Our beautiful boat Isbjorn is hauled out at Antigua Slipway getting her steering system re-built. The whole project, which is probably going to cost north of $10,000 (update: it’s complete, and the final bill is $14,000), inspired me to write about my refit experiences.
Isbjorn is the third old boat I’ve had the “pleasure” of refitting and I’ve learned the hard way what it takes to buy and refit an old boat for long-distance ocean sailing.
(For the details on all three refits see my previous chapters in this Online Book.)
To be clear, I love the concept—refits have elements of history, creativity and recycling, all things I value in life—but there are unexpected realities that I will explain in this post to help those considering refitting an old boat.
I could not agree more about survey results. We just bought a 1988 Tartan 37 and the surveyor missed so many details (and shame on me for not picking up on at least some of them..); a toasted battery bank (4 yr old Lifeline AGM’s x 4) probably the fault of a bad Xantrex Truecharge 40+ charger, masthead tricolor was full of rusty water, broken wind transducer and a bunch of other minor quibbles… BUT- the boat is just bomb proof in almost every other regard. The previous owner had gone through and did some wonderful upgrades.
And another great example of an S&S design! Good choice! One of my best friends had an S&S Tartan 37 on the Bay for a few years and we both loved it. Does yours have the centerboard? I know they only made a few with a deep keel…
A good summation, Andy, and it’s nice to see the old Albergs appreciated for their qualities. I think you’ve got to a sweet spot with your Swan, however: they are structurally excellent and amenable to alteration and access, which is a problem I find with newer boats with pan-type and/or modular structure. Let’s face it, whether you are doing 12 or 7 knots across oceans, you want “bomb-proof” and few boats are built for that today, because few people are doing that today. It has occured to me that the reason older boats are more sea-kindly is not just because “fibreglass was new so they were over-engineered” but because they were expected to get their owners home in one piece: there was no big red button, very limited SAR resources and no means by which help could be requested, never mind delivered. So boats were built stoutly to raise the odds of them being seen on the other side of the ocean, still the best endorsement a design can have.
Marc, you make a good point about the Swan in particular – the joke is that ‘a Swan can be taken apart with a screwdriver!’ It’s a joke, but it’s also true. EVERYTHING is accessible. When we replaced the chainplates, you couldn’t even see them at first – but it was just a matter of removing some interior trim, and bang, all the bolts are there, nothing is buried in fiberglass, etc. It makes maintenance and improvements that much easier.
They are not the only boat like that of course. My dad’s Wauquiez (which resembles a Swan in design, and which we jokingly referred to as ‘the poor-man’s Swan’) is similarly built and easy to ‘unbuild.’ Some boats are notoriously NOT built in this way. A friend in Portugal is ‘rebuilding’ a 30′ Van de Stadt design. The chainplates were buried in fiberglass, and that’s just one example. Luis loves the work, so it’s not issue for him, but it’s a LOT of work.
So look for stuff like that in older boats – how easy are they to take apart? Something quite obvious when you start looking for it, but completely hidden if you don’t know where to look.
I think we need to be careful that we don’t wax lyrical about these old boats. I am certainly a lover of old, strong, GRP as I have cruised extensively in a Rival 41C. The hard fact is that for £60k to £80k I can buy a damn good modern hull yacht, in excellent condition and strong enough to sail anywhere. Today, you can read about Hi Latitude adventures in modern GRP cruisers as well as the ubiquitous Atlantic circuit. The facts are clear – statistically sailing offshore in a modern yacht is safe and sound: crushing, collapsing, sinking and snapping just don’t feature in the statistics. Where they do you find things like extreme designs, poor maintenance, not manufacturer recall stuff. Modern hull form and construction methods offer reliable, low cost access to sailing and many also have that row away factor as well.
Why do I like my old Rival? Well, for sure I know she is strong because I sailed one for 5 years in a professional capacity all over the UK and EU and she never let me down once from F10 to bumping over the Goodwin Sands, to drying her out on her beam, 10s of thousands of hard earned coastal miles. Mainly though, after a long search for a boat to buy, I kept coming back to the Rival qualities and robustness, the clincher though was when my good wife stepped on the Rival and later she said, ‘I like the way she doesn’t tip when I step on her gunwale.’, thats not a reflection on the redoubtable lady, I’ll let you wonder which I mean.
Surveyors, don’t get me started, a lunch time lift, hold and launch. In pouring rain the surveyor wielded his moisture meter and reported that she had hi-levels of moisture – no shit Sherlock. No account was taken of any water that may have been inside her, the environmental factors, the fact that she had just been lifted out etc. He also missed a loose engine mount, which nearly resulted in me losing the yachts on a lee shore in F7 – F9 when the shaft coupling sheared on her short delivery trip between marinas. I always sail with the anchor ready to be deployed in coastal waters and it saved my bacon. The look on my brothers face as I smartly went to the bow and launched the anchor as he was preparing fenders. I had specifically asked for an engine survey.
I stated this before, but I think we are seeing the beginnings of these older GRP hulls being sought and refurbished, like Classic Motor Bikes, many will pass through the hands of good intentions, few will make it to a concours prize.
