Dix 43, Adams 40, Roberts 43, Alan Pape 39 Cruiser, Ebbtide 39

[Lee Austin]

Dear Members,

I am seeking you opinions on the steel boats above. Currently sailing wooden Vertue. I am looking for a steel go anywhere boat suited to short handed sailing. Cutter rig without bowsprit to keep LOA manageable in close quarters, centre cockpit, low freeboard, good tracking, sea kindliness, pointing ability. And good distance run. It will be home so could use a bit of space but not at the expense of good sailing characteristics. Another boat I have considered is the Trireme 38. Tall order!

Head steers me towards southern hemisphere designs as in Dix and Adams as they are designed for tough conditions and offer respectable 24hr run distances for steel monohulls what with fin/keel and skeg configurations. Concerned about exposed prop on Adams 40 however. Heart tends towards slower but perhaps more sea kindly three quarter keel boats from Alan Pape, perhaps from my experiences with the Vertue. Yes, I’m struggling with the compromise.

Yachting Monthly magazine in the UK designed a theoretical blue water cruiser from pooling ideas from a variety of experts. They came up with the YM 36. The significance of this design is that it is a fin keel with integrated skeg profile. Can I confidently walk away from the three quarter keel for the sake of improved run distance and not lose sea kindliness and tracking ability?

Any thoughts gratefully appreciated.



Lee Austin.

[Steve Pope]

The Roberts 43 mauritius and Norfolk has the same hull form as the Off shore 44 roberts 45 and Roberts 45 classic. The differences are in the keel and the transom, either full keel with keel hung rudder or short keel with the rudder on a skeg. The transom can be regular or reverse or on one I have see the builder had it vertical. the Classic has a slight clipper bow. These are solid boats that cruise well and can put in reasonable averages if attention is payed to sailing them well.

[waikikin]

My vote would go to the Adams, through familiarity & a great design, then maybe the dix but not that knowledgable on them, the Roberts last & the other choices I have no experience with so wont comment on em, All the best in your search from Jeff.

[Lee Austin]

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for your input.

What are your thoughts on the exposed prop on the Adams? The fin and skeg profile tracks well - will she hold her course or does she need constant tweaking? And sea kindliness?

Thanks,

Lee.

[Weyalan]

My partner's parents live-aboard full-time on a steel Adams 40'. It is the centre-cockpit, cutter rigged, lifting centreboard (for shoal draft) version. They are in their 60's, but have no problem sailing the boat 2-up anywhere they want to go (mostly up and down the east coast of Australia). I spent a couple of weeks on board with them; the boat seemed to perform relatively well, both upwind and downwind, and under motor, considering it is a steel boat with full live-aboard gear and we were 4 adults + 2 kids on board. So the Adams 40 gets my vote.

[Brent Swain]

Check Metalboatsociety.com for a discussion on skeg failures of Roberts boats. No reason they can't be improved ,altho Roberts says he designs them to fall off if they hit anything.
A couple of dagger board trunks angled out at the stern should help a lot in heavy running conditions in the southern ocean. An outboard rudder would drastically simplify the trimtab self steering steering and make it bulletproof as well as allow a bulletproof trimtab steering system for inside steering.
Brent Swain
brentswain38@yahoo,.ca