen the swing in real estate (my chosen profession) It's the law of diminishing returns. The McMansions are losing value, the tiny house movement is on fire. I am a believer that good things come in small packages.