We drove to Marina del Rey on Thursday with Mr. Broker. He arrived at our house on Wednesday night, we went to dinner, then crashed for a few hours. We were on the road by 3am. The drive was uneventful and we arrived about 15 minutes late for the survey. Mr. Broker had hired Clark, a surveyor he had used before. This guy was amazing. He had surveyed this boat several years ago and brought his notes from that survey to compare. Clark was super cool and let Rich tag along behind him asking all kinds of questions. Clark pointed everything out to Rich and explained why things were good, bad, or no big deal.
We were at the dock for a couple hours with Clark, then we headed out for the sea trial and “haul and hang” at the boat yard. Getting this behemoth to back out of the slip was a chore. The captain did a really good job, but it took at least 3 people to make it work. The engine sounded great and ran well. The 90 horses really pushed the beast well.
We headed out into the channel and put the sails up. We motor sailed for a little bit then cut the fuel to the engine. Surprisingly, the boat sailed with only about 8 knots of wind. When we got to the boat yard the dock workers wanted the boat backed into the slip. The captain was pretty sure this boat would not back up, but he attempted it once, aborted and had the dock workers back it in manually. Apparently the captain had owned an IF41 and knew it would not backup. Clark surveyed the bottom of the boat while Rich listened and watched everything he was doing.
After the haul-out the boat was put back into the water and we headed back to the marina. Getting it into the slip was pretty sketchy. Again, the captain did a really good job, but it took about 3 people to get it done. We spent about another 30 minutes finishing the survey with Clark and then headed for a hotel.
Here’s the bad news.
We’re not going to buy this boat. There are several reasons, but the main ones are 1) the standing rigging was not as advertised; 2) the sails were shit; and 3) the engine needs work. One of the selling brokers claimed the rigging was new in 2007, the other selling broker said it was “gone through” in 2007.
Clark found that all the standing rigging was bad. Most swages were cracked all the way through and bottomed out. The bobstay was cracked and water had migrated behind the bracket that holds the bottom of the bobstay to the bow. The sails were mushy and would last maybe one season. Finally, the engine, which ran fine, had a slight wiggle in the shaft. It was small but amplified at higher RMPs. This would not be an easy fix and would require a mechanic to realign the shaft and level the motor mounts.
Basically, there were too many big problems and we’d have to spend several thousand dollars before we could even bring it north to the delta. We spent $700 on the survey and $400 on the haul-out and even though we’re not going to buy the boat I think it was money well spent. Rich especially got our money’s worth by following Clark and asking questions. He learned a ton.
So we’re going to move on to Plan B. In February we made a whirlwind trip though So Cal looking at boats. In San Diego we walked on an Endeavour 38. I really liked it, but Rich thought it was too small. Later on that same trip we walked on an Endeavour 40 in Marina del Rey and we both fell in love with it. Unfortunately it’s about double what we want to spend. The IF41 seemed like it might be a good compromise. Now we’re back to thinking about the Endeavour, but this time we think the 38 might be workable. We’re going to call Mr. Broker tomorrow to break the news about the IF41 to him and ask him to set something up for the Endeavour 38.