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Ed,
Before I bought my P-33-2, I spent a couple of years lurking on Sailnet email lists for a number of boat manufacturers -- Sabre, Tartan, Island Packet, Freedom (and some others I forget.) You can learn a lot by sitting back and watching the email traffic as people write in about problems, solutions, projects, good things, bad things, etc. Eventually you get a pretty good feel for the quality of the boats and for potential problems.
The one thing that stuck with me about Freedom's and their carbon fiber masts is that they can be damaged (stuck by lightening for example) and not really show any damage on the exterior. One fellow wrote in with a story about buying a used Freedom that supposedly had cosmetic cracks in the mast. Well, after he bought the boat the mast came down in very benign conditions and he was stuck. As I recall, the mast had been struck by lightening but at the time it appeared to have survived the event unsacthed. No factory support of course. and replacing a carbon fiber mast is EXPENSIVE.
I mention this not to denigrate Freedoms because they are very good boats. I have talked to a number owners who love their boats and would own nothing else. But if you decide to go with a Freedom, and if the surveyor finds "cosmetic" cracks in the mast -- think twice.
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SailorMitch Sailing winged keels since 1989.
1.20.09 Bush's last day the end of an error !! Hopefully we still have a constitution and economy left by then.
"Compassion and tolerance are not a sign of weakness, but a sign of strength." The Dalai Lama
good planets are hard to find-- a song by steve forbert
I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know no way of judging the future but by the past.-- Patrick Henry.
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