MULTIHULL MONOHULL SURVEY

[SeaKing]

Hey Sandy,

Good to see you here, this is a GREAT board. People and Information.

[Therapy]

Originally Posted by sandy daugherty

What a great forum, Hud! Thank you for telling me about it!
I lost a tooth recently. It's wrapped up in a lottery ticket under my pillow, with a gentle note to the tooth fairy describing the infinite advantages of my winning enough money to buy, dock, and care for a MaineCat 41 and a hybrid Outremer 42 together. I need both so I can finally decide which is the best way to sail. The next drawing is Friday, so I'll be busy placing those orders next week.

You are new enough here to maybe not know that I am first in line when a cat (cruising catamaran) is given away. It's true.
So, when you find yourself in receipt of the two new ones perhaps an older one could be given away. Or the one you like the least.
Thanks.

[videorov]

I like the front steering design on that boat but wonder if its dry there?

[Hud3]

Originally Posted by sandy daugherty

What a great forum, Hud! Thank you for telling me about it!
I lost a tooth recently. It's wrapped up in a lottery ticket under my pillow, with a gentle note to the tooth fairy describing the infinite advantages of my winning enough money to buy, dock, and care for a MaineCat 41 and a hybrid Outremer 42 together. I need both so I can finally decide which is the best way to sail. The next drawing is Friday, so I'll be busy placing those orders next week.

Hi, Sandy.

Good to have you here on CF. We welcome people with open minds about multis vs monos!

[Llamster]

what if you don't own any?

[sandy daugherty]

My mind is not really mine but after what I've done to it I don't think they want it back. Oh, you mean own a boat! Well buy one! Or don't and say you did! But please, make it a multihull; that initial departure from the 'wisdom of the ages' opens the door for far more interesting views, and jars the sanctity of "mono"-thiesm.
Some advice: compose your posts off line so you can re-read them a few times, in the hope of making sense to someone else. My borrowed mind wanders around while its waiting for my two fingers to catch up....

[Llamster]

hahalollol

i would have typed "lol" but it has to be at least 10 characters long =/

[Toys_with_time]

I currently own a Hanse 370e (cruiser / racer in stock form) and would put her up against most 2 hull cruising multi's in a race but, and its a big but, when its 20 to 25 across the deck we're hanging on to anything available and if I've got young kids on board they're looking decidely nervous. We chartered a cat (Seawind 1000) and the kids were playing monopoly a few feet from me while my wife was reading a book and I was having a ball sailing on my own in 20 plus knots.

After many years of offshore sailing in mono's I still love them and think they are prettier to look at plus I love the motion and feedback from the wind and waves. However my knees and hips dont work as well as they used to and a stable relatively level platform makes life a lot easier and safer. If I want non hardcore sailing guests to relax and enjoy themselves there is in mho no comparison. I'm hoping to buy a 40' cat and would need to win the lottery and buy a very big mono to be able to entertain 15 - 20 guests in similar comfort.

Whether its any faster from a to b will depend on where the winds coming from but then different mono designs also have their preferred point of sailing and a given hull will have a bias towards up or down wind sailing.

Regardless of who gets to the anchorage fastest I just know which will be the more popular boat for sundowners

[swagman]

All I've ever owned and raced are monos.
But I'm converted now.
I've fallen for the Gunboats - 48 or 53.
After seeing how high and fast these guys can move in Antigua Race Week 2008 - my past beliefs have been disproved.
Cruising at 16 knots has an appeal. Plus climbing over 60 foot mono's on the race track is not exactly unappealing either. Plus they look really good.
The minimal interiors also suit my style - so if our lottery gave the couple of million dollars needed - a trade up would be on.
JOHN

[Southern Star]

Toys and Swagman, I suspect that you are going to hear about this from some die-hard monohullers. What is interesting to me is that you are both extremely experienced monohullers who are attracted to cruising cats, albeit different types and for entirely different reasons: Toys for the cruising comfort and stability, and Swagman for the performance that is available in boats like the Gunboats, which admittedly have no particular advantage in interior accomodation over many modern monohulls.

I too was a lifetime monohull man who has only recently made the switch to cats; I too still appreciate the look and 'feel' of a mono, but gave that up for reasons somewhat akin to Toys (although as mine will also be used for charter snorkeling and sunset cruises, I absolutely required the additional deck space of a cat). I can also say that, once my new business is up and running and I have the free time for some more personal cruising, I will be tempted, like John, to go for the performance end of the cat spectrum (if, and that is a big 'if'. I can afford it).

Brad

[skifinnatic]

50' Lagoon all the way....love those anchoring options in shallow water!!!!

[GordMay]

Some kind of Catamaran - probably power.
This, from a life-long monohull sailor.
Did I just admit that I might be afflicted with a desire for increased stability, deck & cabin space, speed, and a reduced draft?

[Joli]

I'll pipe up since I have not posted in a while.

I would have to agree with Toys the bigger platform is going to be more comfortable but a 42 foot boat with a 28 foot beam will have expensive docking unless the pier end is open. Those that are new to sailing are uncomfortable with healing and the cat removes that worry. Parking near a shore can be good or can be bad. Certainly it is convenient and more anchorages are open to the shallow draft but the shore can become lee and bugs can be a problem.

