John,
You are correct about hull strength. The standing rig on my sloop came from
a 70ft aluminum sloop whose owner decided to convert from a masthead rig to
a fractional rig. The name of the boat was the "Dance II" out of Southampton
in the UK. When the new rig was fitted, the owner set out for Gibraltar for
some chartering. At 0200 in the morning running at 8 knots 200 miles off the
coast of Portugal, the vessel struck a partially submerged shipping
container that holed the aluminum hull. The Dance II was lost, but
fortunately without loss of life. Had the hull been made from steel, there
would have been a very good chance the boat would have survived that
collision.

Roger,
Aluminum is good, but corrosion is actually a much bigger problem than with
steel. Even marine grade 5000 series aluminum is very reactive in salt
water, both electrically and chemically. Addionally, it is very difficult to
get a good paint scheme to adhere properly with aluminum. This is especially
true now that Zinc Chromate primer has been banned almost everywhere.
However, the construction techniques available for both steel and aluminum
support watertight bulkheads, where the existence of those are almost
impossible with low density materials and had they been present in Dance II,
the loss of the vessel would have most likely been prevented.
Steve

wrote in message
...
On Mar 6, 4:01 am, ray lunder wrote:
Anyone owned a steel hulled sailboat in the 40 foot range and have
some advice on what to look for when buying one? Thanks as always.

I own a steel trawler and there is much to be learned in dealing with
metal boats. The boats of today should have been white blasted
immediately followed by multiple coats of epoxy primer before any
finish coatings and all interior areas have at least 2-3 inches of
high density foam sprayed in before building interiors. Exterior rust
is actually less important than interior rust. Many steel vessels rot
from the inside out. Then there's electrical isolation
techniques.....a whole new topic.

Overall, maintenance is somewhat higher (your labor), but not a bad
trade off in terms of vessel strength. If crossing the pond and you
happen to bang into a semi-submerged cargo container, you may get a
dent in the steel. With fiberglass, you're boat is likely to take the
Davey Jones express to the bottom.

Capt. John
http://www.blueseas.com