Dufour catamaran

[GARRYOWEN]

Why not? More cash for more grabbin! Catamarans are the new hot cakes...people can't get enough of them and they are willing to pay whatever to get them.

[Catopia]

Originally Posted by Valiente

So this new Dufour is a 48 footer or a 45 footer ?
Are they joining the current trend to cash on name figure instead of actual length ?

Per the video, It looks like they are using length including bowsprit to get to 48. Actual Is 46.5 feet.

[smj]

Originally Posted by Catopia

Per the video, It looks like they are using length including bowsprit to get to 48. Actual Is 46.5 feet.

Cool, my cat just grew to 42'[emoji1303][emoji16]

[danielamartindm]

Originally Posted by yeloya

After Bavaria (Nauthitec), Hanse (Privilege), Benetteau (Lagoon), Jeanneau (to be announced soon), Dufour also couldn't stay out of the booming catamaran market..

https://nlyachts.com/en/used-boats/d...catamaran.html

I am told the #1 will touch water in April and she will be available for charter already in 2018 season.

Cheers

Yeloya

I find it hard to get excited until I see an actual photograph of a completed yacht.

[Jeannius]

Originally Posted by smj

Cool, my cat just grew to 42'[emoji1303][emoji16]

Bet you don't say that to the Dockmaster when you arrive at some fancy marina.

Privilege owners were always thankful that they used to understate the length in the name, the vast majority of 465s were 49 ft and even my 435 was 44 ft.

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by Factor

15 ton for 48 foot is very nearly obese

Sure but sporty performance is not why the vast majority of people buy big cruising cats.

If you want to go fast strap a 300hp outboards on the back of a 15' dingy. It will go like a scalded cat (if it doesn't sink first).

Most guys have to adjust their shorts when they talk about a Ferrari but when push comes to shove, they buy the mini-van because it does what they need far better.

[Cherod]

looks more IKEA than Dufour , ( is it home completion ? )

[LeeV]

So many new boats with different quotes for length. This from the Voyage site:

Main Features: VOYAGE 480 VOYAGE 600 VOYAGE DC45
Designer VOYAGE Yachts
Overall Length 15.10 m | 49.5 ft18.23m | 59.8ft13.6 m | 44.7 ft
Waterline Length 13.56 m | 44.5 ft16.7m | 54.8ft12.5 m | 41 ft

I have a 36, but with my bowsprit she's now a 44!

[Bean Counter]

Originally Posted by rom

In some interview I heard the boss say they will never do that. Maybe with with another brand, like catana did with bali...

@Yeloya, where did you get that 16.9 tons for the L450 ? WTF ?! you are right, I just checked the website, 16.9 tons for L450F, 14.9 tons for L450S. They both used to be about 15.5 tons. I believe the new spec is a mistake.

The Spec in my owners manual for 2011 Lagoon 450 F is 16.9T. The weight is EEC as defined by some ISO standard, some sites do not quote this standard for some reason.

[rom]

Originally Posted by Bean Counter

The Spec in my owners manual for 2011 Lagoon 450 F is 16.9T. The weight is EEC as defined by some ISO standard, some sites do not quote this standard for some reason.

Now that is strange because I happen to have the 2011 brochure of the L450 on my PC and it says "light displacement (CE) 15.5 t"

As for the meaning of it you can check A weighty question! | Lagoon Inside

Also I cannot imagine the 450F being 2 tons heavier than the 450S, unless the bimini is reinforced concrete maybe. Which is why I believe there is a mistake in the new spec.

Last but not least, the owner's manual of my L440 show a 2 pages listing of all possible weights on the boat starting from "light boat 11.9 t" to "light displacement (CE) 12.15 t" to "Maximum displacement 18 t". This consistent with the brochure and actually makes me think that Lagoon is rather serious about the advertised weight of their boats.

[yeloya]

I never trusted the factory supplied displacement numbers but I've sailed Helia, L 440, Orana 44 and L450 F. Performancewise if 450 F is 100;


Orana is 110 (she's one feet shorter than the rest)
Helia and L 440 is 115.


I would expect L 450 S to be parity to Helia and L 440.


Everyone is free to argue about these numbers, they are simply based on my personal impressions.

Cheers

Yeloya

[Valiente]

Originally Posted by yeloya

Performancewise if 450 F is 100;.....L 440 is 115.
...

they are simply based on my personal impressions.

Cheers

Yeloya

I always thought L450 basically kept L440 hull lines and rig, upgrading interior and deckhouse.

Am I wrong on that?

Why that significant 15% diference in performance, being the older boat the better?

