SWAN 40 new owner

[jamrocksailing]

Hi all,

I have just purchased a Swan 40 and are based in Jamaica. I was wondering is there any other Swan owners that can help me in getting some spares for the yacht. For example, the baby stays deck seal joint?

As you can appreciate being in Jamaica parts are not the easiest.

Look forward to any assistant.

[skipmac]

Hi Jamrock and welcome to the forum,

Not sure about the deck seal joint you ask about but you might discover that most of the parts on your boat are not made by Swan but are available from regular marine suppliers. Most boat almost everything except the hull and interior cabinetry is made by another company and installed by the builder. Engines, pumps, electric panels, mast, rigging, sails, winches, windlasses, lights and more are usually from outside suppiers.

For the deck seal joint, if you can post a photo maybe someone can spot a replacement for it.

So where in Jamaica do you keep your boat? Kingston, MoBay or in between?

[jamrocksailing]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. Attached is an image. Its the section where the baby stay goes through the deck. Its not deck mounted as its a hydraulic to control the tension. The deck rubber seal is cracked so water comes in.

The yacht has a cover so you remove the babystay when not sailing

It is kept in Kingston, the harbor is a great place to teach the family sailing.

Any help you can be would be much appreciated.

[geoleo]

HUH? Just scrap out the old caulking, Mask it neatly and recaulk with Boatlife.

[jamrocksailing]

Hi,

Unfortunately its not chalking its like a rubber gasket as the baby stay needs to slide up and down, thus it needs to be able to slide in the join. Its not a fixed join on the deck.

The issues is when you don't have the baby stay up people hit the join with their feet and thus breaks the rubber.

I put a boat cover on the yacht to protect the tweak decks and need to unhook the baby stay each time we leave the yacht.

[skipmac]

I would try to make one out of some kind of rubber or neoprene. Got any old 7 mil wet suits or maybe a heavy truck tire inner tube? Cut out a piece the right size, make a hole in it and attach to the fitting.

[Tillsbury]

You can be almost sure that wasn't made by Swan. I would be removing the entire fitting from the deck and looking for a manufacturer's name. And, if replacing it, I'd probably look very carefully at whether I really wanted a hole in the deck this far forward of the mast anyway. I'd be tempted to replace it with a solid fitting and a dyneema tackle or similar that could easily be tensioned or released to bring the babystay back.

[TomNH]

I own a Swan too. Welcome to Club Swan. There are owners groups on Facebook for each of the designers. Nautor, unlike many builders, do manufacture a lot of bespoke fittings, but have a parts service. Not cheap, with a hefty handling fee, but will get it make whatever you need, including obscure seals and bespoke deck fittings to match existing.

They are brilliantly built boats. Do you have all the documentation? The owners manual is useful but the full wiring and systems drawings are really handy.

Enjoy her.

Tom

[Seighlor]

I sailed a Swan 441 for fifteen years. She was a beauty to sail. As mentioned by TomNH, Nautor does make a lot of its own hardware. At the time of my ownership, they would manufacture any part I needed. But OH BOY, you will pay dearly. I suggest looking for alternatives.

[sailormed]

You need something like this. In french it is called “soufflet”, in dutch “balg”. Don’t know the english word for it.
It is used a lot in industrial machinery. If you search you can find semi-on demand dimensions for topside diam, bottom diam and length. I found a comp. in France for my autopilot installation some years ago. Good luck.

[Alan j]

Hi Jamrock. I also own a S&S Swan 40. I have tried to attach a picture of the baby stay tang on my boat which is Hull # 9. The tang is attached to a bulk head down below and is about three feet long. I have a tall rig with double spreaders. When I bought there was no baby stay and the previous owner sailed it that way. Also a rigger told me that it wasn’t needed in part because the large section of mast. I decided to put one on anyway because the boat only has single lowers. A good source of information specific to S&S Swans is the S&S Swan Association. Check out there website. They also have a forum. Another possible source of information is the boatyard in Jamestown RI where these boats where commissioned; although, some of the 40s where commissioned by Palmer Johnson and marketed as P&J 40s. I tried to attach a picture but probably without success. Good luck with your Swan.
Alan

[Alan j]

It just occurred to me that you probably don’t have an S&S Swan 40 but a Frers one.
Alan

[DougR]

I had a similar situation with the hydraulic back stay adjuster on my boat. There was some corrosion on the top surface of the cylinder and I wanted to protect it from sea water, so I went to the local NAPA automobile parts store and had a look thru their rubber boots for auto steering cylinders and tie rods. The boot (gator) that connects to the tie rod on one end and the rack and pinion cylinder on the other end. I found one that was perfect and gave something like five inches of expansion/contraction. Something like that might work for you, or perhaps the rubber boot that is used on cars with manual gear shift levers mounted on the floor.

Good luck.

[jamrocksailing]

Originally Posted by TomNH

I own a Swan too. Welcome to Club Swan. There are owners groups on Facebook for each of the designers. Nautor, unlike many builders, do manufacture a lot of bespoke fittings, but have a parts service. Not cheap, with a hefty handling fee, but will get it make whatever you need, including obscure seals and bespoke deck fittings to match existing.

They are brilliantly built boats. Do you have all the documentation? The owners manual is useful but the full wiring and systems drawings are really handy.

Enjoy her.

Tom

Hi,

That is good news. I tried looking on FB for groups but without success so if you could recommend any it would be appreciated, then I can join.

The good news is that the yacht only had one owner from new and yes I have all the original documentation in the original branded ring binders which is very nice.

Thank you kindly for reaching out and nice to meet a fellow Swan owner. Very impressed with the build quality so far.

[jamrocksailing]

Hi yes, its like a rubber diaphragm. Being in Jamaica sometime you need to be inventive or sail it to Miami

Thanks for the help.

D