Reconstructing Interiors?

[JustInTheBreeze]

My wife and I are planning on taking our two kids on a 5 to 10 year sailing adventure. We want to wait untill our youngest is old enough to safely navigate around a sailboat without us waking up in the middle of the night and running to their bunks to check on them.
We have never owned our own boat, so we are pretty ignorant to the construction of boats. We want a blue water capable boat since we will be crossing both the Atlantic and Pacific. We also don't want to spend a fortune on some giant rig that takes up the biggest slips. But considering we have a boy and girl, we need a 3 cabin layout so they can have a space to call their own. This epic vacation will be for educational adventure as well, we'll be home schooling them and trying to locate educational things to do at different locations. Learning from doing is better and more fun than looking at a text book.
My questions (finally);
1-Is there a specific hull design needed to be blue water capable
2-If we found a good size 2 cabin boat, or any boat for this question, can the interior be changed? i.e. Move cabins around, add cabins, or just completely remove interior and have a contractor rebuild it to our specifications?

Thanks for enduring this lengthy post and any advice and or personal experiences shared.
Justin and family

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by JustInTheBreeze

2-If we found a good size 2 cabin boat, or any boat for this question, can the interior be changed? i.e. Move cabins around, add cabins, or just completely remove interior and have a contractor rebuild it to our specifications?

All your other questions have been argued ad infinitum.

This one is interesting as I can clearly tell you absolutly not. However others will say they are doing it/ have done it.

Basically if there is only 1 aft cabin the galley will be now blocking that 'door'. So you need to move the galley. i.e shuffle the whole boat around.

There is a vast number of 3 cabin boats out there so you should never need to worry about that as a problem.

All the best.


Mark

[CharlieCobra]

I'm completely redoing Oh Joy's interior. The only thing that won't change much is the head, other than having a drain pan for a shower. The nice thing about wooden boats is that you can move bulkheads, unlike plastic ones where they are tabbed in. The thing to watch for though is that those bulkheads in wooden boats also help support the deck and cabin rail beams. You have to place a temporary brace until the bulkhead is attached in it's new spot.

[roverhi]

Think about a boat with two quarter berths. One couple with a preteen boy had a large quarter berth for him. He had all his toys and cloths stored in lockers along the side. Could be closed off with curtains for privacy. It would make the cost and size of the boat way more affordable.

The Tartan 41 is one boat that comes to mind. The aft part of that boat under the cockpit is wide open. A partition down the center and curtains would make two really comfortable sleeping areas for the Kids.

Aloha
Peter O.

[James S]

Having a contractor put a whole new interior in your boat would cost more than a house in most places.
There are lots of layout choices in the market.
If your serious about this then you could do some homework by using the Google box in the search ....after that you may have more specific questions.
Welcome to the forum and good luck.

[Catamount]

As above:

(1) having somebody else re-do your boat interior will likely be cost prohibitive, but doing the work yourself could be a fun project

and

(2) How much of a separate "cabin" do kids really need? Pilot berths or quarter berths that can be curtained off may well be sufficient.