Help! How does one choose a great boat for a better one?

[Ted Hoppe]

Last week I was happy with my old girl but then I saw her from a distance. I felt lust in my heart for another more shapely, longer lined model with dreams of adventures outside the golden gate.

To give you background, I own a nice 1957 H-28 hard chine wooden sloop which has been a great sailing boat as well as giving me an introduction to classic wooden restoration project. Her sails are new and tight with a rebuilt mast. She is classically vintage fast and easy to single hand. She is always ready to leave in a moments notice. I alway am willing to buy her a nice fitting or happy to fix her when she is stressed. She is a bit small for my family with limited cockpit spacing. Her only drawback is that her performance has been less than I expected as compared to similar twenty year newer boats.

But on a recent walk down the pier fingers, I saw her. She is a custom designed 36 foot planked stripped sloop and former noted Transpac racer. Like the 28, she is rigged like she had been in her prime (ala 73) in her races to Catalina. Her engine is strong but bit tried and her mast is new. She can seat 8 very comfortably in the cockpit. She needs at least the following: Her planked hull needs a solid sand paint. A 4 aft ribs need sistering and rigging needs four turnbuckles. I think she will be at least $1500 haul out to do her right and all the work done by my self. Oh yeah, She will require a second hand to sail her properly.

Question is… Do I stay with my girl or do I go for a boat that is more. The asking price is 5000. My wife said goes for it. My young son says we need to stay with our nice old girl.

I am that type of guy who like simple, uncomplicated, elegant solutions and high quality things. Like many folks nowadays, money is a bit tight and I will have to part with a few toys to have the new boat... I suppose this kind of feeling is much like having a great, classy wife and being aware that there is beautiful, willing, fast and demanding (expensive) mistress who has made herself available.

What would you do?

[paladin]

Sometimes ya need a little gnu adventure.....

[WX]

Do you have to sell your H28 first, or can you keep sailing her while you get the new girl up to scratch?
Do you want to take on a new project?

[Larks]

Ted, can you post pics of both so that we can take a vote for you? I'm a H28 fan myself and I've seen a few 36'ish classics that don't have that much more room and certainly aren't as sea kindly. I'm also a little surprised that you feel your cockpit space to be quite small on the H28 - is the hatch possibly further aft than normal giving you more room below?

I haven't seen a hard chined H28 before so I'm quite interested to see her anyway so bang up some pics mate.

cheers
Greg

[Aed]

Two questions:

1. A hard-chine H-28?
2. Got any pictures of both boats?

[James McMullen]

I always used to lust for bigger and bigger boats myself. . . . .

. . . but needing a second hand to sail her properly will automatically reduce your opportunities to leave the dock at a moment's notice.

I find I'm now utterly content with my own smaller, perfectly single-hand-able sailboats. I don't think I'd want the extra expenses required for a bigger boat that I wouldn't be able to use as much.

[SchoonerRat]

If you lust for a bigger boat, you need a bigger boat. When you get that bigger boat, you will lust for a yet bigger boat---or lust for your last boat. You will not know unless you try. I lust for nearly every beauty I see, and the long progression of boats I've sailed has varied in size greatly, going from bigger to smaller as often as the other way around. My personal preference has settled on staysail schooners about 65 feet, but that doesn't stop me from lusting after a beautiful H-28.

The ultimate goal is to lust for your current boat more than you lust for the boat next to you. When you can do that, keep her---until you find another boat to lust for.

[JimConlin]

Get a survey and talk to your accountant.

[Ted Hoppe]

Here are the two boats:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28817251@N02/

[Henning 4148]

Get a survey and talk to your accountant.

Yeah, get a survey unless you are 100% sure that you won't find any more nasty surprises on her. 36 ft can mean a lot of problems. Engine is tired, just the upcoming engine overhaul alone will probably already blow your budget. Rigging already has some problems, it may well be time to replace all the standing and most running rigging, again, it will blow your budget. Hull needs structural work, if it's more than what you found, it'll blow your budget. It sounds like some maintenance / repair backlog - which is the only explanation for the low asking price. How about the keelbolts? The shaft and shaft bearing? Rudder bearings? Hull fasteners? Hull planking? All the floors and frames and deckbeams and deck and stringers and cockpit support and bulkheads and heads and electric gizmos like VHF, log, echo sounder, ....?

As you are on a tight budget - you can not afford major repairs ... You already have to part with some toys, just to buy her. And if you find major problems after buying, you would either sail an unsafe boat or might have to lay her up which would cause drying out which again would increase the extend of work that needs to be done ...

[nautiguy]

If you are seriously looking at L-36's, I believe there is one for sale at Arques over in Sausalito. It was given to them after the passing of Bob Griffiths. I believe that the boat, Eventide, is in good shape. I know that he singled handed the boat down to the Channel Islands and Catalina and back every other year, up until he died.

Norm

[John B]

Life is short.

[Gary E]

SELL the old one FIRST........ IF you can find a buyer.

[Ted Hoppe]

All very good points. Saving pennies (dollars) are very important to me. I find a sublte joy in getting to sail a classic boat without breaking the bank or robbing my retirement.

One nice thing about being "a married man"... he can always look at a beautiful stanger before coming home to a honey do list, a comfortable chair, clean house and understanding, complecated and beautiful wife. As my brother always says... I got a wife and a television and they both work.

Nevertheless, I think I will expore these boats further and look to ride on one or two before I sell my old BMW bike, wave tearfully goodbye to my Nichols Buccaneer and drain the ATM.