Helia 44: Buying a Helia 44

[seahag]

Great thread, I can see why it's still going after almost 5 years.

[sailorgirl1954]

make sure you check out the apparent problem with the rudder linkage, steering cable, I think, or some thing that is continually breaking on Helias. found out about this prob from the charter captain/owner of 6 of them, (name withheld) said it is always breaking and a new one has to ship from FP, not available in carib. lots helias for sale. FP's in general are not high quality, I have an Orana. Like layout much better, no probs with this issue, do love her, was cheap and is fast!!

[yeloya]

Originally Posted by sailorgirl1954

make sure you check out the apparent problem with the rudder linkage, steering cable, I think, or some thing that is continually breaking on Helias. found out about this prob from the charter captain/owner of 6 of them, (name withheld) said it is always breaking and a new one has to ship from FP, not available in carib. lots helias for sale. FP's in general are not high quality, I have an Orana. Like layout much better, no probs with this issue, do love her, was cheap and is fast!!

We have two Helias on our charter fleet, one being mine. They are both from 2013 and in total they have made about 150-160 weeks of charter. Never ever we had this problem that you are refering to, never.. We are official service point of FP, thus we have seen many other Helias in our marina. I have never seen this problem. I have sailed almost all of the range of FP's from Fidji and Tobogo up to Ipenema, I owned two Orana's, so I know a bit about FP cats. The term that you used "high quality" is relative, not high quality vs. what ?
Beside FP's we have seen many other makes and models from Gunboat, to Outremer, Catana and various Lagoon that we serviced. Helias are among the least problematic one. If yr captain knows soımething that we don't know, I would appreciate that you share those with me with a PM just for the sake of education. All I can say that we never got anything from the factory except for the boat that grounded or crashed.
Is Helia perfect ? Of course not, but statements like "somethings that break continiously", "lots of Helia are for sale", " not high quality" are not true and appropriate unless you support these claims by facts.

Cheers

Yeloya

[cwjohm]

We had this problem. Turns out the steering linkage was not installed correctly in the factory. Replaced under warranty and I ordered a spare which I have never used.

Given the setup of rudder and engines if you do not lock the wheel in reverse it is possible to snap the linkage, but this should be one of the first issues discussed when the boat is handed over.

I have no problem with the quality of the Helia. I do have a problem however, with quality control at the FP factory. There have been many issues all of which have been addressed by FP but which should have been addressed at manufacture. I have to say, however, that in discussion with many boat owners, and after now visiting many factories, this problem is not confined to FP and also not confined to production boats - so called prestige manufacturers also suffer from lack of quality control.

My own personal view on this is that I would not buy a new boat again, as my experience is that I had as many or more difficulties with a new boat than a used boat. Of course this is safe in the comfort that I have now had enough experience to understand clearly what I would be buying in a second hand boat.

[captainjay]

Originally Posted by sailorgirl1954

make sure you check out the apparent problem with the rudder linkage, steering cable, I think, or some thing that is continually breaking on Helias. found out about this prob from the charter captain/owner of 6 of them, (name withheld) said it is always breaking and a new one has to ship from FP, not available in carib.

There is/was a problem with early Helia's and Lipari's with the push pull Teleflex cable steering. The Mahe used this same system but due to lighter loads it holds up much better. On the bigger boats they do not hold up well under continues use. As for parts availability. We keep them on the shelve at the charter company that I work for.

FP has replaced this system on the newer Helia's dating back to some time in late 2015 with the same Hydraulic system that they use on the Saba 50 and their power cats. It is pretty much bullet proof. They do offer an upgrade kit to replace the steering on the older boats.

They also have stopped using set screws to hold the tiller arm on the rudders and through bolt them. They have sent out a memo to the dealers to retrofit the older boats in the field. The set screws are also a common point of failure. Through bolting has stopped this issue.

Jay