These are a fiberglass interpretation of the famous Tahiti Ketches. When it comes to build quality these are very difficult boats to classify. For example, they have balsa cored hulls. While I am generally a fan of cored hulls, these boats were built in the 1970''s before the boat building industry undertood how to build a durable balsa cored hull. As a result these boats are bound to have some coring problems and the problems could be very extensive.
They had concrete (some used resin) and steel boiler punching ballast. This is a recipe for a short lifespan as moisture can reach the steel and eventually destroy the bond bewtween the keel stub and ballast. This is also a low density ballast which meant that these boats have substantially less stability than the wooden externally ballasted Tahiti Ketches and so have substantially less stability. Tahati Ketches were renown as heavy air boats as long as they did not have to go upwind in a breeze. These boats with their significantly higher center of gravity are not likely to be very good heavy air boats and are also bound to have an uncomfortable motion since they are bound to be more rolly than the already rolly original Tahiti''s.
They came with wooden spars and gaff
rigs. This means a whole lot to maintain.
By any objective standard these are miserably slow boats. poor handling boats with especially poor performance in light to moderate winds and poor safety perforance in heavy air. They do not point worth a darn and so by any reasonable standard can expect to spend a lot of time motoring. Most have bigger
fuel tanks than water tanks.
I would run, not walk the opposite way.
Jeff
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