Powerlines hit by lightening

[yes2precious]

So we were just about to close on a catamaran and our broker went to do final check and turns out powerlines were hit and caused electronics to be fried. Trying to decide our next move, we estimate 2 months to replace all electronics. The deciding factor I think for us is, how long does it take for the insurance company to pay out the claim so we could even start the repairs?

[redneckrob]

Originally Posted by yes2precious

So we were just about to close on a catamaran and our broker went to do final check and turns out powerlines were hit and caused electronics to be fried. Trying to decide our next move, we estimate 2 months to replace all electronics. The deciding factor I think for us is, how long does it take for the insurance company to pay out the claim so we could even start the repairs?

You probably want to first determine if your insurance covers a boat you have not yet closed on and therefore don't own. That's pretty rare that they would, so you may be waiting a long time for them to pay out that claim

If it's the seller's insurance you're referring to, who cares how long it takes? The boat is objectively worth less now by the value of the destroyed electronics. Negotiate a new lower price to reflect that and use the extra money you were going to spend on the purchase to replace the damaged electronics. The old owner may or may not get a claim paid out, but that's really irrelevant to the current value of the boat or to you as the buyer.

[BlueH2Obound]

The bad news is that lightning damage has a potential to cause problems that may not show up for a while after the strike . . .

The good news is that if you can negotiate a lower price based on the need to replace all the electronics, you will end up with a new suite, all designed to work well together.

More bad news is that seller's insurance policy likely depreciates payouts for electronics so he will only receive a small portion of the cost to replace . . . so he's not going to want to reduce the price by an amount that will allow you to put in all new 'lectronics . . .

If it were me, I would get an electrical survey of the boat, by someone who has experience with lightning strikes. Get a cost to repair everything, and take it to the seller, and ask him what he is willing to do. If he comes anywhere near 75% of the cost to replace/repair, I'd jump on it, figuring the extra 25% I will have to shell out will be worth it to have all new gear. Good luck in whatever you decide!

[GordMay]

Greetings and welcome aboard the CF, yes'.

[Bycrick]

I’ve had two strikes in 20 years and helped several other boaters fix their problems. In every case, the insurance company wanted the owner to fix all the problems and then send them the bills. They weren’t going to put up a penny in advance. However, once they had the original bills in hand, none of them took as long as a week to deposit the money. Whatever satisfaction you might get is more likely to come from the seller than from any insurance company.

[Stewie12]

Definitely deduct the new cost of everything that is damaged from your offer. Let current the owner claim what he can from his insurance. It is not your worry as to how long they take to settle with him.

[yes2precious]

Thanks everyone for your replies. We haven't closed on boat so the owner has to obviously deal with their insurance. Our main concern is time we knew already that the hydrolics needs work and wanted to start working right away but now if we have to wait for owner to get all electronics done and figure out if there is any more damage we are worried about losing our season in Bahamas. In this case we might just walk away we don't want to store a boat for a year . This has really stressed us and are thinking this boat is cursed. It just had a refit due to lightening already everything in boat was already new. Reason we are paying more then we should already. Guess we shall wait to see the scope of the damage and go from there.

[Stewie12]

2 strikes !!! Walk away, and find another boat.

[yes2precious]

Believe me we would if there was any to choose from for what we are looking for, the inventory on boats are a joke when you want something over 45 feet. It's definitely a sellers market right now.

[Nicholson58]

We’ve had three hits.

The good part is that you can have all new electronics, somebody else's dime!

The lightning strike and replacement also affords you the opportunity to doa couple things we have discovered to reduce the damage of future hits. We know this by experience, unfortunately.

Connect a two-pole on off switch next to each device. This is to interrupt both +&- wires. The on/off switch on most modern electronics does not interrupt power. It only tells the device to sleep. The usual always connected negative can send an induced spike in the back door of the device. Interrupting both makes the unit isolated almost like it was still in the box. Make it easy to access the VHF antennas so you can disconnect them. We lost a lot of conventionally connected electronics but all that had air gap type two pole switches survived. Same logic, we have all mast wiring through a commercial monster 48-pin plug. My solar panels each have two pole breakers as does the charge controller.

When a storm is imminent or if we leave the boat for an extended time everything is off, isolated.

An example where we did not do this is LED cabin lights with on board rectifiers and PWM circuits. These all have only a single pole switch on the positive wire. Many were wrecked including navigation lights. All of these were identically destroyed when the diodes on the power circuit popped.

I would work for a steep enough discount to also cover the things that might fail soon after it’s yours. The damage would not deter me as long as you get covered. My list of wrecked:

Shore power breaker
Stereo
VHF radio
AIS
18 glass BUSS fuses
All forward cabin wiring
All mast and deck mounted nav lights
Many cabin lights
Simrad autopilot computer and input console
Auxiliary 1.5 kw alternator
Battery charger - inverter
All VHF antennas vaporized
Windex on the main mast melted
All paint on the transom checked and spalled. Check your through-hulls and hoses!

[svfinlandia]

Originally Posted by yes2precious

So we were just about to close on a catamaran and our broker went to do final check and turns out powerlines were hit and caused electronics to be fried. Trying to decide our next move, we estimate 2 months to replace all electronics. The deciding factor I think for us is, how long does it take for the insurance company to pay out the claim so we could even start the repairs?

Confusion here. Was the boat struck by lightning or did it hit a powerline?

Al, S/V Finlandia

[crashley]

Do you mean the boat was connected to shore power and the lightning hit the shore power which damaged the boat electronics

[Nicholson58]

What difference does it make? Boat got spiked.

[Redreuben]

I’d walk unless everything electronic on the boat was replaced, wiring, anchor winch, batteries, electric toothbrush, the lot.

[bobnlesley]

Originally Posted by Stewie12

2 strikes !!! Walk away, and find another boat.

Whilst we've never had a strike, we've met/known many yachts on our travels that have and what's surprised/worried me the most is the number of those boat which've suffered from multiple lightning strikes.

Just doing a quick tot up in my head and I can recall eleven yachts whom we know that have had a lightning strike, (seven were catamarans and that's way above the proportion of catamaran/monohull owners that we've met, so something else to ponder) and five of those have been struck twice and two of them three times!
The majority have suffered in lightning-prone areas (Florida, Bahamas, Panama) but this also includes yachts in the UK/Med/Pacific. It's long seemed to me that contrary to the maxim, lightning often does strike twice.