Trimaran - Especially Searunner - Owners

[Buzzman]

OMG. Hand the man a can-opener and a tin of worms.... lol

Short answer is: no problem. Tris like SeaRunners have crossed oceans successfully, and safely.

The trick is to keep them right way up, for as any mono sailor will tell you, multihulls aren't self-righting. Which is true. Multis are equally stable right way up or 180 degrees from this.

So the general rule is not to sail anywhere really bad whether is expected or forecast, and to reef early.

The other advice usually provided is to be sure you have a tleast one drogue aboard, and the Jordan Series drogue on a long line seems to be the one most favoured.

But be sure the vessel you purchase is fitted with very strong cleats or samson posts to attach it to.

And be careful out there....

[longjonsilver]

Originally Posted by theocerbo

How safe is a 40ft Tri vs a 40/50ft heavy displacement mono?

Every boat is unsafe in unskilled or negligent sailors hands. That said, there are differences in the safety level of various boats. In my study of offshore boats dating back to the 70's, i have at various times preferred heavy displacement boats like the Westsail 32, skinny fin keeled heavy ballasted boats like the Hughes 38 and i am now investigating trimarans.

Jim Brown (of Searunner fame) wrote "The Case for the Cruising Trimaran" and probably explains better than anyone why trimarans make for good sea boats. Here is what i picked up from his book: monos sink, trimarans turn upside down. Would you rather that your boat sink or turn upside down? An upside down trimaran is more stable than a right side up one, and as such makes a good life raft - you have food, water and tools inside the mothership that you wouldn't have in a liferaft.

Most safety starts between the ears of the skipper. Proper vessel preparation, route planning and timing of passage, keeping watch, and reefing all play a part in this process. This goes for both monos and trimarans. Whatever vessel you pick, learn both its strengths and weaknesses (they all have them), and learn how to minimize the inherent weaknesses with proper precautions.

blessings

jon

[Buzzman]

I also read Jim's book and was impressed by how honest he was about multihulls capacity for flipping over.

But the reality is it doens't ahppen that often, and exerienced sailors who sail them report that as long as you're careful and don't sail with a racing sails in rising winds or big seas, they are more likley to flip than a mono is to sink.

BUt yea, having read the story of the Rose Noelle, I'd rather be on a tri that flipped than a cat.

The floats keep most of the main hull above water.

Cats have a problem that the bridgedeck fills with water and the narrow hulls are a lot toughwer to live in when they are half full of water.

Once you breach the airlock by opening an espcape hatch or cutting a hole in the hull for access, the buoancy level drops as the compressed air escapes, making the boat sink lower in the water.

On a tri the beams and floats, if not breached, keep the main hull afloat.

So it's kinda important that positive buoancy be added to older boats, just in case.

Farrier had some interesting ideas for rightin flipped tris. INflatable float at the masthead, flooding one of the outer hulls, etc

BUt that assumes the mas doen't break in a pitchpole or wind-over capsize, so can't be guaranteed.

But a trimaran 'raft' is way better than a fragile inflatable liferaft. Read 'Capsized' the Rose Noelle story. Fascinating.

[owly]

In many ways a trimaran will be safer than a monohull. It basically isn't going to sink, and that's worth a great deal. People usually do not last long on "death rafts" which are basically designed to keep you minimally alive for a few days until you get rescued. A death raft without an epirb is a death sentence in most cases. The raft itself is built for a minimal life expectancy, so minimal that in one case a manufacturer refused to allow their raft to be used in a survival movie. Cast adrift with no navigational resources and no propulsion minimal food and water, does not appeal to me. The rule is never take to the death raft until your boat is actually slipping beneath the waves. Half sunken monohulls are often found with the death raft and crew gone, never to be seen again.
In theory a monohull can survive a knockdown and capsize due to self righting of the keel weight. In reality, they more often than not take on enough water that they are unrecoverable after a capsize, and even if they do not sink, they are pretty much untenable. An inverted trimaran offers a main hull that has spaces above water line where you can take refuge if you are prepared in advance to do that. The amas keep the main hull afloat even after you cut an access hatch into it. Jim Brown makes some suggestions as to how to prepare your boat for this remote possibility.

