Modern Production Cruisers at Sea

[Celestialsailor]

Originally Posted by Randyonr3

just catching up here,

And I still stand by what I said.. "short story" as when I was about 10 or 12, myself and a couple other guys built a raft from old railrode tyes and a couple pallets.. found a 10 foot pole and roped it into place for a mast and hung an old bed sheet for a sail.. we'd sail that raft across the pond and then drag it around the shore to do it again.. (it only sailed down wind) but it was a dream come true for us at the time.. and oddly, for a railrode tye raft, it sailed quite fast as I remember..
Now I'm not one for heavy weight boats and dont think I'll ever own a W32 or a formosa but off the wind, they sail ok for what they are and what they were designed for..

Now Randy...You know down deep you really want a W32, so you can tell everyone on your dock how it wins every Transpac!

[Randyonr3]

Originally Posted by Celestialsailor

Now Randy...You know down deep you really want a W32, so you can tell everyone on your dock how it wins every Transpac!

Got to say, they do look good and have great lines.. which brings up another story..
Back a few years ago, maybe 30 or so, I spent mucho hours riding my Harley,... A 1936 rigid frame with a 1980, 80 incher shoe-horned into place and sporting a paxton blower with a "little john" 5 speed..
I'd pull up to a bar or such where all my friends would be hanging out, and while climbing off the rigid frame, bent over and growning from the back pain, someone would often say,
"dosent it hurt riding that thing?" and looking up with a grin on my face, I'd say " yep, but I sure as hell look good while I'm riding it!"
So i kinda put those old boats in the same class as that old 1936 Harley Rigid frame.. The lines are great, they are pretty as hell, but the've seen better days, and just like the old harley, newer designs, better products, and more effeciant cruisers have been born..
If you like bouncing around and destroying your back, find an old Harley, and same as cruisers, if your likes of the boat, be it slow, heavy, and less productive, by all means, buy an old boat..
I for one have limmited years left in my life and I want to cover as much water and experance as much travel as I am able... For me, the smother ride, additional speed, and easier handeling of a newer production boat is the right answer........

[zeehag]

just go sailing and figger out what ye want and get that. dammit--but the pooh fling was fun....both of ye are being XXXXXXX and XXX--lol but is fun to read...pass the ketch up....

[neilpride]

Originally Posted by Randyonr3

Got to say, they do look good and have great lines.. which brings up another story..
Back a few years ago, maybe 30 or so, I spent mucho hours riding my Harley,... A 1936 rigid frame with a 1980, 80 incher shoe-horned into place and sporting a paxton blower with a "little john" 5 speed..
I'd pull up to a bar or such where all my friends would be hanging out, and while climbing off the rigid frame, bent over and growning from the back pain, someone would often say,
"dosent it hurt riding that thing?" and looking up with a grin on my face, I'd say " yep, but I sure as hell look good while I'm riding it!"
So i kinda put those old boats in the same class as that old 1936 Harley Rigid frame.. The lines are great, they are pretty as hell, but the've seen better days, and just like the old harley, newer designs, better products, and more effeciant cruisers have been born..
If you like bouncing around and destroying your back, find an old Harley, and same as cruisers, if your likes of the boat, be it slow, heavy, and less productive, by all means, buy an old boat..
I for one have limmited years left in my life and I want to cover as much water and experance as much travel as I am able... For me, the smother ride, additional speed, and easier handeling of a newer production boat is the right answer........

Randy define old, and slow.. in the recent Transpac Honolulu 2013 in divion 8 a 80 years wooden s&s beat the new modern production fleet aka Beneteaus and Jeaneaus. Another wrong thinking, Old=Slow...

Transpac 2013 Unfiltered - Dorade - YouTube

[Cheechako]

Yep, driving a classic 55 chevy your mind is thinkin': "wow, is my Toyota sure a pleasure to drive compared with this POS"... but I'm sure gettin' the looks!

[letsgetsailing3]

Originally Posted by settingsun

In the end, the old versus new and custom built versus production built is like choosing a car to take on a cross-country trip...

1975 Bentley or 2008 Dodge Caravan?

One has 40 extra years of engineering and design and knowledge built into it but is a production unit. The other was more meticulously built.

