New Buyer

Polie · #1 (**permalink**) 10-19-2008

Well I have been looking at buying a boat for the last few months. I'm not ready to buy yet, but I should be after a year or so. I am looking for a fix-er-upper over 40' and under $125k. I have decided to forgo buying a house and have a live-a-board

I am relocating back to the Seattle area and plan on doing 80-90% of my sailing there in the Puget Sound. I do plan on a few trips up through Alaska to visit a few friends up in Sitka and Nome. A few boats I have looked at are a 1994 66' Gulet Ketch,1984 44' Bruce Roberts, 1986 42' Tayana, and I also found a 1951 45' Alden but it needs allot of work. I know most people have a dream of sailing down to NZ, but I would be concerned about the structural integrity of the ones I have been looking at. Most of then seem to be more open, which tells me not as strong. Am I correct? I also went though a several page debate on another forum about light v. heavy in weather. Since I plan on having a live-a-board and doing mostly coastal sailing I don't really see the need to get boat designed for very bad weather, because if the weather sucks I will just stay docked.

Now for an explanation of the time I would like to wait, I do not know how to sail and I want to have the time to read several more books and take some classes. As well as have time to research my boat more.

camaraderie · #2 (**permalink**) 10-19-2008

If you are planning to single hand the boat...suggest the boats over 40' will be quite a handful even for most experienced sailors. I agree you don't need a bluewater boat as you have no plans for open ocean sailing. Given the territory though, a better than average build quality and some protection from the elements would be nice. Suggest looking in the 35-40 foot range and stay away from the oddball boats and kit boats and stick with mfrs. that had a reputation for building solid boats as your base.

BTW...I am deleting your other posts. ONE post per topic is the rule here. Welcome aboard!

Polie · #3 (**permalink**) 10-19-2008

thanks for the info, and I didnt think it went thought. It kept on giving me an error message. Something about initializing the thread or something.

Ok 35-40'. Do you think 35-40' will be enough for 2 people and a dog taking a trip up through in Inner Passage? Part of me wants wood, but the other part says wood is going to be too much trouble. Wood also seems like it would be warms during the winter months. Mostly I will be running it myself, in fact I want to be able to run it myself 100%. I plan on only doing 2-3 open ocean sailing right now. (although I may get bitten by the bug and really enjoy it) I have always wanted to sail down to Chile and then head down to Palmer, Antarctica but that's not going happen for another 20 or so years for me. Too busy right now.

I do have several questions, but I am searching the forums first. Mostly stuff about solar panels, wind generators, electronics, ect. ect. ect.

sailingdog · #4 (**permalink**) 10-19-2008

You're really better off looking at boats in the 35-40' range as Cam has suggested. The costs for maintenance, dock space, haulouts, and such go up considerably with larger boats.

I'd also stay away from the Bruce Roberts boats, since many were home-built and not of the greatest quality IIRC. Not stellar designs to begin with IMHO either.

Another option would be a catamaran in the mid-30' range, since that would give you considerably more living space than a monohull in that size range. Some catamarans to look at would be the Gemini 105, the MaineCat 30, TomCat 30, Prout SnowGoose 37, and the Catalac 9m.

xort · #5 (**permalink**) 10-19-2008

When you look at a used boat, multiply by 4 the amount of things you will want/need to fix!
In that price range, plan on 15 to 30 thou for repairs/upgrades.

Lots of choices at under $100,000 if you stick to around 40'.

Polie · #6 (**permalink**) 10-19-2008

I don't know why I didn't think of that myself. After doing a quick search I see that they are in my price range and reviews say that they are very stable. Thanks, now I am going to be up all right looking for at them

Now here is a question, are they as easy to learn how to sail?

sailingdog · #7 (**permalink**) 10-19-2008

I am assuming you're referring to the catamarans I mentioned. Yes, they're fairly easy to sail, but need to be sailed a bit differently than monohulls.

First, most catamarans are relatively slow to tack and some may need to have the jib/genoa backwinded to come about through the eye of the wind. The catamaran sailors, like CHucklesR and TropicCat can talk about this a bit more.

Second, you generally reef a multihull for peak gust wind speeds, rather than the average wind speeds you'd reef a monohull for. The reason for this is that multihulls can't heel and bleed off the excess wind in the gusts like a monohull can.

Third, you generally want to keep a multihull light... Weight is the enemy of a multihull generally. Also, if you can, keep more of the weight aft in a multihull, since it is generally safer to have a multihull a bit aft heavy rather than bow heavy—since one of the biggest dangers in a cruising multihull is having the bows dig in and the boat pitchpole.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Polie

I don't know why I didn't think of that myself. After doing a quick search I see that they are in my price range and reviews say that they are very stable. Thanks, now I am going to be up all right looking for at them

Now here is a question, are they as easy to learn how to sail?