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MacGregor owners use MPH, too. Ergo: MacGregor owners are powerboaters and therefore the MacGregor is a powerboat

Actually, the MacGregor is a compromise between a powerboat and a sailboat. But from what I hear, not a very good one - compromises seldom are. There is no such thing as "the best of both worlds".

I agree with you - there has been too much namecalling (especially in the TP52 thread), but I think it is quite understandable that people with experience and knowledge get fed up with Mighetto and his endless ramblings. I know I did, and I'm not responding to anything from him anymore.

 

I have that same feeling - am I sick
Actually, from what I've heard it's best for all of us (including himself) that Mighetto stays away from here during the weekends - his ramblings would be truly delirious (if you know what I mean )
Oops - that's namecalling! I'm sorry, but I couldn't help it!

 

Probably vindicated.
I am a part of several internet community forums. The whole idea is to share differing ideas and help one another. I truly see an us vs them mentality and anyone disagreeing regarded as a *****. I fing the attitudes here disgusting and doubt I will be posting in any future sailboat forum threads. I remember why I stopped hanging around sail boaters in the first place.

There was a sailboater docked next to me in the inner harbor of Baltimore. He left for the week. When he did he left his lines on the dock. Not wanting anything to happen I gathered them up and put them in my boat. When I saw him the next weekend I gave him his lines. Rather than thank me he said one was missing and accused me of stealing it. It wasn't a minor accusation, he wanted to board my boat and look for it. Is that any way to treat someone you are docked beside? Lest you think me an exclusive power boater my brother and I would sail together on his O'day. He died a few years back and left it to his son. His son moved and I have taken possession and intend to teach my children how to sail. I will however NOT teach them this horrrid us against them that resides here.

 

The above quote by Sorenfdk. I am going to expand on it in simple terms for the sake of Woodboat. The numbers won't work as Greenwood clearly explained.....

The pretty cool boat, Mac26x is actually a powerboat that can sail.

Sailboats are displacement hulls and their hull speeds rooted within their waterlines to put it simply. Because of the wave making effect of the hull, the faster it goes, the more the boat "squats" at her stern. Boat have a bow up and stern down stance. At theoretical max hull speed you would need a massive amount of engine power to get it over the "hump" and onto a plane. Really impossible.

Any planing hulls on the otherhand, are displacement hulls below planing speeds. This explains my statement that the Mac26x is basically a powerboat that can sail.

Even her dry weight (displacement) for her lenght spells "lightweight" and this raises some serious questions on the scantlings used for this boat for save cruising. The onboard water ballast.......no comments

To sum up Woodboat, proper blue water sail boats are totally different and superior from powerboats (planing or sailing kind)

 

wb, I feel hurt by that remark, because I will discuss any issue with anyone at any time in an intelligent way. And after reading this forum for months, I have found that almost every single one of the other forum participants feels and acts likewise. Spaghetto is the biggest, most glaring exception to this rule, and another motorboater is the second.

And see the thread "Sailboats are evil...", started by the other motorboater.

wb, if you haven't looked at any other thread in this entire forum, then you have no idea what the forum is like. And if you haven't browsed the TP52 thread, then you just don't know why our attitudes toward Spaghetto are justified. And if you judge the entire sailing community by one jerk moored next to you, then that's just stereotyping and prejudice. In fact, that's exactly what that other motorboater did. One rude, inconsiderate sailor and he wrote off the entire sailing community. wb, should I write off all motorboaters as bigots and bullies just because two of them engage in stereotyping and pollute the sailboat forum with their prejudice and bad manners?

 

Woodboat: If you would care to go back to the first posting in this thread and click on the link to Frank Mighetto's website, then you'll find out that this man is dangerous and needs to be stopped. Numerous people have tried to help him and clear up his many misunderstandings, but he just will not listen.

You're right - this has evolved into an us versus them thing, but it's Frank Mighetto that has estranged himself from the rest of us.

 

The posts confirm what I have said.

