Keel casting costs/ Carbon Fiber mast

[Royhunter]

Hello Everyone,

Well I have settled on building the Van de Stadt 44 foot Maderia. I need a little help with a few questions...

Can anyone give me an idea of what it will cost me to have a 12,500 pound lift keel cast in lead?? It has the large bulb on the bottom...

Can anyone offer an opinion on the lift keel concept good/bad???

I also need an estimate and supplier for a 65 foot carbon fiber mast. (With three spreaders to give you an idea)

Oh, and one more thing... does anyone know who has the best deals on diesel engines in the Miami area??

I hope I am not asking too much :-)

Thanks in advance,

Roy Hunter
Key West

[D'ARTOIS]

We have presently a few posts that handles the keel aspect. As long as engineering is sound and Van De Stadt knows quite well what they are doing
it is definately not an adversary idea. Personally I prefer it rather than a CB.

About making a costcalculation in the US goes a bit to far for me. Getting the lead is not the problem I think with that many shooting ranges around! Ask the NRA. (Joke) A bulb would kost you in Holland around USD. 2.500,=

What are the recommendations of VDS regarding the keel? Normally they give
plenty of info when you buy a (very expensive) construction plan from them.
This is a intgral part of the boat and should be carefully studied if you are in doubt.

[Royhunter]

Hello D'Artois,

I havent ordered the plans just yet, I want to get my last ball park figures in order and take a deep breath before sending them $12,000 and I am also looking for a building to rent to build it in. In Key West there is no such thing as a back yard and I like the idea of air conditioning...

The design for the boat has either a fixed keel ot the lift keel plan available The lift keel design is E1,600 more. The waters in Key West to the mainland side are very shallow (often less than a meter) so many of the smaller keys are impossible to get to unless you have a small boat. The lift keel will allow me to go to some shallow places and it also makes jumping any sand bars a breeze. It will probably be the only 44 foot sailboat down here that can make it to some of the remote areas.

Yes the plans are insane price wise but they are good designs. I wanted a modern design and they have that. The Maderia design was made available last October. When you compare the price to a custom design the plans are very reasonable. I think the boat will have a good resale value being a lift keel Van de Stadt rather than trying to sell a dated Roberts design.

We are having a regatta here in Key West this weekend... I had a walk around the marina... it was better than sex! LOL

Humm I'll have one of those and those and those... so many beautiful boats. Should be a great weekend. I love this place, warm, sunny, and lots of boats.... :-)

[D'ARTOIS]

I know the design and I am familiar with the Van De Stadt company. Van De Stadt offers - that must be said - extremely safe and seaworthy boats, when
builded correctly. They attach a lot of information to their designs and therefore I could not completely understand your query about the lift keel.
I must admit, over the years I have lost a little bit foot in the smaller boat business (boatdesign.net brings me back nicely) but Van De Stadt I know for a long time. When I checked their pricelist however, I was "not so amused" - although a lot of work and research goes into a new design. But 12.000 US$...... that is indeed something to think about twice. And that might be caused by the fact that their designs are illegally copied everywhere. It is very difficult to defend your intellectual ownership. Look simply at poor Bruce Roberts who is simply robbed from a particular nice design, that is copied by a Dutch company and sold by a non-existent German company.

Bear this in mind. Do the step only if you feel that you are capable to build that boat. If any doubt - don't do it.
On the other hand, buying a fully equipped Madeira will set you back approx.
US$ 235.000,= so the 12.000 US is about 5% and that is not an unusual amount for a design - in Europe at least.
If you go to Luca Brenta, or Group Finot, I don't think that you are getting away with a better deal.

I agree that Bruce Roberts is way cheaper. But.....Bruce Roberts travels a lot, is not always able to help you out in particular situations. The designs of Bruce are nice and sturdy, but they lack the finesse of a Van De Stadt, for example.

I have still a half finished design, the Tramontana 43, 13.10 mtrs, a light displacement, I designed it for myself but I wanted a bigger boat and found
what I wanted. If you are very skillfull - you could go ahead with it, paying a fraction of 12,000 US - but if you are not skillful you better stay with Van De Stadt whose designs are proven and very well balanced.

The Madeira is a real improvement, style is timeless and still very fashionable.
I looked again, no its top!

But......not an easy and not an inexpensive boat to build.

About that carbon mast, I'll check some manufacturers for you. I discovered
something sneaky in the production of Carbon masts, keep us posted and I'll
check things for you.
Good Luck!

[Eric Sponberg]

Roy,

For a keel, you can expect to pay a little more than a dollar a pound for a cast keel, ready to deliver. The best supplier that I know of is Mars Metal Company in Burlington, Ontario, Canada (www.marsmetal.com). I have also had keels cast by I. Broomfield at Son in Providence, RI, (401) 941-7361, at reasonable prices and very good quality. A keel manufacturer will need the keel lines to make the pattern and the mold.

As for carbon mast manufacturers, the three best ones are Hall Spars, Bristol, RI, (401) 253-4858, talk with Jacques Swart;

GMT Composites, Bristol, RI (401) 253-8802, talk with David Schwartz;

Composite Engineering, Concord, MA, (978) 371-3132, talk with Ted Van Dusen, ext. 27.

For an engine supplier in Miami, I am of less help, but I would expect the major manufacturers like Yanmar and Volvo to have outlets there--check the yellow pages and/or the internet.