Side by side, our 2008 Hunter 44DS doesn't compare to a mid-1980's Valiant 42. I studied the differences one day when a gorgeously maintained Valiant 42 was in the slip next to us. The differences made me crack up. There is no comparison.

But did I need any of that ruggedness and over-builtness on our 3.5 year cruise of Mexico? No.

I have seen lots of cruisers putting most of their cruising kitty into their boat once they arrived in Paradise. I've seen older boats getting new holding tanks, new plumbing, new electrical wiring, new spars, new sails, new varnish, new engines, new gelcoat, new chainplates, new heads, and the list goes on and on.

These aren't small or cheap projects or quick projects.

Are those projects what those cruisers dreamed they would be doing in Paradise all those years they were sitting in the office imagining themselves setting sail over the horizon?

If you buy a new or nearly new vanilla production boat, throw on good ground tackle, solar and a watermaker, you are good to go. When things break, all the broken parts and the bowels they lurk in will be sparkling clean. It is doubtful you will need to replace any of the parts listed above.

I have been around boats my whole life and I was anti-Hunter when we first started looking. Hubby was new to the industry and thought I was nuts not to love the Hunters -- for their clever engineering, quality build and beautiful layouts. Only when I stopped to view the industry from his eyes -- and he had a 26 year career as an electro-mechanical service engineer, so he's no dummy in that department -- only then did I see that he was right.

I'll take a lightweight easy-to-sail production boat any day of the week.

After all, most cruisers go for only 1-4 years. They may have dreamed of cruising for "the rest of their life" but most we've met are done before their 3rd year is over. Why spend any precious days of those very few years replacing parts on an old boat, just because it was custom built and had a good name in its day?

Wow. That is the best post in this thread, in my opinion. I'll have to keep that in mind as I look for a cruising boat.

[Paul Elliott]

An older boat is probably slower, but it may be more comfortable.

My boat isn't an antique, but it is probably closer to an old design than a new one. Many newer boats will out-point and out-surf us.

Something interesting happened in last year's Pacific Cup race to Hawaii. Our boat was competing against a range of designs (in our division), and while we were the biggest and had the fastest PHRF rating, I was fully expecting some of our competition to beat us. Ratings aside, those boats should have been able to surf much more easily and much faster than us, and the Hawaii run usually favors that style of boat. As it turned out, in our division we were first to finish and first on handcap. The conditions were a little rough and these modern boats experienced gear failure and major crew fatigue. They started out strong, but just couldn't keep up the pace over the 13-day race.

There were many variables at play so I won't claim that we beat the others because we were more comfortable, but our boat took care of us and we didn't break a thing.

Of course, racing isn't the same as cruising, but I'm proud of how we did on our old-fashioned boat.

[Bash]

Having been away from the net for a few days, allow me to point out upon my return that the OP, after successfully inciting a 217+ post riot, hasn't visited this thread since initiating it last Saturday.

Hook, line and sinker, fellows. You're making it a bit too easy to troll.

[Paul Elliott]

I think we're just having an interesting conversation. Not much new has been said, but the way it gets said is always different. I don't mind getting trolled, as long the resulting discussion is fun.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by S/V Illusion

Had to laugh. A 50 yr old boat is 50 years old regardless of the nameplate and will require a lot of duct tape and luck to keep it afloat.

Well, I doubt that. My boat is 39 years old. I paid $2,000 for it. I painted the bottom, played around with a couple old diesels, and finally put a new 5 hp outboard on it. Btw, it's a 6600 lb Bristol 27. (about 2600 ballast) I also did patch the cabin sole. $10.00 in materials.
I then sailed it the 75 miles to Va Beach.

I have since added a new main, solar, inverter, controller. I have sailed it back and forth across the lower Chesapeake in some pretty tough NE weather without a problem for the past couple years. No more maintanence.

To be honest though on some of those early trips this 39 year old boat sailed me across the bay because it was being sailed by the old Navico TP5000 Tiller Autopilot while I was blowing chunks over the side or lying in the cockpit facing aft trying to not blow chunks.

(but) the old boat did impress me as to how it handled the swells from astern in 20 to 25 knot winds with the ocean waves coming thru the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel gaps. This was on a downwind run.

