We want this boat!

[Cadence]

I had a friends hell bent for election they didn't want a " Clorox bottle ". Bought a very nice Elco flat top. A few years later, lo and behold owned a 50' Clorox bottle. Wood boats are beautiful if your gig and deep pockets are the thing. If using rather than maintaining is your gig wood isn't it.

[sobraon]

Scout 30 Re: We want this boat!
It's my understanding that there are no actual plans for the original Spray. There have been a lot of designs called Spray but they are all just based on old pictures.

The "Spray" was measured a number of time during her life including by the Park City Yacht Club in Bridgeport Connecticut so that an accurate model could be produced. At that time a common practice.

Ken Slack did more work and research than anyone to gather all of information possible to replicate the lines of the original "Spray". His book "In the wake of Spray" has a very detailed description of the Spray and her construction. It is the very reason the builder of our boat used his plans. He had assessed the Roberts plans and saw many reinterpretation by Roberts to modernise what is a classic North Sea Oysterman.

We tracked the builder down 6 years ago when we were refitting and getting ready for our East about Circumnavigation. He gave us all the details of our boats construction and his reasons for not building a Roberts Spray hull. He stuck as close as he could to the original Ken Slack plans and I for one am very happy that he did.

Over time I have had lots of "Experts" advise me that I should fair the bow, change the under water profile, reduce weight all to modernise the hull shape and make her more efficient. I find it comical that with all of their superior knowledge, they have never sailed on one of these hulls and don't understand the true beauty of the cod shape hull of a North Sea Oysterman and it's sea kindliness.

When we traveled through Indonesia we were surprised at just how well we sailed compared to many other modern designs. We had more than 80 boats to compare ourselves against on the same route. I was initially concerned that we would be slow. I was very happy to find that we were normally in the top 25%. Sure there were some flyers, however there were few cruising boats that would pass or get away from us. All the time my wife and I were very comfortable, hardly ever tending the wheel and never healing more than 7 degrees. Beam is a Spray,s biggest asset. It give room and form stability.

For the doubters I'll post 2 videos. One sailing in 12 knots and the other sailing reefed in 25 - 30 knots. In both watch the wheel it hardly ever moves. If she is balanced she tracks true.

Spirit of Sobraon .wmv - YouTube

Test.wmv - YouTube

Sorry to drift a little from the original post. I hope this information allows the OP some further information to make an informed decision on his purchase and clears up a few of the misunderstanding of the Spray design.

Garry
Spirit of Sobraon
Home Page | Spirit of Sobraon's Travel Log

[El Pinguino]

My first reaction was 'avoid'..... but having looked at the pics I would think that, subject to knowing her pedigree and after a really really good survey, she would be quite a bit of boat for the money.

Wood costs more than GRP to look after? I've owned both.... the current strength of the New Zealand dollar is due entirely to the money I am putting into a half life overhaul of my 30 yo GRP boat ( most of the money going into keel, hull and deck).

Most costs regardless of hull construction - in my not so humble - involve systems, rig, electrics and engines.

Would I buy a 30 year old 'wooden' boat? Probably not..
Would I buy a 30 year old GRP boat? Probably not.
Would I buy a 30 year old steel boat? No.

[Sand crab]

Not many construction details on the OPs first choice. Typically these cold molded one offs were finished with epoxy and glass. Think about it. Blistering is virtually eliminated. They might be stronger and lighter as well. That one might be a good one.
And once again it's not a wood boat, it's a composite boat (just like 90% of the yachts). Big difference.

[tallboy]

I have seen this boat and I guess builder and owner did a good job. Its amazing to see how the oldest material on earth to build boats is treated like crap. High insurance and maintenance are two reasons however living in a plastic jar or a wooden box is a huge difference. The cold molded systems eliminates most of the disadvantages and downsides of a wooden boats but provide the healthy climate of wooden surroundings down below.
No other material absorbs condensation better than wood. Look on the other areas. We moved away from nature by treating our food to name one only and now we are going back to organic.
The other day I looked on the biggest sailing yacht of the world which is currently under construction. Guess what material they are using?
Right its wood and modern lamination technique makes it very convenient to build and to use.
A proper survey - and turkey knows a lot about wooden boats - is going to tell you if there are and what issues needs to be addressed. The reason to sell seems to me the aging owner. Anyway do that and decide on your own.

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by tallboy

The cold molded systems eliminates most of the disadvantages and downsides of a wooden boats but provide the healthy climate of wooden surroundings down below.

Oh I have the healthy climate of wooden surroundings down below on my GRP boat As in the comment above mine is a 'composite ' boat.... a wooden boat with a GRP skin.........aka the hull... even the decks are balsa core..

[tallboy]

El Pinquino, that's a great combo and I guess your boat can't get blisters, too. I am wondering why balsa core isn't much in use anymore because it saves a lot of weight.

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by tallboy

El Pinquino, that's a great combo and I guess your boat can't get blisters, too. I am wondering why balsa core isn't much in use anymore because it saves a lot of weight.

Sorry... my last was poorly worded.... balsa core decks ...standard GRP hull.... everything internal is timber, well 99%...

I wouldn't touch a cored hull....

Blisters? I'll give you blisters.... just finished the full osmo treatment... she was pretty wet...... seems taking your blisters into sub 4*C water doesn't make them go away but rather the opposite

[K_V_B]

Originally Posted by Scout 30

Production wooden boats went away along time ago. For at least the last 60 years all wooden boats are custom builds. That's one of the great things about them.

Depends what you call "production", and "wood". There is a yard in France that builds about 40 wooden boats a year. In the Netherlands there was also a well known yard that until recently build wooden boats in quite significant series.
But these are all plywood boats, so more like wood composite.

[Coops]

I think you will find many production boats in wood if you do the right searches. No huge numbers of builds I agree, but still, there are many active builders.

Coops.

[Kenomac]

The OP has decided not to buy the boat.

[Sand crab]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

The OP has decided not to buy the boat.

But this is a good discussion. My point is that if this boat was epoxy glassed then blisters are just about non-existent.
I suspect El Pings boat was the typical polyester built and that will give you a much better chance of blisters. Epoxy is virtually waterproof and poly is not.

[Scout 30]

We might be arguing semantics here. A production builder has traditionally been one that builds a lot of the same model boats. Beneteau, Hunter, Catalina come to mind. They may have some variations of the model but they are not known as custom builders. Up until about the 50's there were production wooden boat builders in the US but they all went out of business or changed to fiberglass. I'm not talking about day sailors like the Herreshoff 12 1/2 or small motor boats like Pulsifer's boats but actual cruising sailboats. I'm not saying that there aren't wooden boat builders in the US. There are plenty but they are custom builders that normally build to order. Spec boats are rare. The great thing about wooden boats is that you're not limited by a mold. You can get whatever you want & are willing to pay for.