Which Boat (with requirements / budget)

[seanicroute]

Yes, it's one of those questions.


Budget 50k. Length 30-40' Semi Displacement (able to get on plane if you must; with decent (not trawler like) fuel economy at slower speeds). OR; sea kindly / worthy MY/Powerboat (is there such a thing?) Pure trawler will not do, due to jobs/school etc and wanting to occasionally go further than the local 50mile radius.



Understand that at this budget point it'll be older.



Goal: Weekend cruising with the Family. Occasional Hopping over to the Bahamas for a month or so, prefer to stay on the hook vs. Marina. Sailed Bahamas on a 46' Sailboat for a year, with the family but jobs and house now mean we need a faster boat for the occasional jaunt. We are located on the Florida East Coast. This is an in-between boat, long term plan when kids are off to college in 5+ years is a sailing catamaran.



Tollycraft 34 came to mind, unable to find one on the east coast though. Thoughts for similar boats?


Thanks in advance.

[rslifkin]

Within your budget, a gas powered motoryacht type is probably going to give you the most boat. While diesels are more efficient, they'll likely put you over-budget in just about any boat.

If you intend to run slow a lot, I'd tend to stay away from the Sea Ray type express cruiser hulls as they tend to handle poorly at low speeds. Something like my boat is likely a better fit (bigger rudders, deeper forefoot, only slightly slower). As an example, my boat will cruise at 17 - 18 kts very happily and with pretty good handling until the fuel tanks are dry (which doesn't take long at 30 gal/hr). Or slow down to 6.5 - 7 kts (provided no large following seas) and burn 5 - 6 gal/hr (fuel burn per mile is about half vs running on plane). Plenty of others from the 70s and 80s will perform similarly at a fairly low purchase price.

Ability to stay on the hook will mostly come down to a couple of things: how you configure the electrical / battery setup and how much water you can carry (unless you add a watermaker). Plenty of boats in your budget can be made plenty self sufficient easily enough.

[Lepke]

The longer the boat, the faster it goes without needing huge hp.
I have an 83' boat that makes 12+ knots with 2 200 hp engines. It originally made 22 knots with 2 900 hp engines.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by Lepke

The longer the boat, the faster it goes without needing huge hp.
I have an 83' boat that makes 12+ knots with 2 200 hp engines. It originally made 22 knots with 2 900 hp engines.

That's a very good point. Getting speed like a smaller planing hull requires a lot of length though (like your boat). But going a bit longer does buy you a faster "slow cruise" for typically very little extra fuel burn vs the smaller boat. However, the bigger boat will be either slower or thirstier on plane, as within a given hull design it's basically a game of less weight = faster (although design differences can have a surprising influence).