Check out the saga of the Rose Noell........ It's available online. Also check out the stories of the survivors of '79 Fastnet disaster and the Queen's Birthday disaster.

In reality the possibility of flipping a trimaran is remote for a cruiser. It is almost always the racer. Proper seamanship, which involves carrying the proper amount of sail and reefing when one should, and a number of other things, and good storm tactics make capsize extremely improbable. I don't believe there's been more than about one Searunner capsized.

Good weather routing is important, and in this day and age with the sailing speed of a trimaran, and the weather information available, there is little excuse for getting caught in a survival storm. There are areas that are far more dangerous than others.... The Tasman Sea, The Cape of Good Hope, where the powerful Agulas Current meets the storms from the Southern Ocean, and there are few refuges along the East African coast, Cape Horn, and of course the Gulf Stream. Most of these issues can be avoided by proper weather routing. Another place where boats seem to get into trouble frequently is the passage between Minnerva Reefs (about 300 miles SW of Tonga), and New Zealand, 800 miles to the southwest. Storms seem to pass through frequently enough, and the passage is popular enough, to avoid the cyclone season in the islands, that it is not uncommon to have the NZ Coast Guard rescuing mariners. What's interesting to me is that often the boats are not even actually in trouble, the crew is just terrified and exhausted. Consider the fact that a multihull is inherently faster than a monohull, and this both exposes one to less risk of encountering dangerous storms, but potentially allows you to sail out of their path, or at least put yourself on the "safe side"..... the side where the the wind direction matches the direction of travel of the storm. You have more options.

Good storm tactics, a drogue or sea anchor, depending on the circumstances, deployed correctly can allow the crew to just go below, and ride out the storm in their bunks with no real danger, and the motion of a multihull will be far kinder to the crew than that of a monohull.

Crew fatigue from constantly having to deal with a heeled over monohull, or the constant extreme rolling when sailing downwind, is a risk factor in and of itself. Tired crew make poor decisions, and exercise poor judgment. There is always the risk of injury from this as well. Broken bones, lacerations, scalding, etc.... Roger Taylor sailed all the way back from the west coast of Greenland to England with several broken ribs from a knockdown in the Labrador Sea. A Searunner probably would NOT have been knocked down in the same conditions. With the centerboard up and the sails reefed down, they can skate away from waves instead of standing and taking a pounding.

I think the fear of capsize is overblown. Consider the fact that an Oceanic 31 catamaran, with only about 15 of beam was sailed round the horn safely with an entire family including small children, and cats are far less stable than trimarans in terms of capsize potential.

I would not only say that the Searunners are very safe boats, but that that I would rather be on a Searunner than a comparable sized monohull when the going got rough.

Two factors have turned me more toward catamarans, and they have nothing to do with safety.......... well very little. One is visibility from the enclosed bridge deck cabin & not having to climb the companionway to get to the cockpit, which means safe and dry watch keeping in rough weather. The other is payload. Nearly double the payload per foot of length. An overloaded boat is an unsafe boat. The SR31 offers only 1500 pounds payload, the 37 2500 pounds. By contrast, Kohler's KD860, which is a 28' catamaran offers 2640 pounds payload.... 94 pounds to the foot compared to 48 for the SR31. Inadequate payload means sacrificing in places one doesn't want to sacrifice. Ground tackle being the most obvious. Anchors and chain add up rapidly. Spares, tools, fuel, water, etc. Look at just consumables (food and water) for two people on a 21 day ocean passage, and you are looking at 400-500 lbs. The rest gets gobbled up rapidly by other things when you start adding them up realistically. That drives you to a larger boat, with everything getting bigger and more expensive to buy and maintain, in an ever escalating cycle. I'm comfortable with the 18'4" beam of the 860, and it's clean low profile. There are several boats in this class. If I settle on this one, I will probably be forced to build it myself in order to incorporate a few mods to suit my needs and desires, but the construction is far simpler and faster than the Searunners.