Do any of you see a problem with this? Am I now the object of attack? Did I ever mention blue water? Did I ever say I wanted to cross the Atlantic? Did I already say my best friend and partner at work owns a sailboat? I have owned and used sailboats? My opinion is my worst day on the water is better than my best day on land. I was on a power boat next to the rotten neighbor because I was a live aboard. Hey and my boat had a semi-displacement hull, whoops I guess I know about hull types Wynand.
Sometimes the conditions around here change quickly. My friend with the columbia was meeting me for a fireworks show. He was very late because the wind died. His universal diesel will only push the boat at 4 Knots or 4.6 MPH. It would have been cool to have him run faster to make it on time. Sometimes there happens to be a destination. Also most of the older sailboats around here have displacement hulls. They can be very slow in the under 30ft range. Even 8 or 9 MPH is faster than an old displacement design I thought to myself. So heck I thought I would ask if any of you actually used the Mac26 and could give a valid opinion based either on objective data or first hand experience. Short of the one very helpful link most postings have been useless to me. So if anyone else can provide real data or personal use I would be glad to hear it.
From the link, the boat is very tender so the sail, must be reefed to maintain proper control. So top speed under sail seems to be about 9 MPH or just under 8 knots. Also as with ANY 8 ft beam power boat (with out the water ballast of course) there is a good bit of roll. So I would conclude that on the hook one should leave the water ballast full. As far as build, even though it is a little thin it uses hand laid glass which is superior to thicker craft made with a chopper. The new construction method this year seams to have eliminated the balsa wood to reduce rot issues. That's what I have gotten from the useful link. Does anyone else have any useful information?

 

If you're thinking about buying a powerboat with the option to tinker with sailing to see what that's all about, I think the Macgregor 26 is in fact exactly that boat. I think it was built to provide precisely that function.

Marketing aside, of course. We all know, I trust, that th Marketing Staff and the Design Staff are frequently different people working in opposition to one another!

Just so we're clear, a PHRF rating in the 250 range doesn't mean it sails like a concrete block or even a raft. It just means it sails like a pretty pokey real sailboat.

 

Thanks again amolitor. My guess is that weight will greatly affect the speed of this design. Given the ballast it probably won't go upwind very well. My guess is that if they did actually get 17 MPH on this boat it was completly empty and on a reach/downwind. Don't know though. I will have the 16 ft O'day to play with this year as well as my houseboat so I won't be buying one this year I have been asked several times about the MAC and really wanted to make an informed recommendation one way or the other.
Rob

 

Actually this is a very objective post which provided you with reference information concerning the performance characteristics of the boat.

By the way, MacGregor owners, for some reason, I assume it because the speedo on the boat is in MPH talk in terms of MPH. While you can assume it to be a negative statement on my part it does not change the fact that it is a true statement. Mariners use knots. Mariner's GPS displays knots. Distance, on the water, in seaways are measured in nautical miles and speeds by necessity are measured in nautical miles per hour (knots) in order to be able to properly navigate the oceans and seas of the world. If we measured distance on land in nautical miles then cars would have knot meters rather than speedometers. I have logged over 25,000 miles underway as a mariner and none of that on a sailboat. So maybe you don't know as much about me as you might think. Maybe the distain you thought you could hear was a bit of a guilty conscious from not having done the same google search I did to find the information I provided to you.

Nothing in this was a "them and us". It seems you came spoiling for a fight and tried to find it. As for MacGregor targeting people like you, it is again not a bad statement nor hostile. You went to a web site and then stated after looking at the promo material that it is a good boat you would recommend. You talked about the "faciliting planing" of its hull and other things that were simply marketing hype and if you had checked the performance numbers and other type of reference numbers available like the SA/D then you would see that it does not plane away under sail easily in fact it is a very poor performing sailboat which should be considered even worse if it has such a planing hull shape since it can't outperform true displacement sailboats little off planing sailboats.

I am sorry you felt bad by my posts, I was not intending to make you feel inadequate or ignorant. I can assure you if I were attacking you, you would have known it, I am not a subtle person and would not waste my time giving relative performance data to answer your questions.

 

So you can be even more combatant, wow. I popped in this thread again looking for real information, not to argue. In general I trust what has been written in the design and power boat forums here. Of course I don't trust MFGs websites or claims. If I did I would have read there site, accepted it as fact and moved on. If you can't read this thread and see an us VS them as well as name calling and an attitude that you are looking down your nose at others than I simply can't help you see it. Yet again, another useless post that does nothing to aid one in deciding on the MAC26. SO I am left with believing the MFG or believing one that simply can't waste the time to post useful data but can come here and post about who he is and what he has done so that I can just take his word for it.

I understand completly why one would use knots. I also know when I am talking to my buds at the cooler they have no idea how fast I am going. If you tell someone in the US that the temp is 32C most don't know if that is cold or warm, sure sounds cold I think one should be able to flip back and forth easily and certanly shouldn't take flak about it.