[Factor]

Originally Posted by valhalla360

Sure but sporty performance is not why the vast majority of people buy big cruising cats.

If you want to go fast strap a 300hp outboards on the back of a 15' dingy. It will go like a scalded cat (if it doesn't sink first).

Most guys have to adjust their shorts when they talk about a Ferrari but when push comes to shove, they buy the mini-van because it does what they need far better.

It is not about sailing fast, it is about sailing.

Let me elaborate - now this was based on my part of the world, but the principles hold:

Over the years in general sailing, racing, cruising my own boats and working in the industry one of the most frequent comments I hear relates to performance, particularly sailing performance. Often you will hear people indicate that as a cruiser sailing performance is not relevant to them, they are cruisers after all and not racing boats with racing crews. Why should they care about sailing performance.

On the face of it that argument sounds feasible and even reasonable but like most cliched hackneyed phrases the reality is quite the opposite of the truism. Lets examine some fundamentals of cruising in our part of the world.

Sensible cruising is done without too large an eye on schedules, yes there are times when you just have to get somewhere but the whole idea of cruising is to take life at a simple level. Cruising under sail, fairly self evidently involves sailing. Lets face it, unless you are sailing your sailing boat, you should have bought a motor boat. Sailing boats are very inefficient motor boats, if their hull shape is good for sailing its not so good for motoring, that mast is annoying and adds drag and doesn’t let you get some places and the sails, well they will pay for a lot of fuel.

The weather is important to a sailor and all jokes aside the Bureau of Meteorology does a pretty good job along with a range of other providers in forecasts for 5 -7 days. There is little need to be significantly surprised, in a macro sense by the weather over a four to six day range. And that range will get you to a safe anchorage anywhere along the east cost of Australia.

Speaking of the Bureau of Meteorology, they have a range of excellent tools for sailors; one of the key sources of actual recorded data for this article was the Average Wind Velocity maps (Bureau Home > Climate > Climate Data Online > Average wind velocity) along with weather station historical records.

What my sailing experiences tell me and what the Bureau of Meteorology confirms is that the average wind speeds along the east coast of Australia are below 15 knots and mostly below 12 knots. Of course as cruisers we don’t leave safe harbour if its blowing stupid wind speeds, so by a combination of choice and nature the large majority of our sailing is done in light winds.

What that means then is that if you own a boat that won’t effectively sail in 12 knots of wind or less then you own a motor sailer. What that means is that Performance is important to cruisers, perhaps more so that racers, performance to a cruiser means actually sailing whilst cruising and not motoring with the all the costs and frequent trips to marinas that is inherent in motorboat travel. Performance under sail is a cruisers life life performance under sail is a racers afternoon fun. If you need 20 knots to get going then you aren’t going to sail too much, at least in this part of the world.

PERFORMANCE IS IMPORTANT - not in outright speed terms, but certainly in cruising sailing

.

[smj]

Hard to make a slow boat go fast, but easy to make a fast boat go slow

[sailjumanji]

I do multihull PHRF ratings for Texas Gulf Coast, both offshore and bay sailboat races. We do performance predictions with inputs of sail area, waterline length, hull shape, foils, rotating or fixed mast, sprit length, and displacement. And yes, the equations are tuned with race data. (I am fully aware of everything we can get wrong, so no need to bring that up.) The hardest input to get right is displacement. For years, the manufacturers severely understated the weight of their boats. This was especially true of the large cats. And then several years ago, they swapped to an EEC standard. Then most of the weights doubled, or something around that, and it appeared that everyone was reporting on the high end. WTH. Same boat as the previous year, but higher weight?

Some boats I am familiar with, like the Corsair tris were pretty close. But years ago the company provided a calibrated strain gauge and we measured boats at Nationals. As such, we knew real numbers, and their website info reflected such. Then there is Seawind, which is now the same company as Corsair. Look at the historical reported weight of the 1160 catamaran - 15,400 lbs. That may be reasonable, given the reported weight of the 1000 model at 10,500 lbs. But now there is an 1160 Lite, with outboards instead of diesels, no generator, all of the interior wood panels deleted, and the newer generation hull now resin infused and vacuum formed deck. So you would expect to be lighter. Much lighter. The specs say 15,400 lbs? On the other end of the spectrum, one of our local boats was 38 ft long, twin outboards, daggerboards, carbon mast, and weighed in at around 7,000 lbs. Yeah, it was fast.

So be suspicious of manufacturer-reported weights. Look at the boats. How are they laid up. How wide are the hulls. What's the topsides look like. Does the reported weight of "x" look reasonable given it looks just like a "y"? Buyer beware.