I'm looking at buying a steel boat for bluewater cruising around 32 -
34', possibly a lot of it singlehanded. I had a look at an Ebbtide 33
yesterday, Alan Pape design, professionally built at Oceancraft in UK.
20 years old but little rust inside or out. Has anyone any experience
of these boats or advice of any advice of potenial problems i should
look out for?

Thanks

Paddy

On Sun, 24 Oct 2004 09:56:31 +0100, Padz
wrote:

I'm looking at buying a steel boat for bluewater cruising around 32 -
34', possibly a lot of it singlehanded. I had a look at an Ebbtide 33
yesterday, Alan Pape design, professionally built at Oceancraft in UK.
20 years old but little rust inside or out. Has anyone any experience
of these boats or advice of any advice of potenial problems i should
look out for?

Just going up an extra three feet to the 34-37 foot range will give
you a larger number of steel models from which to choose, including a
lot of ketches, which may prove easier for a single-hander to sail.

Steel's weight generally means (particularly in older designs) that
it's less than ideal in producing decent sailers as you creep down
from 40 to 30 feet. It doesn't mean they don't exist, obviously, but
that the designs *can* be too "tank-like".

That said, a lot of Ted Brewer designs (www.tedbrewer.com) and those
of his former partner Bob Wallstrom are in steel and/or aluminum and
several have been produced commercially over the years. A good example
is the Goderich 35, also known as the Huromic 35, which is reasonably
fast, but bulletproof enough to circumnavigate single-handedly.

For Brewer's discussion of little steel boats, see
http://www.boatus.com/goodoldboat/steelboat.htm

Good luck and make absolutely sure to get a qualified METAL boat
surveyor to check out everything below decks. If the interior hull is
accessible (not foamed in to the underside of the cabin sole) and was
properly prepped, a steel boat is a wonderful thing...but it requires
either constant vigilence or constant maintenance.

But you probably already know this. G

R.