socalrider
Super Anarchist
Hi all!
After almost 5 years with the First 405, wife and I decided it was time for a change and I put her up casually for private sale & just took a deposit on her at a fair price. She's in survey on Wednesday, so a close is likely in the next couple weeks. I'm poking around more seriously now & thought I'd start collecting advice from the stable geniuses on this forum. Enjoy my dissertation!
We listed the F405 because my three girls are getting bigger (6, 9, 11 now) and it's become clear that while *I* put a high priority on sailing performance, everyone else just wants a comfortable way to be together on the water. Everyone hates heeling. These criteria are leading me to look seriously at boats I would have scoffed at in earlier years.
Use case: easy daysailing with 6-10, overnighting with 5-9, summer Pacific coastal cruising for 2-10 weeks with 5. Ready by late summer.
Budget: trying to stay around $100k all-in including any refit work. Have more, but don't want to spend it. I'm handy, but time-constrained.
Goals are:
- Interior that can sleep 5 in cabins (3 cabin or master plus one three-berth cabin). We are used to smaller spaces than most (live in 1400sqft house). 6'2" headroom.
- Ample shaded cockpit free of lines, traveler, etc. Ideally I can tack the boat without moving from the helm with 6-8 others aboard
- Motion comfort at anchor and in our normal Pacific swell. This is tough to describe I know, but I know it when I feel it.
- Simple systems: the F405 had a composting head, almost no electronics, and two through-hulls.
Candidates (as of today):
Kaufman 47: this whole thing started when I saw one for sale locally & started a thread about it here. She's beautiful and fast, but needs an interior refit below and a significantly modified deck layout to meet my criterial. Would need to come down a lot in price. She was listed for $89k, taken off market by an offer to buy (sight unseen) at ~$75k, but the buyer has backed out before survey.
Cal 2-46: I never would have looked at a boat like this before, but the layout is just amazing & wife loves it. Looks like a fantastic Catalina boat, and ready for going further afield if we got more ambitious. This particular example has the galley down, which is vastly better & creates a massive open saloon. Interior is *great*. Lots and lots of tanks, hoses and manifolds. Old. Great big 4.236 spinning a massive 26" 4-blade Martec, but the engine side not pictured has salt crystals on the heat exchanger (pinhole leaks I assume), and a lot of old clamps and hoses. Running rigging needs to be completely redone (wire halyards & winches!). More exterior wood than I'd like (I'd like none). https://www.yachtworld.com/boats/1977/cal-2-46-3619031/
Lagoon 35ccc: Baby cat, oddly similar in useable space to the 2-46. In great shape. Tankage is low (might need watermaker) but I liked it a lot more than I thought I would, and 1/3 the displacement of the 2-46 means everything is simpler. Much much less load capacity than the 2-46 but I think we could make it work - comments? https://sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/boa/d/san-diego-1996-lagoon-35-ccc/7069655500.html
20 year-old French 45-50' 3-cabin monohulls: The obvious choice. Finding one in good shape on the West Coast is more challenging than I'd thought. There's a nice Dufour 45 Classic in LA but a bit over my range. There are also a few ex-charter boats like this one with lots and lots of heads. Lots of wing keels and in-mast furling mains which I don't like, but they'd still be faster than the 2-46 or 35ccc I suspect!
If I could imagine the perfect boat it'd probably be an older lightweight but well-built 40' cat (Woods, Simpson, or even some of the 90's production boats), but these are very hard to find here. I see a lot of good stuff in the Caribbean but don't know if it's practical to contemplate bringing one over; I just don't have the time.
After almost 5 years with the First 405, wife and I decided it was time for a change and I put her up casually for private sale & just took a deposit on her at a fair price. She's in survey on Wednesday, so a close is likely in the next couple weeks. I'm poking around more seriously now & thought I'd start collecting advice from the stable geniuses on this forum. Enjoy my dissertation!
We listed the F405 because my three girls are getting bigger (6, 9, 11 now) and it's become clear that while *I* put a high priority on sailing performance, everyone else just wants a comfortable way to be together on the water. Everyone hates heeling. These criteria are leading me to look seriously at boats I would have scoffed at in earlier years.
Use case: easy daysailing with 6-10, overnighting with 5-9, summer Pacific coastal cruising for 2-10 weeks with 5. Ready by late summer.
Budget: trying to stay around $100k all-in including any refit work. Have more, but don't want to spend it. I'm handy, but time-constrained.
Goals are:
- Interior that can sleep 5 in cabins (3 cabin or master plus one three-berth cabin). We are used to smaller spaces than most (live in 1400sqft house). 6'2" headroom.
- Ample shaded cockpit free of lines, traveler, etc. Ideally I can tack the boat without moving from the helm with 6-8 others aboard
- Motion comfort at anchor and in our normal Pacific swell. This is tough to describe I know, but I know it when I feel it.
- Simple systems: the F405 had a composting head, almost no electronics, and two through-hulls.
Candidates (as of today):
Kaufman 47: this whole thing started when I saw one for sale locally & started a thread about it here. She's beautiful and fast, but needs an interior refit below and a significantly modified deck layout to meet my criterial. Would need to come down a lot in price. She was listed for $89k, taken off market by an offer to buy (sight unseen) at ~$75k, but the buyer has backed out before survey.
Cal 2-46: I never would have looked at a boat like this before, but the layout is just amazing & wife loves it. Looks like a fantastic Catalina boat, and ready for going further afield if we got more ambitious. This particular example has the galley down, which is vastly better & creates a massive open saloon. Interior is *great*. Lots and lots of tanks, hoses and manifolds. Old. Great big 4.236 spinning a massive 26" 4-blade Martec, but the engine side not pictured has salt crystals on the heat exchanger (pinhole leaks I assume), and a lot of old clamps and hoses. Running rigging needs to be completely redone (wire halyards & winches!). More exterior wood than I'd like (I'd like none). https://www.yachtworld.com/boats/1977/cal-2-46-3619031/
Lagoon 35ccc: Baby cat, oddly similar in useable space to the 2-46. In great shape. Tankage is low (might need watermaker) but I liked it a lot more than I thought I would, and 1/3 the displacement of the 2-46 means everything is simpler. Much much less load capacity than the 2-46 but I think we could make it work - comments? https://sandiego.craigslist.org/nsd/boa/d/san-diego-1996-lagoon-35-ccc/7069655500.html
20 year-old French 45-50' 3-cabin monohulls: The obvious choice. Finding one in good shape on the West Coast is more challenging than I'd thought. There's a nice Dufour 45 Classic in LA but a bit over my range. There are also a few ex-charter boats like this one with lots and lots of heads. Lots of wing keels and in-mast furling mains which I don't like, but they'd still be faster than the 2-46 or 35ccc I suspect!
If I could imagine the perfect boat it'd probably be an older lightweight but well-built 40' cat (Woods, Simpson, or even some of the 90's production boats), but these are very hard to find here. I see a lot of good stuff in the Caribbean but don't know if it's practical to contemplate bringing one over; I just don't have the time.
