Buying Wisdom Needed

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by Floodhound

I am not dead set on this boat just happen to like the style a lot. I also like the full keel and beefiness it presents.

I am not an accomplished sailor at least in the traditional since. I do believe that a motor on a sailboat is a must for many armature sailors but for me its not what I want to use and soon will never need. Truthfully I think that a motor is far more unpredictable than sails and many people tend to lean on the motor more than they should. Sailing without a motor is sailing in my eyes.


So all in all I think I am going to take everyone's advice and keep looking. My attention is now on a Union Cutter. Any comments on this vessel? From what I am reading these make for decent liveaboards and cruisers.

Just curious here, but will you never spend a night at a dock or marina? With no engine guess you will never need to get to a fuel dock but what about water? With no engine making your own water could be a problem so you would have to get to a dock at some time for that.

Wondering how you would accomplish any of the above without an engine and your claim that you are not an accomplished sailor. Even an accomplished sailor can have a problem trying to dock under sail.

[denverd0n]

Some day you will want to sell the boat, also. And if you don't then that task will eventually fall to your heirs. In any case, someday the boat will be sold.

Without a motor, though, it won't be sold. At best it will have to be given away. You might even have to pay someone to take it.

Let me just say--as tactfully as I can--that since you appear to have no experience with long-term cruising, it would be best if you would at least leave the motor in until you have enough time and miles under your belt to REALLY know what you want and need, instead of just what you IMAGINE that you will want and need.

Good luck to you, whatever you decide.

[foolishsailor]

Originally Posted by Floodhound

I do believe that a motor on a sailboat is a must for many armature sailors but for me its not what I want to use and soon will never need. Truthfully I think that a motor is far more unpredictable than sails and many people tend to lean on the motor more than they should. Sailing without a motor is sailing in my eyes.

If you wish to follow this philosophy than you need to look at hull types that are actually designed to sail. The hull type you are looking at is designed for living aboard not for sailing. To operate an engineless boat you need to look towards the more narrow hulls that can work upwind, full keel or not.

If your boat cant point closer than 50 degrees to the wind and cant move upwind at all in less than 10-15kts your "diesel-less fantasy" will get pretty old pretty quickly. There is nothing as tedious as sitting outside a harbor after weeks of sailing cause the wind or tide is unfavorable - ask the Pardeys they have done in numerous times and thier boat is purpose built to operate without an engine...

Admirable philosophy, but to be realistic you are severely narrowing your boat types adn the one you are interested in is totally unsuitable to the conditions your are setting for it.

edit: Also the boat needs to be maneuverable enough for you to be able to propel it using one-man power, again the pardeys use a sculling oar off the back to maneuver in no wind or tight situations in a marina for example...

[onestepcsy37]

we looked at a union 36 when we were cruising boat hunting. i think it's more liveable than the dreadnought. we eventually found our boat - a csy 37 - which is significantly more liveable; we also didn't like all the wood on the union 36 but i have to admit i think our csy 37 also has too much wood.

and yes, we kept and use the engine. it's hard to get away from. there's a very good reason why sailboats have engines, and when you actually start cruising on your own boat you will discover why for yourself. going engineless is mostly for the starry eyed landlubber....

[Floodhound]

Skipmac

Just curious here, but will you never spend a night at a dock or marina? With no engine guess you will never need to get to a fuel dock but what about water? With no engine making your own water could be a problem so you would have to get to a dock at some time for that.

Wondering how you would accomplish any of the above without an engine and your claim that you are not an accomplished sailor. Even an accomplished sailor can have a problem trying to dock under sail.

I do plan to dock and I think this is fairly simple to do without a engine, in most cases or generally speaking. I also think that making water is a problem but since there are other ways to get / store / make water without a motor I will solve this problem by other means.

denverd0n

Some day you will want to sell the boat, also. And if you don't then that task will eventually fall to your heirs. In any case, someday the boat will be sold.

