420: Lagoon 420 Owners & Fans

[ess105]

Originally Posted by SeaKing

The reports must not be too "glowing" or we would have heard plenty.

We may have to accept that very few charterers are active commenters on this board. I had a brief chat with one set of charterers of the Horizon and I would certainly describe their comments as "glowing."

[ess105]

Originally Posted by sailvi767

Were those speeds off a GPS or the knotmeter. If they are off the knotmeter I suspect they may have been off. In 18 to 20 knots of wind you should have been seeing a solid 9 knots topping 10 now and then on a broad reach in a cat that size.

Thanks
George

The second charterer of Martha R who I met at Cooper Island stated he managed 9.6 knots in under 18 knots of wind.

[SeaKing]

Originally Posted by ess105

We may have to accept that very few charterers are active commenters on this board. I had a brief chat with one set of charterers of the Horizon and I would certainly describe their comments as "glowing."

Do not take my comment wrong, friend. I want to see this technology go. It will only help the sailing industry. I will look strongly into an electric refit when the time comes.

Fairwinds

[ess105]

Originally Posted by SeaKing

Do not take my comment wrong, friend. I want to see this technology go. It will only help the sailing industry. I will look strongly into an electric refit when the time comes.

Cool.

It is going to take more time - maybe into next sailing season or inputs from Europe - before we get the full picture. For the people whose needs are met by these boats I am sure the reviews will be good.

I just spent 3 weeks on a 45 foot Privilege. Whenever we got the chance to get aboard a 420, we did. The difference in accomodations were staggering - a good job has been done in this aspect of the design. The boats have had more issues that I would have liked but they are all being addressed and the boats are really shaping out. They are not racers (too heavy) but boy are they comfortable.

[sail2wind]

Originally Posted by ess105

The second charterer of Martha R who I met at Cooper Island stated he managed 9.6 knots in under 18 knots of wind.

Steve,
I would think this guy was exaggerating a bit, over 50% of wind speed? I talked to the first mate from Italy who brought the boat over from Europe. Those speeds were not achieved on the passage. The boat is beautiful, roomy, comfortable, but by no means fast. Even if the knot meter was not calibrated on the Martha R, my hand held GPS was about 1-1.5 KPR faster.

[ess105]

Originally Posted by sail2wind

Steve,
I would think this guy was exaggerating a bit, over 50% of wind speed? I talked to the first mate from Italy who brought the boat over from Europe. Those speeds were not achieved on the passage. The boat is beautiful, roomy, comfortable, but by no means fast. Even if the knot meter was not calibrated on the Martha R, my hand held GPS was about 1-1.5 KPR faster.

It's a fair point but these may not be incompatible statements. This could be a peak number arising from getting an assist down a wave or even being in an extremely favorable current. You can get up to 3 knots of current in some places.

I don't want to sound like I'm trying to promote the fact that the L420 is fast. It is not. I've also spoken to delivery skippers and I have my own data on Dignity. I think we all know the compromise here. I'm still looking for good data from a 420 fitted with a headsail more appropriate than the one they come with. It'll come in time.

[Frank Artville]

I just found this on Yachtworld.com

....Delivered in March 2007 to Tortola, this is Hull #10 of the hybrid Lagoon 420 - the first charter version to see active charter service in the Caribbean!

Four cabins and four heads with separate showers, Lagoon crammed a huge amount of accommodation space into this boat. Equiped with 2 electric motors and a 21Kw generator along with full boat air conditioning and a highly comprehensive charter specification (including MCA Code safety equipment - legally required by ALL commercially operated vessels in the BVI).

This boat is a steal given the year-long waiting list for a new boat from the factory - a similar spec will cost closer to $600,000!

Why is the owner already selling?
Is the owner a member of the Forum?
Maybe the 420 community can shed some light?

[sail2wind]

What is the asking price? What is the name of the boat? Is it in Cat Co's charter?

[ess105]

This is the Horizon boat. No contact with owner - if their is one. The boat doesn't even have a name. My guess is that Horizon bought the boat themselves without an owner and has since found one. Other dealers have bought some of the other hulls - I understand this is common.

Horizon will have made a pretty good turn on the deal as the (pending) sale price of $520k is significantly above the amount that owners of similar hull numbers paid for theirs. The new owner is probably a happy camper as they're getting a terrific boat at a good price. Could be that they have to commit to a year or two in charter though.

[Frank Artville]

Maybe the owner / seller was disappointed with certain aspects of the vessel and never got to put 'his' name on it. Maybe he had a personal situation? Only he can tell.

The asking price is $520k, who knows what the price on the contract is 'for a quick sale'.

If the seller then has to pay 10% commission to the broker, I wonder if he really made money on it.

At the end of the day, only the seller can enlighten the forum. If Horizon owned the yacht, wouldn't they have tried to sell it sooner when the market was hotter and made more money?

[ess105]

Originally Posted by Frank Artville

If Horizon owned the yacht, wouldn't they have tried to sell it sooner when the market was hotter and made more money?

If Horizon owned the yacht then they probably have been trying to sell for a while. It's a business gamble at the end of the day. The downside for the dealer is that it's harder to sell a prespecced boat as the buyer doesn't get to choose the options. This translates into having to carry the boat for a while. The upside for Horizon is they are making $80k-$100k on a deal like this - gross. Even considering the cost of carrying the asset for a while, this is more than they'd earn on selling a factory boat.

But here we are again looking for faces in the clouds. Given the information we have you can paste any number of interpretations.

Another way to look at this would be to compare this to other models. Does anyone remember how the early days of the Lagoon 440 played out? Did the dealers sell off boats after launch in a similar manner?

[sailvi767]

Horizon did not own the yacht. Not sure why the owner is selling. There could be many reasons.

George

[Badgerman]

Hi all,
Currently on a Lagoon 42 after a week on a 44. This 42 is a dog of a cat. 5 minutes of running on electric and the generator runs for an hour.
The internal power and the motors will not run at the same time.
The generator is noisy and sits right next to the owner suite.
The helm is a mess with sheets everywhere. The boat is way underpowered sail wise as we get about 7 knots max with the wind howling (25 knots at 120 degrees). Nice boat to tie to the dock with shore power.
Sorry.
44 felt like a race boat compared to this tub.

[kesey]

Originally Posted by northerncat

so all those discussions/predictions about heavy catamarans earlier are now revealed to be real,
sean

cobblers. I've done 10 knots in a Moorings 4200 (Leopard 42). The 4200 is a fine heavy boat and she can move.

[ess105]

A few things to note.

1) The generator always runs for an hour each time it starts automatically - regardless of how much juice is really needed. Not sure I like this but if you know you don't need the power, the generator can be switched off.
2) The 420 will run on batteries up to a point. If you push the throttle further forward and demand more power then she'll respond by turning on the genset. If you want the extra power - take it - but see point 1) you don't need to run the genset for an hour if you don't want to.
3) Lagoon seem to be shipping the 420s with the sheets too long. Coupled with the fact the boat is designed to bring everything back to the helm I can see why it can be a mess. I will be getting my boats lines shortened to reduce this problem. It won't go away as this is a penalty for bringing it all to a single spot.
4) The sails coming out of the factory are smaller than one would like. I'm aiming to put larger sails on mine soon. It won't enable her to win any races but it should make a reasonable difference. Won't satisfy someone who wants a race boat (and the lack of luxury that comes with that) but then they're on the wrong boat. Can't help that.

I can't comment on the internal power versus motors issue. I've not heard this before. Perhaps someone else can comment.

Finally - no need to appologise. Everyone knows these are very new boats and some tuning is going to occur as they settle into their respective fleets.

Steve