buying a trawler

edbulmer wrote:


So I'm thinking by the replies that a single is easier to work with but a double has it's advantages too. *I guess when you find the boat you want it won't matter that much whether you have a double or single engine.

Now for my next dumb question. *I plan on living on the boat or boats depending on the answers and info. I get. *Whew, here we go.

I will live 6 months in Toronto Canada and 6 months in Key West Fl. *Would it be better to have one good boat (trawler) with diesel motors and travel back and forth or would it be better (in my case) *to have two boats perhaps more inexpensive power boats with gas motors and fly back and forth?

There goes the neighbourhood he he! *Lets have it I know were going to have some fun here. *Basically what I'm saying is *I will only be doing a small amount of travelling from the dock at either location. * Perhaps in the future when I retire I will buy a boat to travel around on.*

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Good God man!!! It gets really, really cold in Toronto and they measure thief snow in meters (not inches!!!). I visited my girl friend there a couple of years ago and they had a real serious winter!!

Seriously, I don't think you will find one boat that would fit both climates.
In florida they're all about air conditioning and keeping the heat out and us folks in the north are trying to keep the heat in. When we want some air conditioning we just crack a window open.:evileye:

Edelweiss wrote:
*Good God man!!! It gets really, really cold in Toronto and they measure their snow in meters (not inches!!!).

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LMAO* I love it!!!!

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*

6 months Canada & 6 months Florida - travel by trawler to & fro = 6,000 miles round trip. Every year? 3 miles per gallon (at your best) @ $4 p/gal = $8,000.00 annually in fuel.

Buy a cheap boat, gas or diesel for each end. Park it!

Bingo, we have a winner.* That's what I'll do.* Forget about the 8 grand in fuel.

I'll buy the beers.* Cheers.**

PS that was funny about the snow.* That's the reason I go south for the winter.

It's so cold here all the chickens line up at KFC just to get in the deep fryer.

I'm surprised they don't jump off the CN tower. Speaking of extreme, that glass floor, watching kids laying on it, looking 1200 feet straight down, just about did me in.

Yeah, I agree condo overlooking Lake Ontario and a 40' boat in Key West, a raspberry margarita, and a little Jimmy Buffet on the stereo. I'm down with this!!

Larry B:biggrin:

Edelweiss wrote:*I agree condo overlooking Lake Ontario and a 40' boat in Key West,

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******* That's the way I would go!* With a condo you get a lot of protection from the cold by virtue of being in a building with other condos. (Supervised, maintained, etc.)

As for the 40 footer in Key West? No decision here except for a hurricane plan.

SeaHorse II wrote: *
******* That's the way I would go!* With a condo you get a lot of protection from the cold by virtue of being in a building with other condos. (Supervised, maintained, etc.)

As for the 40 footer in Key West? No decision here except for a hurricane plan.

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I guess I left out the part about getting good boat insurance (That was just assumed).. . . .

That's the beauty of it though, Winter in Toronto begins after hurricane season. *So we're talking November through April-May in Florida and May-June through October in Toronto. *

Toronto has beautiful summers, It's just across the US Border from Buffalo, NY, and lots of things to do, the Great Lakes, St. Lawrence Seaway, Niagara Falls, Horseshoe falls, *Hmm. that's all water things?? *Must be a good City to live in then. *

"Soap on a Rope" . . . in Key West? *I think you need to be careful about which bars you frequent regardless of where you go. *If it's got "Blue Oyster" in it's name, you may not want to go in there. *LOL

Larry B

nomadwilly wrote:But I agree** ...most trawlers on this site have twins and singles w the same engine. Lots of builders did the same dumb thing.

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We've talked about this before but it isn't dumb if the buyers of your semi-planing boats want to semi-plane them at 14-18 knots or whatever.* And many if not most buyers of GBs in the 1990s and on up to now want to do just that.* We would, too, if we had the engines that could push our boat along that fast and the money for the fuel.** A semi-planing hull is something of a waste if you're not going to run it at semi-planing speeds.* If you're not, better off to buy a more efficient and appropriately powered displacement boat I think.

Marin wrote:nomadwilly wrote:But I agree** ...most trawlers on this site have twins and singles w the same engine. Lots of builders did the same dumb thing.

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We've talked about this before but it isn't dumb if the buyers of your semi-planing boats want to semi-plane them at 14-18 knots or whatever.* And many if not most buyers of GBs in the 1990s and on up to now want to do just that.* We would, too, if we had the engines that could push our boat along that fast and the money for the fuel.** A semi-planing hull is something of a waste if you're not going to run it at semi-planing speeds.* If you're not, better off to buy a more efficient and appropriately powered displacement boat I think.

