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On Mon, 19 Apr 2004 05:05:55 GMT, (Lee
Huddleston) wrote:

S/V
Truelove is made of steel. She is a center cockpit, raised poop,
cutter-ketch with cutaway keel. Especially given her displacement and
modest sail area, she sails remarkably well. I have been very pleased
with all aspects of the boat. She is stable, comfortable, strong,
able to carry huge loads, sea kindly, easy to balance under sail,
sails surprisingly well in light air, and can handle very heavy air
with ease.

A few Wallstrom-Brewer designs are like this, as well. I am coming to
the conclusion that if you can't afford a Kanter, or kan't afford a
canter (keel, that is), and new Saga 43s aren't in your budget, this
style of passagemaker represents the least number of compromises for
the distance cruiser.

I have heard the arguments for "fast, light displacement" to avoid the
weather, and I like them, mostly, but in terms of cargo, sail-handling
ease and weatherliness, a split rig on a cutaway keel and a skeg-hung
rudder, all in steel or perhaps aluminum, sounds good to me. Added to
that is the consideration that steel is easily repaired pretty well
everywhere in the world. I also notice that the majority of
high-latitude boats seem to be steel ketches or beefy steel cutters.

I will give the fast, light, modern boat the two knots x 24 hrs. in
distance if I have a sense I'll survive not only the storm, but the
full daylight encounter with a coral head in unfamiliar waters, which,
after all, is by far the more likely mishap.

Aside from the hard chine homebuilt versions (I dislike hard chines
for no good reason, but it's a handy way to spot a Roberts design at a
distance!), the Roberts designs generally follow these parameters, and
while they won't win races, they seem to please a large number of
cruisers around the world. Bruce Roberts seems to know what works and
what thoughtful cruisers want, and if you buy into his logic, you can
find some real bargains. Bring a surveyor, however: not to be morbid,
but your best buy will be a Roberts design fastidiously built and left
unfinished by a careful man who died before he could sail away to the
sun. Homebuilt can in fact be better than production, if the builder
has learned how to be careful and has a clear idea of how to build
strongly and soundly.

Now, if you glassed a skeg onto a Shearwater 45 cutter rig, and gave
me $100,000 off, I might change my tune. Those are very beautiful
boats.

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