Eric

[Royhunter]

Thank you D'Artois, Eric, for the posts,

D'Artois the only information I have for the Van de Stadt design is what I can see from the website. I have not ordered their catalog or the study plans. The Van de Stadt website is nice but it lacks a lot of information and this is why I am asking about the lift keel. They are good designers but their website needs help.

Eric, I have seen in you website that you have a design with a lift keel. I would like a little more information on lift keels. I understand the main reason for the design, to be able to have access to shallow areas and to provide a lower center of gravity when sailing in blue water. What I would like to know is how reliable the mechanics that operate the keels are, does the lower center of gravity offer better performance than a fixed keel, how sturdy is the keel if you hit something with it (stupid question I know but something to consider). Nothing is said about the lift keels in the Van de Stadt website and the last thing I want to do is spend $12,000 on plans for a boat that leaves me thinking I had ordered the fixed keel version. Holland is a long way from Key West.

The difficulty doesn’t scare me, I can build anything out of wood given enough time and I am more than qualified to build something like this. Finding people to do the fiberglass is easy. Sure I have never installed an engine before but the good thing about Key West is there are a lot of boat yards on the keys and a lot of qualified people to do the work. If I need assistance, I am not going to have a hard time finding it. The American Van de Stadt representative is a 4 hour drive from here. These are all things I have considered so I don’t end up being one of those back yard builders that never finish the project. I can assure you when this boat is finished it will be of the highest quality, an interior that is nothing less than stunning, and I will not have a cent left to my name! LOL :-)

D'Artois, you said the boat would be worth $235,000... So far with my pricing everything needed (Just missing an exact quote on a mast, boom, and keel so I estimated those figures) I have a list of $92,300 just in materials alone. Including stanchion bases :-)

Roy

[D'ARTOIS]

From the firm tone you set in your reply I reckon you would. However, I cannot answer for Eric Sponberg, although the design you refer to: "Bagatelle" is a beautiful one. Seldom I have seen such an elegant boat!
The combination of wood, stainless steel and lead for the bulb is definately a very ceative one - to keep thins light.
What is scaring about a lift keel? You should only make sure that the keel case is made according the instructions and that there are no leaks. For the rest it is a simple operation.

Another possibility is that you look for another design and that maybe Globetrotter or a similar one coud be converted to your requirements.

I have sailed on a French yacht fitted out with a lift keel and save for the obstacle in the cabin, it worked technically ok. Winching up and down the keel was quite easy.

If you do not feel at ease with VDS design than check for another one, such a boat you build only once, maybe twice.

What I said about the value of Mirabella is this: VDS designs have a high resale value. 6 or so years ago I build a Forna for an Italian lady, equipped with an Aerorig (carbon). This 37' at that time was sold to her for recalculated in USD 195.000,=
Ok, yard build. But if you build your Mirabella as a yard does - or better -
such prices are not exaggerated. probably the value of the euro is distorting my calculation, if I calculate Mirabella on basis USD and the old Dutch FL the boat comes on USD 335.000,=
But due to the introduction of the Euro we have undergone an increase in prices you won't believe.

Better buy your products in the USA.

[Eric Sponberg]

Roy,

We have found that Bagatelle's rudder was pretty reliable until the boatyard dropped it on a piling and cracked it. We have designed a new keel of a different design now, but the first one worked fine, they are just not designed to be dropped from a great height. Bagatelle did ground a couple of times her first season, and the crush boxes that we put in front of and behind the keel absorbed the shock nicely and prevented damage in the boat.

Crush boxes are rectangular boxes of foam covered with fiberglass that are inserted in the slot in front of and behind the keel. If you hit something, the keel rotates backward (held in place by a single pin) and crushes the box. You have to have spares handy to change them out as soon after a grounding as you can. If you don't the keel will move around back and forth in the slot until you get the new crush box in. Crush boxes work very well.

The lifting mechanism for Bagatelle was a reel winch, but was originally designed for block and tackle working from a coachroof winch. The ballast is heavy, so you need a lot of purchase and power (block and tackle, hydraulics, or electric winch) to get it up and down.

As for the value of the boat, Bagatelle cost over $350,000 to build. My latest design, Saint Barbara, a 37' sloop building in Michigan, also has a lifting keel and will likely cost about $400,000. Saint Barbara's lifting keel is operated by a hydraulic ram and a reverse block and tackle, so that the short throw of the ram multiplies to many times that distance to raise the keel.

My Globetrotter 45 design (brand new) will probably cost about $400,000 to $500,000 to build. It has a 6'6" draft, not a lifting keel.

D'Artois, thank you for your compliments on my designs, the Globetrotter, and now Bagatelle. I appreciate that!

Eric

[ancormar]

Dear Sir,

I'm at present also interested in the purchasing / construction of a Madeira 44 - aluminium.

Regarding to lifting keel, I've heard about two "systems" (both suitable for Madeira): 1) upside down and 2)downside up. I've heard about one is much more effective than the other (and more expensive too). But, unfortunately, I don't know "which is which".

Could we cooperate in our possible construction adventure? I'm living in Spain.

And regarding to lifting keel, you always have another option. That's centerboard: www.alubat.com
www.alliage-yachts.com

Both shipyards works in aluminium (a lot of people says that is the best blue water cruising material).