*What I observe, is that semi-displacement/planing hulls at hull speed don't roll as much as a similarly sized full displacement boat at the same speed.* The hard chines, while less efficient to push through the water, tend to have a stabilizing effect.

Which brings up the interesting phenomenom of when the SO suggests that maybe we should slow down because it's getting a little bumpy, there are many times that the correct solution is to speed up to increase the stabilizing influence of the hard-chines in order to provide more comfort.

Jay N wrote:
*What I observe, is that semi-displacement/planing hulls at hull speed don't roll as much as a similarly sized full displacement boat at the same speed.* The hard chines, while less efficient to push through the water, tend to have a stabilizing effect.

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*Yes, BUT...... and it's a real big but..... the roll characteristic of a hard-chined, nearly flat aft section, semi-planing boat absolutely sucks, at least in a lot of people's opinion.* They may not roll as far but the motion is a lot more "violent" than what you get with the typical displacement hull.* A semi-planing hull like our GB has a very fast '"snap back" at the end of the roll.* You go over and then, wham, you start back.* As opposed to the much more gentle, albeit farther roll with more of an ease into the roll back that you get with*the typical*rounded displacement hull.

I know a few people who have moved from sailboats to power cruisers like GBs and the like.* Some of them are very happy with the ride.* Others absolutely hate it.* The complain bitterly about being "jerked around" in any sort of beam sea or when encountering a good size wake from another boat.* While my wife and I have no real objection to our boat's "snap back" roll, I always turn into the "Bayliner" wake that comes off so many plowing boats because if I don't and take the wake at all on the beam the GB will flip you on your head if you aren't careful.

In rough water with the waves coming from abeam or nearly abeam our dog has proven to be smarter than us.* At the first sign of significant rolling he heads for the aft cabin floor and lies down on the centerline of the boat.* He figured out on his own that this is the least "violent" spot he can get to.

Now I know there are people who hate the slower, deeper roll of a displacement boat.* I've experienced this movement in sailboats in Hawaii but that's not a fair comparison because sailboats have both the deep keel and the sails to stabilize the boat.* So I can't say I'd prefer it to our GB's roll characteristics.* We're used to what our boat does and have learned to stow everything that's not tied down if we think we're going to be in rougher water because if we don't that fast, snappy roll will toss it all over the cabin.

So it all depends on what an individual likes.* But this notion that a semi-planing hull is*less rolly*and so has a "better ride" needs to be taken with a grain of salt.* A better ride for one person may be a horrible ride for the next person.


-- Edited by Marin on Monday 8th of August 2011 07:57:05 PM

"We've talked about this before but it isn't dumb if the buyers of your semi-planing boats want to semi-plane them at 14-18 knots or whatever."

Yes but if they want to go 14-18 knots then they should get a boat that is designed for that speed. And if they want to go 7-9 knots they should also get a boat designed for that and it is NOT the same boat. That's what is dumb about it. If for example you have a 42' GB w a single Lehman powered to go 7 knots it should not have a hull designed for 11-12 knots. Slow boats have a very narrow speed range. The slower the boat the narrower the speed range so a 7 knot boat has a speed/power range far less than 100% so at least one configuration can't be judged to be a good responsible combination of power and hull design. I think your boat is properly powered but the single is an under powered medium speed hull (in trawler terms). Ironically I would not look at a twin for myself in a GB 36 as it's too heavy and burns too much fuel properly loaded. Last winter I found a GB 36 single. It was powered by a Deer. But my ideal GB 36 would have twin 50hp engines.

Marin wrote:
So it all depends on what an individual likes.* But this notion that a semi-planing hull is*less rolly*and so has a "better ride" needs to be taken with a grain of salt.* A better ride for one person may be a horrible ride for the next person.



-- Edited by Marin on Monday 8th of August 2011 07:57:05 PM

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You're right Marin.**Perhaps my wife has just been humoring me all these years!

nomadwilly wrote:
Yes but if they want to go 14-18 knots then they should get a boat that is designed for that speed. And if they want to go 7-9 knots they should also get a boat designed for that and it is NOT the same boat.

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But to the market GB appeals to, they ARE the same boat.* A whole bunch of GB buyers in the 1990s, 2000s, and still today want a boat they can go from here to Desolation Sound in 1 or 1.5 days at a speed of 16 knots or so burning 25-30 gph, then when they get there they want to meander around at 8 knots or so for*a week or however long their vacation is burning 8 gph, and then they want to blast back to Puget Sound at 16 knots in a day or so. They call it "maximizing the use of their time."*

They don't want a purely planing boat because they tend to not have the same*volume of space in them in the same length boat.* They want the Grand Banks interior space and*configuration but they want to be able to run it fast to get somewhere, at which point they want to run it slow.* This was explained to me in great detail by the then-owner of our local GB dealership some years ago and he made a lot of money selling these folks the kind of boat that would do exactly*what they wanted to do.