Without a motor, though, it won't be sold. At best it will have to be given away. You might even have to pay someone to take it.

So true but here is something you might not have considered. If I pull the motor then I must push the motor : I can install engines as well as I can pull engines. I am an engineer and have a talent for making things with my hands. I can fix and build almost anything.

Let me just say--as tactfully as I can--that since you appear to have no experience with long-term cruising, it would be best if you would at least leave the motor in until you have enough time and miles under your belt to REALLY know what you want and need, instead of just what you IMAGINE that you will want and need.

Good luck to you, whatever you decide.

Ill admit that I have 0 experience in the arena of long term cruising that is why I am here asking you all about my future boat. The motor pulling is frankly something I want to do only after the boat and I become good friends and all in the universe is harmonious.


Foolishsailor

If you wish to follow this philosophy than you need to look at hull types that are actually designed to sail. The hull type you are looking at is designed for living aboard not for sailing. To operate an engineless boat you need to look towards the more narrow hulls that can work upwind, full keel or not.

Now we are getting somewhere, thank you for not insulting or undermining my ideas. Perhaps you can validate this for me (a link would be great), I was under the impression that a wide beam mixed with a full keel was a good combination. Oh also with the proper gear as in storm sails etc. I can see that I may need to reconsider my combination.

edit: Also the boat needs to be maneuverable enough for you to be able to propel it using one-man power, again the pardeys use a sculling oar off the back to maneuver in no wind or tight situations in a marina for example...

True. Hey we all know sailors (not yachtsmen) have sailed for hundreds of years without any motor why do we all insist on them now. I think its a crutch then again I am the rookie with big dreams of removing fossil fuels from my boat and sailing around in the deep.

.

[Bash]

Originally Posted by Floodhound

True. Hey we all know sailors (not yachtsmen) have sailed for hundreds of years without any motor why do we all insist on them now. I think its a crutch then again I am the rookie with big dreams of removing fossil fuels from my boat and sailing around in the deep.

Those sailors who for hundreds of years sailed without a motor were unlikely to live aboard a small craft with a woman and a three-year-old child.

Exposing yourself to "the deep" has a long and venerable history. Doing so to children is relatively recent.

Maybe an engine isn't such an awful "crutch" when a child is involved?

[Floodhound]

Bash

Children have been sailing all the same if not more in the past. Do a little research and you might be stunned to see what you uncover.

Ok....everyone I give up.

If I promise to keep the motor in the sailboat can we continue discussing the pros and cons of boats I am shopping for?

[snort]

It's the "clawing off the lee shore" scenario that makes the existence of a good engine a thing of solace to the worried mind.

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by Floodhound

Bash

Children have been sailing all the same if not more in the past. Do a little research and you might be stunned to see what you uncover.

Ok....everyone I give up.

If I promise to keep the motor in the sailboat can we continue discussing the pros and cons of boats I am shopping for?

I'm still interested in how you think it will be so simple to sail a 32' boat into a slip. Maybe alongside an end dock in the right conditions but I've been sailing for 40 years and I wouldn't try to sail into a slip in anything bigger than a small daysailor. Hell, I've smashed into docks a couple of times even with an engine.

[Floodhound]

Look sailing into a slip without a motor is not always the best idea for everyone on everyday. But for me it is what I have to do! If you have sailed for many years and you cant sail into a slip on a nice day then you may never learn to sail.

I would place a friendly wager that if you have motor problems you stress out and your day-motor-sail is over. Right - be honest as I use to be that guy too?

The ability to use ground tackle, momentum, sails, wind, current, a long oar and wits to get a sailboat into any slip is priceless. Unless you have visa then its a simple tow, expensive and everywhere you want to be.

PM me and ill do my best to help, point or curse you into the right direction.

[Stumble]

Flood,

I think they guys above have jumped on you too much about the engine thing. Personally I only sail my 30' into the dock, because the engine never works, and I gave up trying to mess with it. But that boat only goes out with a full race crew, and I have been sailing since I was your kids age.