I would tend to disagree with Swagman about passage speeds for a cat. Cruising cats are simply not that fast. The passage times for the 2007 ARC shows that Swagman finished with a Catana 471. Passage speeds respective were 6.82 and 6.75 or a 5 hour difference over 2600 miles. That was trade wind sailing ideally suited to the multi hull but only one cat averaged 200 miles per day (a Lagoon 67) versus nine monos that made 200 miles per day. I did post Heineken Reg times in an earlier post and the Gunboats seemed to get around the course in about the same time as similar well sailed monos of the same size.

IMO, comfort goes to the cat, speed is a wash, a mono has ultimate stability, and some cats will be livable if inverted.

Every boat is a compromise, choose from the matrix that works best for you.

Originally Posted by Southern Star

Toys and Swagman, I suspect that you are going to hear about this from some die-hard monohullers. What is interesting to me is that you are both extremely experienced monohullers who are attracted to cruising cats, albeit different types and for entirely different reasons: Toys for the cruising comfort and stability, and Swagman for the performance that is available in boats like the Gunboats, which admittedly have no particular advantage in interior accomodation over many modern monohulls.

I too was a lifetime monohull man who has only recently made the switch to cats; I too still appreciate the look and 'feel' of a mono, but gave that up for reasons somewhat akin to Toys (although as mine will also be used for charter snorkeling and sunset cruises, I absolutely required the additional deck space of a cat). I can also say that, once my new business is up and running and I have the free time for some more personal cruising, I will be tempted, like John, to go for the performance end of the cat spectrum (if, and that is a big 'if'. I can afford it).

Brad

[Southern Star]

Joli, how many Gunboats, Outremers and Fastcats were in the fleet? Frankly, most consider those to be at the performance end of the cruising cat spectrum, whereas the Catanas - while able peformers (and better than many cruising cats upwind due to the boards), are more oriented to comfortable cruising because of their displacement.

If there were the same number of performance cats as monos, and if they were of comparable size, and if they had crews that were of comparable size and with comparable ages and levels of experience on their respective boats, then the total number of monos versus cats that had 200 mile days would have some statistical significance. And I say that even though the 200 mile day is, while oft cited, an arbitrary standard, or cutoff point.

What I do know is that Gunboats and Outremers are quite capable of (and have been filmed sailing at) sustained speeds in excess of 20 knots - something that performance oriented cruising monohulls of comparable size can only dream of (or at best, achieve for brief periods when surfing). Will they be faster in all conditions? No. But their ultimate, achievable performance is still superior as they are not constrained by their LWL in the same way, or at least to the same degree as a cruising monohull.

Brad

[Joli]

Brad, all I can do is point out race and rally results for say a Swan 68 versus a Gunboat 62, comparable boats for sure by price. At the Heiniken Cup they sailed the course in ~ the same time.

The ARC results stand on their own. The multis were Lagoons, Catana's, FP, Broadblue, Sunbeams and probably others I do not recognize. The course was broad reaching and the multis sailed to their waterline speed potential just as did the monos. Once you get much deeper then 135 degrees the sail carrying advantage of the catamaran disapears. How else do you explain the ARC results?

Swagman states it would be wonderful to cruise all day at 16 but the reality is a 400 mile day in any cruising boat will be very dificult unless you have a 400 mile a day waterline. I'm an open minded guy, point me to rally results or a blog that shows Gunboats sailing 400 mile days. Day in and day out. Fastcat is on here quite a bit. I like and respect Gideon but I have yet to read a blog from any Fastcat owners who are cranking off 400 mile days, 300 mile days, or even 200 mile days. As near as I can tell Gideon is the only Fastcat owner who has made passages of better then 200 miles and from the sailing history I've gleaned on this site Gideon has more then a few miles and knows how to make a boat go.

As I said before, every boat is a comprimise, pick the features that are important to you. But if you think passage times in a multi are quicker then in a mono, you better think again.

Originally Posted by Southern Star

Joli, how many Gunboats, Outremers and Fastcats were in the fleet? Frankly, most consider those to be at the performance end of the cruising cat spectrum, whereas the Catanas - while able peformers (and better than many cruising cats upwind due to the boards), are more oriented to comfortable cruising because of their displacement.

If there were the same number of performance cats as monos, and if they were of comparable size, and if they had crews that were of comparable size and with comparable ages and levels of experience on their respective boats, then the total number of monos versus cats that had 200 mile days would have some statistical significance. And I say that even though the 200 mile day is, while oft cited, an arbitrary standard, or cutoff point.

What I do know is that Gunboats and Outremers are quite capable of (and have been filmed sailing at) sustained speeds in excess of 20 knots - something that performance oriented cruising monohulls of comparable size can only dream of (or at best, achieve for brief periods when surfing). Will they be faster in all conditions? No. But their ultimate, achievable performance is still superior as they are not constrained by their LWL in the same way, or at least to the same degree as a cruising monohull.

Brad