Jan 2025
Insurance Resolution
We finally got the bank paid off on the 6th of Jan. Then when we asked about our money we got asked for a payoff letter from the bank (WTFO). So back to the bank we go for yet another piece of documentation. .....
The Search for the New Boat
While waiting for the insurance payoff, we've been busy online and in person looking at boats. We were thinking about getting another mortgage so we could get a bit more modern boat, but because we don't have a physical land based address, it's obvious that we are full-time live-aboards, and the mortgage laws are not advantageous to the lenders so they won't provide financing. So we are going to be looking for a boat we can buy outright with the insurance funds and likely dipping into the retirement funds a bit more.
Let's start with what the old boat was and what it could and could not do
We’ve learned a tremendous amount from owning and operating SV Unladen Swallow. SV Unladen Swallow was a 2002 Beneteau First 47.7. Her hull design was optimized for Blue Water Racing. This made her a racehorse. She was 47’ long and the interior was designed to keep a crew of 9 berthed and fed while racing. Our boat was hull number 220 and she was bought to be the home of a couple who were no strangers to the world of sailing. He was an accomplished J24 racer and wanted a cruising boat that could take him places without waiting around for perfect conditions.
He took delivery of the boat originally called “Wombat of Sydney” in France and then fitted it out there before leaving for the east coast of the US only to rip out everything done by the French Technicians and redo it all himself as he was not satisfied with the quality of the work.
His requirements were to be easily sailed single or short-handed (everything was rigged to the cockpit). He wanted to be able to easily sail upwind, so he constructed the rig to be a Solent. This means she had a second headsail configured as a high aspect ratio Jib. When finished, he had a boat that easily sailed at 30 degrees apparent or less. He also setup a spinnaker pole so he could fly an Asymmetric Spinnaker for downwind work, and he added a Code Zero for light air work ahead of the beam.
He converted one of the 3 water tanks (under the starboard berth) to hold diesel fuel doubling his fuel capacity. He installed a water maker that went through several iterations before settling on a basic high-pressure pump and membrane system foregoing the more technical solutions which had reliability issues in the past.
He put the largest GenSet he could fit in the Lazarette (3KW) along with a 400W wind generator. Along the way, he discovered that the original DC wiring was bare minimal for the loads and had to upgrade several circuits as a result to adequately power the refrigerator and freezer. He also added a solar array of 6 (six) 80W panels to feed a house bank of 8 golf cart 6VDC deep cycle batteries. Between the solar array and the GenSet he was satisfied with his ability to supply his energy needs.
He had a basic set of tools onboard and kept a healthy supply of spares onboard.
Once he got the boat to Australia, he decided he wanted more protection in the cockpit and designed and built a custom hardtop dodger and Bimini that covered the cockpit.
This was the boat we bought after it had circumnavigated. The systems were dated, and the culmination of the electrical work was by no means compliant with current marine electrical standards. The solar was almost 10 years old and most of the electronics were original to when the boat was commissioned.
The original website takes you through in detail what we did, and why and finally our results, which were still very much a work in progress.
So, our requirements for our new boat are updated a bit based on what we learned.
Maintain the ability to single/ short hand her.
Maintain the ability to navigate at more than walking speed
Be self sufficient (or as much as possible)
Sufficient fuel storage for operating the main engine for 5 consecutive days.
Have sufficient reserve buoyancy to easily accommodate tools, spares, dive gear, dive compressor, provisions for 2 for 6 months without significantly impacting performance
“Safe” blue water boat capable of handling weather up to gale force without causing the crew to fear for their safety.
Easy water access for getting on / off the boat while at anchor for both pleasure and getting in and out of a dingy. (or an “inexpensive” path to providing that capability)
Easily accommodate a dinghy of 11 feet - davits for nightly and short hop storage and deck storage for long distance passages.
Easily accommodate 3000-4000 W of solar (mixture of fixed and flexible panels)
A cockpit easily sheltered from weather, but also easily ventilated while at anchor (path to a hard dodger/ Bimini).
Sufficient refrigeration (Refrigerator and Freezer) to store protein to support provisioning described in #5.
Water Maker (Basic technology)
Easy path to a true workbench and ready access to tools necessary for 90% of the maintenance work on the boat.
Accommodations for 4 – 2 berths – one master.
Be Cutter Rigged forward but accommodate light wind sails (Asymmetric and Code Zero)
The Hull must be free of serious osmosis.
The Rigging and sails should be in good condition – if the standing rigging is more than 10 years old – we will replace.
Traditional slab reef mainsail - Jiffy Reefing.
Serviceable main engine and GenSet.
When taking all of this into account, we’ve decided we need to be in the 50’ range to easily fit everything without negatively impacting the ship’s performance underway.
We have also learned that we can not get consumer financing for our boat since it is clear we will be living on it full time and the regulations are not in favor of the lending institutions. We are exploring the ability to use commercial financing as an alternative.
We have decided that we can afford up to about $200K as a final purchase price. This will get us an older boat (1980’s) but we are confident that these older boats are well constructed and once they are thoroughly surveyed to ensure the hull and electrical systems are in good working order.
Once we have the boat, we plan to bring it to Stuart, FL where there are ready sources of parts, expertise and labor to bring the new boat up to speed.
OK so let's look at what we've learned (mostly from others with far more knowledge than us) about builders and models in our target range.