So getting back to the meat of your question.

A full keel is the second worst keel design possible for going upwind, only beating out internal ballast with no keel by a little bit. There are a lot of engineering reasons for this, but basically the measure that is important for upwind work is the leingth, where a full keel is optimized in the chord dimension. Since chord does very little to generate lift and creates a lot of drag, and a full keel is designed for maximum chord... You get a foil that is really bad at anything except creating parasitic drag.

Beam can be helpful for going upwind, but only if the boat is designed to do so, not because beam is desirable, but because beam equals righting moment, assuming the boat was designed this way. Otherwise a beamy boat just adds more drag, and does nothing to help. So what should a beamy boat look like for upwind work? It should be flat, or nearly so across the bottom, basically the wetted hull needs to be as flat as possible, so that when the boat is heeled, there is just a sliver of boat in the water, and a wide section of the boat out of the water. Basically the boat itself is hiking out.

A beamy boat with a rounded hull like the Union Cutter is the opposite of this design. The beam adds little to the righting moment, and thus to upwind work. Instead there is just more drag.

I am not sure which of the UC's you are looking at, but the 36 at least is generally considered a pretty reliable, heavy built Bluewater cruiser. She isn't fast, and doesn't point very well (particularly by today's standards), but was well designed, and well built. I haven't sailed one, but based on the numbers, she probably takes 15kn of breeze to really start performing, but would defiantly be a good choice in 45kn, where more modern boats may have pounding issues.

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by Floodhound

Look sailing into a slip without a motor is not always the best idea for everyone on everyday. But for me it is what I have to do! If you have sailed for many years and you cant sail into a slip on a nice day then you may never learn to sail.

I guess you're right. Probably too late for me to ever learn how to sail. If I couldn't figure it out after 40 years, owned sailboats from 32' to 65', a few power boats and a sport fisherman and 25,000 sea miles I'm certainly a hopeless case.

By the way, don't understand why you would "have to" sail into a slip other than a personal preference to ditch your engine?

Originally Posted by Floodhound

I would place a friendly wager that if you have motor problems you stress out and your day-motor-sail is over. Right - be honest as I use to be that guy too?

I think you might lose that wager. I learned to sail on a Morgan OI36, not the best sailing boat in the fleet, and spent two years cruising the Bahamas and Caribbean in the mid seventies. Most of the time I was too broke to buy diesel so I sailed (or rowed) everywhere I went. Singlehanded I hoisted sail without the engine, dropped and weighed anchor under sail also singlehanded, including double Bahamian layout in spots. When I spent a few months in Marsh Harbor I had to short tack out the channel (again singlehanded) anytime I wanted to go sailing. Lack of a motor never stopped me.

Under just the right conditions and if I had to for some reason I might try to sail a larger boat into a slip but the odds of a minor misjudgment and the resulting damage to my boat or worse, other boats in the marina would be a strong deterrent for me.

Don't know what marinas are like where you are, but in FL most are long, parallel finger piers with slips lining both sides. You would have to come in under sail down the fairway, drop sail and turn 90 degrees into a slip with just enough way on to make the slip but not smash the pier. Often you may only have a 50' width in the fairway and the slip may only be a couple of feet wider than your boat so not much margin for error.

Add any sort of current or strong winds and trying to dock a boat in a tight slip under sail would be pretty high odds for boat crunching, at least for me.

[Floodhound]

Thanks for giving me something to chew on. I am finding it difficult to research sailboat physics mostly due to my unfamiliarity of terminology, try googling something that you don't know a word for, that is me at this moment.

I have chosen the full keel style boat because I am convinced it will fit my needs better. For strength, stability and other reasons I dare not say in this thread. I also think that a large displacement and ballast should make for a smoother ride. Ill admit that it will be slower but ill also concede I am not going to race, at least not to win. I think 34 to 36 foot range is all I will need and should be able to repair by making my wife donate plasma 2 times a week. <~joking here.