Being a former catamaran racer and having not sailed since 2006, it took a while for me to get used to the motion from these steep, close bay waves at the mouth of the Chesapeake and on an old full keel boat.

[settingsun]

Originally Posted by letsgetsailing3

Wow. That is the best post in this thread, in my opinion. I'll have to keep that in mind as I look for a cruising boat.

Thanks, Letsgosailing3.

The greatest thing about cruising is that you can do it in any style on any budget anywhere.

Some of the happiest cruisers we've met in Mexico are on old boats -- with no expectations and a tiny budget.

They are happy to be afloat, happy not to be at the office, and are happy with whatever comes their way.

I met a young couple in their late 20's who sailed a 30+ year old Catalina 27 from California to the Guatemala border (a few thousand miles, further than many Mexico cruisers ever go). They sold it for $2k at the end of their 8 month trip when they were tired of bailing it out all the time. Best of all, they were ecstatic about the whole adventure.

But the more common long-term tropical cruising scenario I've seen (I'm not talking about Transpac racing or sailing within 500 miles of home) is a couple in their mid-60's with a 5-10 year cruising agenda who have scrimped and saved and planned for years to go sailing in the tropics. They have set aside $150k-$250k for their boat and another $25k-$35k a year for living expenses.

They have high expectations.

They aren't happy spending that cruising kitty and their precious retirement time replacing major systems in their boat.

If they had gone with a newer production boat rather than a name brand old boat that was "more seaworthy," they would have been much less likely to need major system replacements during their cruise to Paradise.

[Bash]

Originally Posted by Paul Elliott

I think we're just having an interesting conversation. Not much new has been said, but the way it gets said is always different. I don't mind getting trolled, as long the resulting discussion is fun.

I suspect that this is because you don't own one of the boats that inevitably gets trashed on threads such as this. Can't imagine this thread being much fun for Beneteau owners.

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by thomm225

Well, I doubt that. My boat is 39 years old. I paid $2,000 for it. I painted the bottom, played around with a couple old diesels, and finally put a new 5 hp outboard on it. Btw, it's a 6600 lb Bristol 27. (about 2600 ballast) I also did patch the cabin sole. $10.00 in materials.
I then sailed it the 75 miles to Va Beach.

I have since added a new main, solar, inverter, controller. I have sailed it back and forth across the lower Chesapeake in some pretty tough NE weather without a problem for the past couple years. No more maintanence.

To be honest though on some of those early trips this 39 year old boat sailed me across the bay because it was being sailed by the old Navico TP5000 Tiller Autopilot while I was blowing chunks over the side or lying in the cockpit facing aft trying to not blow chunks.

(but) the old boat did impress me as to how it handled the swells from astern in 20 to 25 knot winds with the ocean waves coming thru the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel gaps. This was on a downwind run.

Being a former catamaran racer and having not sailed since 2006, it took a while for me to get used to the motion from these steep, close, bay waves at the mouth of the Chesapeake and on an old full keel boat.

I didn't get to finish. I had to post a picture. 39 year old very well built old boat. New main as in I had it made. 1-2 year old lightly used jib. This boat will sail quite a bit better than most folks would think. I bought it to learn monohulls, but I'm actually a racing type sailor. Cruising is actually boring ............well at times. Sometimes it's great

My point is these old boats were built tough and for some reason, they refuse to go away............and with a new set of sails these old boats can perform pretty darn well.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by thomm225

Well Dave, you have hit the nail on the head. I have said for years half the sailors out on the water think they are driving a car!

It's not just like cars. First, the rudder doesn't have total control like your steering wheel. Second, a boat travels over a different surface on different days. If there is bad weather you cannot just pull over at the nearest restaurant, etc

Did you actually say lower wetted area is better? I know you didn't mean that if so you have lost it totally. A small racing catamaran has very little wetted surface and in bad weather it has almost zero defense. If you really believe that lower wetted surface is better, there is no need to argue because you wil never understand.

Explain to me why wetted area is a defense in heavy weather ?

Dave

[barnakiel]

Originally Posted by neilpride

(...) wooden s&s beat the new modern production fleet aka Beneteaus and Jeaneaus (...)

If so, what does this story tell us of their skippers?

b.