Roger Long
Senior Member
You may remember that I was here last year talking about our trading in the 32 foot sailboat I cruised 25,000 miles on for a Krogen Manatee. Last winter I was reporting on our attempts to sell her.
Well, we did find a good home for a boat that we absolutely loved but which needed work that increasing problems with my arm joints made pretty daunting. We also realized while owning her that we both want to spend more time doing non-boating things and could not justify a boat of that size and outstanding issues. We were able to get out with a small enough loss that the eight great weeks we spent on the ICW worked out to a not too expensive vacation.
A few weeks boatless, the first time for me since 1983, have made us realize that we just can't be without a boat. So we are looking for a smaller trawler that won't need any major work in the near future. Fuel economy is a major issue for us so there isn't much to choose from. The one boat that looks like it would fit the bill would be a Willard Vega Voyager 30 and we are going to inspect one tomorrow.
The one thing that gives me pause about the Willard's is the fire retardant resin which is reported to blister much more seriously than standard resins. One Vega we looked at online was heavily blistered. The one we will see tomorrow has a modest number of topside blisters smaller than a dime. They are reported to be very hard and not to be cracking or leaking fluid under the repaint job. We'll see.
I've never been concerned about small blisters as they are seldom structural. However, I've seen reports that the resin used by Willard, Uniflight, and Valient is subject to de-lamination from the blistering. I've read through Pascoe's online articles on the subject but would appreciate some any additional first hand experience or opinions. Also, any comments on the Willard Vega hulls in general.
Well, we did find a good home for a boat that we absolutely loved but which needed work that increasing problems with my arm joints made pretty daunting. We also realized while owning her that we both want to spend more time doing non-boating things and could not justify a boat of that size and outstanding issues. We were able to get out with a small enough loss that the eight great weeks we spent on the ICW worked out to a not too expensive vacation.
A few weeks boatless, the first time for me since 1983, have made us realize that we just can't be without a boat. So we are looking for a smaller trawler that won't need any major work in the near future. Fuel economy is a major issue for us so there isn't much to choose from. The one boat that looks like it would fit the bill would be a Willard Vega Voyager 30 and we are going to inspect one tomorrow.
The one thing that gives me pause about the Willard's is the fire retardant resin which is reported to blister much more seriously than standard resins. One Vega we looked at online was heavily blistered. The one we will see tomorrow has a modest number of topside blisters smaller than a dime. They are reported to be very hard and not to be cracking or leaking fluid under the repaint job. We'll see.
I've never been concerned about small blisters as they are seldom structural. However, I've seen reports that the resin used by Willard, Uniflight, and Valient is subject to de-lamination from the blistering. I've read through Pascoe's online articles on the subject but would appreciate some any additional first hand experience or opinions. Also, any comments on the Willard Vega hulls in general.