It makes since now as I think and write this. A large keel is going to be a bear into windward but I know there are solutions to rectify this. Can you think of any others?

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by Floodhound

Thanks for giving me something to chew on. I am finding it difficult to research sailboat physics mostly due to my unfamiliarity of terminology, try googling something that you don't know a word for, that is me at this moment.

I have chosen the full keel style boat because I am convinced it will fit my needs better. For strength, stability and other reasons I dare not say in this thread. I also think that a large displacement and ballast should make for a smoother ride. Ill admit that it will be slower but ill also concede I am not going to race, at least not to win. I think 34 to 36 foot range is all I will need and should be able to repair by making my wife donate plasma 2 times a week. <~joking here.

It makes since now as I think and write this. A large keel is going to be a bear into windward but I know there are solutions to rectify this. Can you think of any others?

If you are trying to learn the physics of hull design, it is a subjec that is well covered in literature so no need to research the subject. The classic book on the subject is Skene's Elements of Yacht Design and I'm sure there are plenty of others.

The issue of different keel designs is addressed there as well as multiple threads on this forum. Like almost everything on a boat, the keel and hull design are compromises. Seldom is there a free lunch. Also you have to realize that the keel is just one part of the overall hull design and structure and saying one boat is better or stronger than another based solely on the keel is false logic. In the most general terms and assuming otherwise comparable or appropriate hull design for the keel:

- Full keel will track straighter but will also be less maneuverable. Rudder attached to the keel is less likely to snag lines. Rudder may be less likely to suffer damage in a grounding but to a great degree this will depend more on how the boat hits than whether the rudder is attached to the keel or the skeg. Full keel boat will not point as well as fin or modified fin keel. Due to the larger wetted surface area a full keel is also a little slower off the wind. I don't know what solutions you have to make a full keel point better. Other than good sails, the only thing I have heard of is to remove the engine and fill in the prop cavity which can improve the water flow and lift over the keel.

- Fin keel. Usually requires more steering input than a long full keel, mainly down wind but depending on other aspects of the hull design and choice of sails, this difference may be minor. Will point better, be more maneuverable and generally faster off the wind as well. More likely to snag lines in the rudder or prop.

Other issues you mention.

Strength. Full keel to does not inherently equal a stronger boat. Strength of the boat depends on how it was built.

Comfort or stability. The same answer. Full keels do not inherently mean comfort. I owned a 65' ketch will a full length keel and a 9' draft. The boat was very tender and sailed at a pretty steep angle which got really tiring after a couple of days. So keel design has less to do with angle of heel than the height of the center of effort of the sails, shape of the hull, depth of the center of gravity of the hull/keel, etc.

Regarding the motion in a seaway, a boat that is too full in the ends, has too much weight in the ends, etc can pitch and hobby horse in a head sea, doesn't matter what kind of keel is under the hull.

Generally in a heavier boat the weight tends to dampen the motion in a choppy sea so you may see a smoother ride but again this doesn't relate to the keel under the hull.

None of this is to say that a full keel is not the boat for you and I am not trying to convince you to change your mind. Just pointing out that some of the criteria you mention as I understand how you stated it, are not related to the keel design but other aspects of the boat design and construction. All the elements have to be right and usually have to work together. No one part of the design is good or bad independent of the rest of the boat.

[denverd0n]

Originally Posted by Floodhound

Ill admit that I have 0 experience in the arena of long term cruising that is why I am here asking you all about my future boat.

And yet you seem quite intent on ignoring, or arguing with, any answer that you get. You appear to me (and I admit that I could be wrong, but this is how you appear) like one of those people who asks a question, but has already made up his mind and only wants to hear answers that fit the answer you have already decided on.

If you have made up your mind, then why ask the question? If you are actually seeking advice, then why not listen to the advice that you're getting?

I think you should just do whatever it is that you have already decided that you are going to do.