Now whether or not someone agrees with what these boaters want to do is something else.* But the point is that*this is what they want to do and Grand Banks and other manufacturers like Nordic Tug sell a lot of boats to this market.* And in the end, the boats that sell are the ones that appeal to the market.

A 16-knot,*twin-engine, 900-plus horsepower, semi-planing*Grand Banks may not make sense to some people.* But if a person thinks it's dumb, I suggest their quarrel is not with Grand Banks but with the people who want Grand Banks to*build that kind of boat and who*back up their desires with their wallets.

Marin wrote:*A whole bunch of GB buyers in the 1990s, 2000s, and still today want a boat they can go from here to Desolation Sound in 1 or 1.5 days at a speed of 16 knots.......

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A 16-knot,*twin-engine, 900-plus horsepower, semi-planing*Grand Banks may not make sense to some people...............

******* It does to me!* That's exactly what I want. Add a Euro configuration & I would be one happy cruiser. Both my wife & I think the 42' GB Euro is our choice for a cruising boat. We do like the 41 Zeus but there's not enough G2 available yet.







-- Edited by SeaHorse II on Tuesday 9th of August 2011 09:46:03 AM

Marin and Walt,

Sounds good to me those last 2 posts. Iv'e got nothing against going fast and slow a great deal of the time but when a manufacturer builds a semi-planing boat and only provides displacement speed power* .......THAT"S DUMB* ........from a design point of view. The old GBs w single engines should have had a different shaped stern and they did'nt get it because the designers/builders were so focused on the almighty buck they threw what little ethics and design principals they had out the window. I will not be sucked into any more babble to support this. I'm out'a here.

nomadwilly wrote:....but when a manufacturer builds a semi-planing boat and only provides displacement speed power* .......THAT"S DUMB

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* * * ** Couldn't agree more!

nomadwilly wrote:when a manufacturer builds a semi-planing boat and only provides displacement speed power* .......THAT"S DUMB* ........from a design point of view.

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Could be.* On the other hand one has to consider what things were like in the mid-60s when American Marine came out with their GB line of boats.* Powerful marine diesels of a size that would fit 32, 36, and 42 foot boats were not readily available, or available at all.* Also, diesel engines are expensive, and they were then, too.* The single engine boat was cheaper by at least the price of one engine and runnng gear.* Also, American Marine in their literature of the day, and in magazine reviews of the GB line, all cite the "seakeeping abilities and stable ride" of their hull.

So perhaps at the time, the advantages they felt were inherent in that hull design warranted its use even though the "go really fast to get there" era was far in the future.* The ads and magazine reviews of that era make no mention of the ability to drive the boat more than 8 knots or so--- that seems to have been the design objective, an 8-knot "dependable diesel cruiser."*

American Marine was no stranger to building boats with displacement hulls--- for years prior to the introduction of the Grand Banks and Alaskan lines they built power and sailboats designed by other people including Sparkman & Stevens, William Garden, Nat Herreshoff and Ray Hunt.* So I don't think it was ignorance that led them to choose a semi-planing hull for the GB.* (By the way, there is no mention of "semi-planing" or "semi-displacement" or semi-anything in the early ads, literature, or reviews of GBs.)* The only way to know what was truly in their minds when they chose that particular hull configuration is to ask them, and there are not many of the folks who were active at American Marine back then around anymore.


-- Edited by Marin on Tuesday 9th of August 2011 10:39:24 AM

"There's no doubt which one I (and my spouse) prefer. "


Your opinion might be very different underway with 6 ft waves abeam every 9 seconds, rather than in a slip.

Or out in blue water , where the waves get interesting.

After a while the wide beamy boat will simply follow the wave contours , like a Cat or a Try.

Yes, whether or not you have covered moorage is important. For older boats with lots of brightwork, if they came out of a boathouse they have to go right back in.

Agreed, you'll only need 80 hp and the second is also a (possible) high-capacity alternator and turning boost.

djones44 said:

Agreed, you'll only need 80 hp and the second is also a (possible) high-capacity alternator and turning boost.

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I agree. Something like a normally-aspirated John Deere 4045 diesel engine, a 150-amp alternator, and a bow thruster. Works for me!

I have been aboard many sport fish , none seem to have enchanted forests below ,

but at speed the true planing vessel does not get that much worse fuel mileage (sometimes better) than the big SD wallowers.

Why not 30K or more instead of 16K , if its the same fuel bill?

And most had a generous cockpit , so outside could be enjoyed , instead of viewed from a window or oxygen tent.