We've been strongly advised to stay away from the large production line boat builders (e.g. Beneteau, Jeanneau, Bavaria, Catalina, Morgan and Hunter) because of build quality and their design focus being mostly coastal cruising. While there have been many of these boats taken offshore, we have been told that there are far better offshore builders out there. These tend to be much lower production runs and are either much older or much more expensive newer boats. Once we took out the builders listed above and then we started looking at the remaining builders. Many of the older boats were designed to circumvent older racing rules and featured tumble-home hulls and these are designed to heel way over (not comfortable for long distance sailing). We also looked at some of the builders like Irwin and Formosa but were advised that these while being tanks, they sailed like it.
February 2025
Meet SV Unladen Swallow 2, a 1990 Hylas 51, HIN/IMO: HYS51003K090
We have been eyeing this boat for about 2 months prior to finally connecting all the dots. We reached a signed contract on 15 Feb 2025. We have requested a mechanical inspection, but no traditional survey. We know we are going to be replacing most of the items the surveyor would be alerting on and we don't want to deal withe expense of a hull inspection given that she's getting hauled out upon arrival in Ft Pierce, FL where we will do the refit. We plan to strip the hull, remediate anything we find and recoat her from scratch.
Based on Sailboat Data (although year of construction is not right?), her stats are:
Hull Type: Fin w/spade rudder
Rigging Type: Masthead Sloop
LOA: 51.00 ft / 15.54 m
LWL: 40.00 ft / 12.19 m
S.A. (reported): 1,185.00 ft² / 110.09 m²
Beam: 15.42 ft / 4.70 m
Displacement: 37,480.00 lb / 17,001 kg
Ballast: 16,500.00 lb / 7,484 kg
Max Draft: 6.50 ft / 1.98 m
Construction: FG
Ballast Type: Lead
First Built: 1991
Builder: Queen Long Marine Co, Ltd (TAIWAN) for
Hylas Yachts USA, Queen Long MarineDesigner: German Frers
Associations:
Engine:
Make: Yanmar
Model: 4JH2-DTE
Type: Diesel
HP: 77
Fuel: 143 gals / 541 L
Water: 200 gals / 757 L
S.A. / Displ.: 17.00
Bal. / Displ.: 44.02
Disp: / Len: 261.44
Comfort Ratio: 35.01
Capsize Screening Formula: 1.85
Hull Speed: 8.47 kn
Pounds/Inch Immersion: 2,203.89 pounds/inch
This places her at a bit larger, 50% heavier and quite a bit more stable than the Beneateau 47.7 First (our original boat). They didn't build too many of this particular model, but she is well built and has plenty of room. With our modernization plans, she has many years of solid service still left in her.
She has a brand new 8 KW GenSet so we are likely going to go back to an electric scuba compressor.
Generator
Make: Westerbeke
Power Output: 12.00 KW
Hours: 50.00
She needs modernization.
So how did we do against our list?
So, our requirements for our new boat are updated a bit based on what we learned.
Maintain the ability to single/ short hand her - we can rig to do this.
Maintain the ability to navigate at more than walking speed - she is not a racer, but she is pretty good for her era
Be self sufficient (or as much as possible) - plenty of space below, room for solar above
Sufficient fuel storage for operating the main engine for 5 consecutive days. - she has tankage for about 80 hrs of motoring at cruising speed - not quite
Have sufficient reserve buoyancy to easily accommodate tools, spares, dive gear, dive compressor, provisions for 2 for 6 months without significantly impacting performance - we should be fine here
“Safe” blue water boat capable of handling weather up to gale force without causing the crew to fear for their safety - well respected design for this purpose.
Easy water access for getting on / off the boat while at anchor for both pleasure and getting in and out of a dingy. - Aft sugar scoop
Easily accommodate a dinghy of 11 feet - davits for nightly and short hop storage and deck storage for long distance passages. - with the center cockpit the dinghy will ride above the aft cabin on passage, davits otherwise
Easily accommodate 3000-4000 W of solar (mixture of fixed and flexible panels) - we can likely get to 3K not sure about 4K
A cockpit easily sheltered from weather, but also easily ventilated while at anchor (path to a hard dodger/ Bimini). - traditional cloth covers right now - will upgrade
Sufficient refrigeration (Refrigerator and Freezer) to store protein to support provisioning described in #5 - decent size refrigerator and freezer but they are both not working
Water Maker (Basic technology) - has one but not sure of its usability - expect to replace
Easy path to a true workbench and ready access to tools necessary for 90% of the maintenance work on the boat - 3rd head converted to workroom.
Accommodations for 4 – 2 berths – one master - 3 double cabins
Be Cutter Rigged forward but accommodate light wind sails (Asymmetric and Code Zero) - cutter rigged as designed - code zero TBD
The Hull must be free of serious osmosis - missed on this one
The Rigging and sails should be in good condition – if the standing rigging is more than 10 years old – we will replace - 15 years old - will replace.
Traditional slab reef mainsail - Jiffy Reefing. - path to convert to jiffy reefing
Serviceable main engine and GenSet - main engine needs some TLC to include a new heat exchanger, GenSet is almost brand new
So overall we are pretty happy with this model. The biggest issue is the hull and that is still being investigated further.
March 2025
In order to get even liability insurance, we need to have a survey done (out of water). This is an extra $1000 we didn't plan to spend as we know she needs a significant refit.
The Survey is scheduled for Mar 6. Survey results:
The survey did not go well. The hull is badly blistered and there are numerous issues inside that would prevent us from moving the boat anytime soon. I'll post the full text of the survey once it's available. We are still evaluating the go forward plan.
We will cover the refit and plans extensively at Refit 2025
Voyages of Unladen Swallow 2
The Logs of SV Unladen Swallow 2 - 2025
