Wharram Tiki 38 vs Mike Waller CS35

[Malapropos]

I am going to start a catamaran. I have narrowed it down to a Wharram Tiki 38 or a Mike Waller Coral Sea 35. Both have similar waterline lengths and load capacity. I know Wharram has a good record. The Waller sits higher and has more freeboard which would make for a dryer cruise in chop but that also means higher profile to the wind. Both have Polynesian Bows The Waller has sugar scoops for the sterns while the Wharram of course is a double ended canoe. The Wharram is lashed together while the Waller is solid mounted. I guess my main hang up is how low the Tiki 38 appears to ride in the water and the fact that you are relying on lashings to hold the boat together. Any insight from anyone would be appreciated.
Mike Waller Yacht Design - Coral Sea 35 Catamaran
https://www.wharram.com/site/catalog...designs/tiki38

[snort]

You've got two very different designs there, so let me throw in one other designer whose catamarans you may not have yet considered: Sailing Catamarans - First Choose a Design

Hopefully, you'll be able to go aboard both of your choices before you go through the very long process of building a certain design. You really want to make sure you're building what you really want before you buy all that material.

[44'cruisingcat]

Of the two, I'd build the Waller.

[double u]

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post2572367

[navysurfer]

I have very dear friend , he and his wife sailed from South Africa to Florida and are now in the Bahamas. The boat is a Wharram Tiki 38. He goes in depth about the boat, on

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CKqexz5YIA&t=133s

Beautiful boat, A new builder is meeting them next week in Bahamas,
Anyway hope it helps.

Pop's

[double u]

I'd love to see them "lounging on deck" when the Wharram is beating north in the RS against 25 gusting 30...

[alansmith]

Double U, if you watched their video's on Lucky Fish you would know that he knows his vessel and continuously develops it. What boat would you be lounging on deck in the same conditions?

Wharrams are not for everyone. Personally i dig them...They are all over the world and LuckyFish has plenty of sea miles that million dollar boats haven't made it out of their own zip codes. At least this chap is out doing it. Not an expensive GB...lashings...and away you go. The concept has survived for millenium in Polynesia. You can maintain these boats with fiberglass, paint, rope, and some basic skills.

Be happy for them...I'd trade places with him in a heartbeat to get out of corporate strifedom.

[Boatguy30]

Was it the cat Facebook group you posted this’s on also a few days ago?

I looked at the Waller briefly but went with a Woods bridgedeck cat. There’s a lot of nasty weather even in the bahamas in winter when an open bridgedeck cat is going to see you hole up in the hulls for days on end.

[Fore and Aft]

The Wharram is always going to have lower resale value and is a much smaller cat even if it is longer. Those V hulls lose a lot of room.
I am not sure if l have ever surveyed a Waller cat but the Easy designs are similar and they are way better than a Wharram.
Still it is a personal choice and if time and money is limited then you will be afloat way quicker building a Wharram.
Cheers

[double u]

"... to get out of corporate strifedom..." - a Wharram is not the only alternative to that!
It looks like all those open-bridgedeck-cat-advocates never had to commute from one hull to the other in rough going or a in downpour at anchor, or they'd value a bridgedeck-cabin higher.
"The concept has survived for millenium in Polynesia" - hardly a valid argument, as so have tooth extractions without anaesthetics & high infant mortality. The ancient polynesians made do with what materials they had & made epic voyages (with losses we do not know about...), let's do the same & make the most out of our contemporary materials.
As I've written time & again:
in no way do I regret building our Tangaroa in the 70ies, it was a great adventure for a landlubber³ youngster, & more so our 7 year rtw with it - BUT: we could have done better with another boat - & with todays used-boat-market a self-build only makes sense if one is
1. an accomplished craftsman
2. one has a lot of sailing experience & needs (or believes so) a very special vessel

but what do I know...

[boatman61]

If you want shelter on deck while sailing you design and make one of these.. used to sleep under it and it kept me dry from the bow wave spray from two hulls when doing 11kts along the UK coast all year round.
Two pic's below.. hood up and hood folded down.. a little imagination some canvas and sailormakers needle and palm go a long way..
Took me 3 winter months of hand sewing.. 6ft deep and 11ft wide.
The existing ideas on the site/plans were ugly, boxy and clumsy.

[double u]

bm61, do not lose sight of reality:
it is extremely farfetched to assume that anybody else these days would be anywhere as tough as to enjoy serious sailing in UK waters with a small Wharram cat (much less cross oceans...). it HAS been done, the UK waters by you, rtw by us (with a much bigger boat - still "expeditionary chacter" the whole undertaking had!)
we had Austrian friends with whom we met up again & again during the 2nd half of the Wharram-rtw, they were on a 24' Whiting "Reactor". while the motion of their boat certainly was very much more unpleasant than the motion of our 34' cat, under certain conditions they were much more comfortable than we were...

[double u]

@Malapropos: what is your sailing background?

[boatman61]

Just saying.. solutions for deck shelters are out there.. and they can be aerodynamic if your prepared to step out of the box of lazy designers

[double u]

bm61, few come as tough as we were on the Tangaroa, & much less as you on the little Tiki...
(sure, Rory took a small Wharram rtw, but not without reason it was called "Cooking Fat"...)
imho there is one benchmark for a boat being the "close-to-ideal" rtw boat for somebody: if they did it TWICE in the same boat - now there gotta be very few Wharrams in that crowd, very few if any...