Budget long range cruiser fit for Pacific crossing - Ideas ?

Whats the cost of a mast, boom, standing rigging, whinches blocks, cleats, hundreds of feet of line, lead ballast in the keel, wind vane, need I go on. Sailing is definitely not free.

 

The $350k was the entry price for a Nordhavn 46, which I thought you and others said had inadequate fuel capacity, partially because of its short length and partially because of its inefficient hull. And I would not want to be in one in a real storm anyway. I watched the 2004 atlantic rally video again last night and several vessels had stabilisor issues on that trip and they didnt have any severe weather.

 

You seem to have a hobby of trying to twist and give false suggestions about what whoever has posted on the thread.

 

So what's your budget to buy sail and maintain your own suggested powerboat ?

 

I dont have a fully developed budget. If I need more funding I will be a seasonal worker, and not full time. Its possible that I may work from home, given that I am an IP worker.

However I do feel one can impose a limit for the capital side of the project and work towards that goal. If it is not going to work out one will know during the design process and would then have to re-adjust your goals.

 

Keith I think that you are wrong about thinking people don't think that you are capable of independent thought. I certainly don't think that of you. What I look for from forums is obtaining lots of different viewpoints from lots of different people. I then use that information coupled with my own knowledge and life experiences to make decisions on what is best for me. Not what might be best for someone else. For example I would never tell you what needs to be in the SOR for your boat. That is something that only you can decide. I will provide suggestions based on my knowledge about boats gleamed from a lifetime of sailing up and down the coast of California and Mexico.

I am not an engineer. I do like intellectual challenges. When I was in college I thought long and hard about being a NA. I read and studied everything I could find about it. Ultimately decided that was not a career for me. I probably did a dozen or so designs with all of the calculations by hand ( this was pre computers) of boats that appealed to me. My most recent intellectual challenge in boating was to learn how to design freestanding masts. Eric Sponberg over the years would give me hints to keep me pointed in the right direction. I now have a massive spreadsheet that by plugging in a few basic numbers will generate the design of a freestanding mast.

I also think that you and I are not that far apart in our thinking about what is important in life. I had been back from Mexico for several years living on my boat on a mooring in San Diego and was thinking about taking my boat back to Mexico. Spend winter and spring in Mexico and summer and fall in the US. I was looking at either a small 5th wheel trailer or a simple cabin in the mountains when my elderly mother told me that she needed a place to live. She was living with my brother at the time and he wanted to move back east to be closer to his kids. No way my mom was going to do that. She had had enough of the cold and snow growing up in South Dakota. So my plans changed. I bought an inexpensive home to provide a place for my mom. She turns 101 in August. When I no longer have to provide a home for my mom I will write another SOR not only about boating but also life in general. It might be my prior plan or something completely different.

I like the simple life and like to take the road less traveled.

 

I wouldnt overlook unpainted aluminum, other than needing protected area for right where welding will take place it surpasses steel in every way.
. Much less weight
. Therefore better fuel mileage
. No sandblasting
. No 3 coat epoxy inside n out
. No painting
. Woodworking tools cut n grind
. Better resale
. Less ongoing matainence
. With overall weight 1/3 less than steel
cost overall close to similar

 

Everything is a compromise. It is estimated that if using aluminum vs steel, the hull itself will weigh 30% less. The material cost multiplier though, is $3.44/$0.574 = 6x multiply 6x0.7 =4.2x I think people may not be aware why aluminum has become so expensive and it is because aluminum manufacturing demands a tremendous amount of electricity. With all of the angst about climate change, utilities have been charging more per kWh and this trend is likely to continue if not accelerate. Kasten Marine wrote on their page aluminum vs steel that the cost of steel is half that of aluminum but that data is way out of date.

So still a non trivial difference in hull cost. Added to this, an unpainted hull assumes no filler whatsoever. That is a tall order in terms of workmanship and I think thats something that is only achievable at a very good yard that has built many examples of that hull. Once you start painting aluminum the situation changes a lot. Many of the chemicals needed are quite toxic and adhesion is not a simple matter. I am not going to sign myself up for the "no fairing" camp...

I think that if I was going to spend that much money, I would rather go with foam cored fiberglass because then shape is anything that you want and weight saving is even higher.

 

Have you thought about a strip planked hull with glass sheathing? A lot of small yards can build a strip planked hull. These hulls are strong, fairly lightweight and less costly than a foam cored hull.. Or a radius chine hull in either wood, steel or aluminum? A radius chine hull is almost indistinguishable from a round bilge hull and much easier to construct. Look at Dudley Dix's website for examples of radius chine designs. Boat plans, yacht designs & boat kits from Dudley Dix Yacht Design & Boat Plans https://www.dixdesign.com/ Dudley Dix could probably modify one of his designs to meet your desire for a long, skinny fuel efficient powerboat. Ted Brewer also has some radius chine hulls on his website. Ted Brewer Yacht Design http://www.tedbrewer.com/

As to the cost of mast, sails and all of the stuff that goes with it IMHO you will never spend as much on fuel as the cost of those items. There was a thread on this forum about a guy building a 40 something catamaran down in OZ. He got the hull done and finished off. He then went shopping for mast, sails and sailing gear. The mast alone was close to $100,000. He decided to forego sailing and uses his boat as a powerboat.

Have you considered a power catamaran? One of my friends was the captain/toymaster for a very wealthy couple in Dana Point. They had a Hatteras 53 powerboat. They purchased the rights from Hobie Alter to build a sister ship to his 65' power catamaran and using his molds built the sister ship in one of their warehouses. I don't know the cost of their build. The end result was that they doubled their cruising speed while using half the fuel. I think that Hobie's molds are currently for sale on Craigslist. Another option to consider.

 

Chuck one can do strip planking with foam too. It seems to me that rigid pvc foam is cheaper than marine grade plywood. One would just have to rip it down to the widths needed so there would be a little wastage. One has to build a more elaborate form to build the hull in and after building the left side you take it apart and reassemble it mirrored and built the opposite side. Ill see if I can find a youtube video that shows the process.

 

Foam is not cheaper than ply.

You are forgetting the foam is just a core and the required lamination uses lots of glass and lots of resin and lots of time to apply all of it to each side, whereas the ply is already very stiff and only requires encapsulation against ingress.

The fastest and cheapest way to build is ply (versus foam at least).

And I am building in foam; dev panel....so not a bias.

 

Fallguy, I have already shown that the glass is the least expensive part of the layup @$0.48/sqft for 22oz triax. I dont have any layup schedules to work off, so dont know how many layers like that are needed inside and outside with pvc core. If I could get some study plans I may be able to get an idea, but this does not seem to be a widely accepted practice with boat plans. If it is going to be a lightweight hull cant be too many layers that thick except at hard points.....

Edit: I see Tad Roberts calls out 30mm cedar strip with 2300g/m^2 outside and 1550g/m^2 inside. So equivalent to 6 layers of 22oz triax or $2.88/sq ft before epoxy. Its basically 5mm of high modulus fiberglass. Seems heavy to me, when added to 30mm of cedar strip...

 

It is heavy, but your layers are about 1 extra-3 out and 2 in is probably close enough.

Then the boat is spec'd for bluewater, so it is automatically going to get more glass...

I do find it a bit heavy, but I am not really qualified to say...

If you infused the entire thing and used say 80% epoxy to glass against the 5 layers; you are 110 ounces glass and 88 ounces epoxy. The epoxy is roughly 75 cents an ounce or $66/sqyd, say $7/sqft!

Some semantics play here, but the epoxy is very costly vs the glass.

 

Also, the reason you don't get glass schedules is that is the boat!