As for my old lady, she has reached the point now where she is worn out enough to warrant a refit (not replacement I may add). I have done the big stuff so she is off to a boat builders to have her joinery finished, if I do it, it will look, well, like I did it. She doesn’t deserve that, she needs skilled hands, an I am talking about my Rival 🙂
I do wonder the value of the moisture meter at all. My boat was supposedly quite wet (but had just been pulled out of the water). 3 years later the decks are super solid, core is generally dry as a bone when I drill into it. There is an area that pegged the meter, but that’s also super spongy under foot and obviously needs to be replaced.
The point of metering the hull of a 1963 Pearson with no core remains a mystery to me.
I wish the surveyor had spent more time looking over the systems and specifically the mast which (ouch!) ended up getting replaced.
That said he said “don’t put a lot of money into this boat”, which is exactly what I ended up doing. Duh. Sure learned a lot of painful lessons along the way. The boat is getting nice though and I will be a lot smarter with the next boat if there is one.
Paul,
They have their uses and are good indicators of moisture content where moisture should not exist. The moisture content is very low and GRP that has been dried will not show any weight decrease that is detectable. They key point is what happens to the level over time and good GRP that shows hi moisture but say 2 weeks later is low (after sitting on the hard) is good. If it’s still has the same readings some weeks or months later then the moisture is trapped because it has reacted with other chemicals and the molecules of the new compound are too big to get continue their journey through. The logic is that if the water gets in, it can get out again unless some thing changes to trap it. And that is the basis of one of the biggest cons in marine surveying, in my humble opinion. Of course, it is not that simple. Modern GRP is prepared and protected so that it is far less permeable than old GRP and one would expect a modern hull that has just been lifted to have very little moisture. In addition water that is in the bilges, sitting on stringers, or even in a bottle pressed against the other side of the hull will show up as high moisture readings. I have checked the bottle issue on my own boat with Tramex meter. The GRP in my cockpit coaming is about 10mm thick around the cave locker and dry as a bone, zero moisture reading. If I place a plastic water bottle inside the locker and press it against the GRP and measure the same spot outside the locker, the meter goes off the scale. In my opinion a good ultrasound survey of GRP is far better at detecting structural weaknesses in GRP, but greater competency to use an ultrasound meter and interpret the results.
I’m sure that’s true Alastair but for a survey on an old, thick boat, to spend 2 hours sounding the hull in a 4 hour survey seems like a problem of priorities. I ended up having manky old rigging that needed to be replaced shortly afterwards, among a number of other very expensive repairs that had not much to do with the moisture, all missed.
I’d still probably pay for a survey for the next boat but would spend a lot more time crawling around myself trying to rule the boat out.
Paul
Hi Andy. Nice reading your accounts of refitting boats very properly.
Your observations on cost are of course not exaggerated. I just though it might be worth considering how this actually does compare to a new boat. That calc has been done well by John here on AAC, but just a few related thoughts….
A new boat has a price tag that is never complete. Mostly one needs to add 10 to 20 percent in sails and equipment. The same day that you took it home, you can sell it, but you’ll loose maybe 20 percent. Expensive day. As time passes, the value will drop gradually slower until it’s only depending on the apparent quality of your boat. A good boat might not drop further in price. Your boat might at This point be a good or bad buy, but it has cost you the price you bought it for, minus what you sold it for, plus what you spent maintaining and repairing it. The maintenance and repair budget for å spanking new boat should be close to zero, but never is.
As it gains a very few years, repairs normally are just as frequent as on a much older boat. On many new boats, systems are so complex or fragile that maintenance and repair costs are way higher than on an older boat that gets to just as nice spots and gets just as much sun. 🙂
There are plenty of badly designed and built older boats, but they are normally quite easy to spot. The newer similar boats still hide their shit behind shiny surfaces. There is no doubt that many builders have reduced some quality elements. Some of them important for safety. Rudders have started to fail too frequently or their bearing support breaks, sinking the boat since there is also no watertight bulkhead. (I won’t name wharfs, but several ones qualify). Keels fall off, even on Oysters. Core structure elements are some times made from non lasting materials.
I think the conclusion is that old or new, it will either way cast a lot. If you know what you’re doing, life is easier. 🙂 There are plenty of good new boats out there too. At the end of the line, enjoy your boat, whatever it is. Optimists and pessimists are probably right and wrong about the same number of times, but who has the best life? 🙂
Your refit wrap-up comments are wonderfully cogent, but few of us possess the vision and skills necessary to make the myriad decisions that the process entails. I lucked out on a first boat with a Cape Dory 31. She taught me a lot, her parting lesson being that I needed a bigger faster boat for longer passages. JBoats are thought of in club racing contexts, but the J race/cruisers in the 40-53 range will join the ranks of classic cruisers. My J42 can be taken apart with a screwdriver, is strong and fast and easy on the eyes.
Minimally equipped: I agree. I can not begin to estimate how much of my time involved removing and restoring poorly done changes. Maybe I’m just a little picky…and the more I get back to the original, the more appreciation I have.
I absolutely think this is true. When I looked at my boat it had a lot of accoutrements of offshore voyaging. Wind vane, big grabrails at the companionway, all lines led back to the cockpit.
I slowly realized though that the vane didn’t work, the grabrails needed to be removed and that all that rigging was old and mostly broken.
If I had bought a virgin boat in perfect condition I would have saved all the work of removing that stuff. And the heartache too.
One thing: I know costs are exponential, but certain costs are fixed. You could have a large boat with simple systems, and if you did the costs would be the same. A mid-sized GPS or a nice VHF costs the same when you put it in a small boat or a large boat.