 

spaghetto

I noticed that some posters call mr Mighetto with the surname Spaghetto. I think a Forum is for sharing and discussing ideas (hopefully intelligent).
Calling a person with such a name is not an argument and never will be: is kind of insulting millions of individuals that dont hide under a pseudonym whose only
fault is having an italian name, simply the name of their fathers.
Regards,
Marco Casavecchia.

 

Hi Marco, i can assure you that our beloved Frankie deserved this and MUCH MORE than this !!!!!
I was non offendend as an italian, when somenone call him Spaghetto, may i've done it too I've found it just a funny joke
Take a look at the old thread "TP52" and you may judge by yourself; and remember that most of replies on that thread were erased by respective authors to protest again Mighetto (so did i) , so actually you can read little just a bit more than his weird, much too long, absurd lonely speechs

ciao
Mistral

 

Thank you for your post cassavechia, I appreciate your comments. I can understand people being concerned over the tone of the forum, for a very simple reason: I'm just as concerned about it as anybody else. It is unpleasant when posts turn negative, and it is reasonable to be unhappy about that. But unfortunately, you and I cannot prevent rude people from posting on the internet. All we can do is respond to them accordingly, and being polite with rude people is just a waste of time. I will always attempt to reason with people first, and will stop being reasonable only after an individual has been rude many times and proved that they have a hostile intent and refuse to be polite and reasonable. And believe me casavecchia, a person does not have to have an Italian name for me to make fun of them!

 

wb, first of all, you didn't start this thread, so you have no right to complain about posts that don't address your question. The TP52 thread and the bogus claims in it are the topic of this thread. If you really want your question answered, then either start your own thread or stop whining about posts here that are ON topic. Note the title of this thread involves the WEBSITE stating a lot of ludicrous CLAIMS, not just a boat.

As for motoring, there are several issues:
* making a combination motorboat/sailboat
* making this combination trailerable
* the quality and seaworthiness of the Mac 26X/M, based on reports of inadequate scantlings
* the accuracy of performance claims made by the manufacturer.

As a quick thought on your question, I would say the biggest issue is to separate motoring from trailering. Obviously those are two different things. I don't see why you couldn't beef up a sailboat hull a little and put a bigger motor in it, maybe some people can recommend motor-sailers that do that. Or can design one. But trailering, not to mention making the boat cheap, introduces a lot of other difficulties, so any buyer will have to decide which features are most important to them, and which ones they can compromise on.

The main problem with the X especially is ultimate stability. I don't know how tender it is initially, but the M has more deadrise, so it should be more tender initially but more stable globally. And I'm not sure how strong the construction is. Maybe someone else could comment on how common chopper construction is these days. And the hull is solid glass instead of sandwich, which won't help it's strength/weight.

wb, I was going to say it's obvious that YOU are the one being argumentative, but after looking at the quotes above, it seems too obvious to need mentioning. wb, you're spewing flame all over the thread, and THAT is totally uncalled for. sb DID provide you with objective data, spent some time researching it, and made a very reasonable explanation of his post. If you don't agree with it, then fine, you have a disagreement. But that doesn't mean sb's post was an attack. And the fact that you continue to treat it as such means YOU are the one inflaming the thread, responding to imperfect but reasonable posts with a hair trigger, interpreting every slight mis-statement as an attack on you. Language like "disdain", "you better back off", "combatant", and "useless post" are not even remotely consistent with "innocent" posting on a valid topic. In fact, they're CLASSIC FLAME TACTICS. So even if you really are trying to post reasonably, which I'm seriously starting to doubt, you just can't make negative accusations of other people's intentions. You don't know what they were thinking or feeling. sb's handicap info was not "useless" or unhelpful, and your criticisms of his posts are just total BS. To the degree that sb is a motorboater and you're a sailor, I would agree with you a little bit more now, that some motorboaters can be polite and helpful, and some sailors can be rude and inconsiderate.

No, but I'm starting to think you're PARANOID. I read Wynand's post, and it looks to me like a serious, nonthreatening discussion of hull speeds. I would say your response is an over-reaction. In my experience here on the Sailboat forum, Wynand is a nice guy who is very polite and respectful of others. In fact, that goes for almost everybody else in the forum too.

And the references to deep-water sailing (again, the references are ON topic) are to absurd claims made by Spaghetto that the Mac26X is a seaworthy ocean cruiser, in fact even better than the TP52. Those claims are not only stupid, they're dangerous. People's lives could be lost if they took their 26Xs out into rough seas on Spaghetto's advice. So with all due respect wb, I consider the possible deaths of innocent novice sailors following foolish advice much more important than your hurt feelings based on minor lapses in other people's posts to you.