H.W.

[longjonsilver]

Does anybody know this boat? Says a Searunner 40, but 41.5ft long and a draft of 4.5ft (huh?), and built of fiberglass. Only 3 pics

83 jim brown design searunner 40 sailboat for sale in Florida

jon

[Redreuben]

It seems de rigueur now for brokers to call fibreglass construction if they find any fibreglass onboard. You’ll find it is glass over plywood. If it was foam sandwich they would be shouting it from the rooftops. Any plywood construction wether sheet or cold moulded that is sheathed in fibreglass is now deemed to be fibreglass or the other favourite catch all “composite”.
Any broker or dealer pedalling this deception should be treated with extreme caution. Imho

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by Redreuben

It seems de rigueur now for brokers to call fibreglass construction if they find any fibreglass onboard. You’ll find it is glass over plywood. If it was foam sandwich they would be shouting it from the rooftops. Any plywood construction wether sheet or cold moulded that is sheathed in fibreglass is now deemed to be fibreglass or the other favourite catch all “composite”.
Any broker or dealer pedalling this deception should be treated with extreme caution. Imho

I see nothing wrong with cold molded or ply and glass. Any buyer not knowing the difference between that and glass should find another hobby. Maybe considering a cored boat falls in the same misconception.

[Redreuben]

Fibreglass sheathing over plywood does not turn a plywood boat into a fibreglass boat.
Play with the semantics all you want. It’s a deception.

[clockwork orange]

In New Zealand and possibly Australia the common description for the construction of a Searunner would be GOP meaning "glass over ply" a good honest description that should be adopted worldwide imho. It is the equivalent to GRP "glass reinforced plastic" which is the universal term for what many refer to as fiberglass. Calling a sheathed plywood or cold molded boat fiberglass is, i agree deliberately deceptive and dishonest whether by a broker or boat owner. Composite is a bit more of a grey area as it is technically accurate. Back in the days before plywood and fiberglass there were boats constructed with carvel planking over a metal frame and that method was referred to as composite construction long before what we commonly think of as composite which simply means its constructed of more than one material. It is however a bit of a stretch when the boat is predominantly wood with just a thin layer of non structural glass. Although no one should doubt that the structural chines on a Searunner are composite. I still think we should not be ashamed of plywood construction such as to try to describe it as otherwise, We should start a international movement to call it GOP.

Steve

[Redreuben]

Steve,
Totally agree, gop is a much more honest description.
And for the record I have no issues with gop boats, all construction methods have pros and cons.

[smj]

I believe Lagoon, Leopard and Fountaine Pajot are all polyester sheathed fiberglass over balsa construction. I’m sure the buyers would refer to these as fiberglass or composite construction. This to me is far inferior compared to epoxy/ply or epoxy cold molded construction.

[longjonsilver]

Originally Posted by Redreuben

It seems de rigueur now for brokers to call fibreglass construction if they find any fibreglass onboard. You’ll find it is glass over plywood.... Any broker or dealer pedaling this deception should be treated with extreme caution. Imho

i believe the owner is selling it directly without a broker. Most boats on sailboatlistings are, no? So far, he has not replied to my emails. i will give the owner the benefit of the doubt as to the construction until i hear from him.
jon
PS: i just noticed at the bottom of the ad that it was posted Aug 2010. i doubt that the boat is still for sale. Funny, i had not seen this ad before, and i thot it was new.

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by smj

I believe Lagoon, Leopard and Fountaine Pajot are all polyester sheathed fiberglass over balsa construction. I’m sure the buyers would refer to these as fiberglass or composite construction. This to me is far inferior compared to epoxy/ply or epoxy cold molded construction.

Far inferior! Ply or cold molded doesn't wick water like "closed cell Balsa".

[rossad]

i would have to agree with you owly

[Tusitala]

all of those types of construction will wick moisture up to the glue joints. I prefer foam or cedar myself - they don't tend to rot. oddly, for some reason most of the plywood that I've seen dryrot didn't go soft at the edges where the incursion was but right in the center of the panel.