Ranger 26-- Hit Rock-- Thinking of buying

[Youngblood]

So this boat was well maintained until one year ago. I finally got the full story after the purchase... The owner previous to the salvage company purchased the boat for $6500 one year ago. He then had $14K in electronics installed on the boat (radar, 12" plotter, thruhull transducer..). All the rigging was redone and bottom paint applied. That owner then hit a rock damaging the rudder. He was forced to have a contract salvage company tow it and store it. He did not have enough for the repairs or storage and ended up giving it to the salvage company for $1400. The owner of the salvage company then repaired it for his own families use but decided to get a power boat instead. The boat sat on a mooring bouy with a brand new motor and fixed up for just under a year. Then I came along and took it off his hands.

All systems go!

Had a nice race today on the boat I normally crew on 12.5 knots on a broad reach in 28 knot breeze. Was a good day!


Edit: the electronics were taken off except the fancy thru hull tansducer which I'll have to figure out which units it is compatible with.

The electronics were installed by a reputable company.

[FutureStories]

Originally Posted by Youngblood

So this boat was well maintained until one year ago. I finally got the full story after the purchase... The owner previous to the salvage company purchased the boat for $6500 one year ago. He then had $14K in electronics installed on the boat (radar, 12" plotter, thruhull transducer..). All the rigging was redone and bottom paint applied. That owner then hit a rock damaging the rudder. He was forced to have a contract salvage company tow it and store it. He did not have enough for the repairs or storage and ended up giving it to the salvage company for $1400. The owner of the salvage company then repaired it for his own families use but decided to get a power boat instead. The boat sat on a mooring bouy with a brand new motor and fixed up for just under a year. Then I came along and took it off his hands.

All systems go!

Had a nice race today on the bot I normally crew on 12.5 knots on a broad reach in 28 knot breeze. Was a good day!


Edit: the electronics were taken off except the fancy thru hull tansducer which I'll have to figure out which units it is compatible with.

The electronics were installed by a reputable company.

Sounds like a steal once put into perspective!

Congrats on a solid find. When given limited information we’ve always got to assume the worst!

With that said hope you’ve already got your boat US or SeaTow package! If you only use it once every 10 years it’s worth it.

[Youngblood]

For sure! It definitely has a bunch of projects for me to keep busy with. Its a very sought after boat up here in the northwest. Of the crew of 9 on board today 3 have been Ranger 26 owners at one point.

[captlloyd]

Originally Posted by FutureStories

Sounds like a steal once put into perspective!

Congrats on a solid find. When given limited information we’ve always got to assume the worst!

With that said hope you’ve already got your boat US or SeaTow package! If you only use it once every 10 years it’s worth it.

No, we don’t always need to assume the worst. It is all right to point out what could be the worst, but to assume the worst might just kabosh a great deal.

[dfelsent]

I used to race against a bright yellow Ranger 26 on LIS. They were a real pain as a competitor. Because they were hard to beat! Enjoy the boat. (And check the tabbing. Every boat is a project!)

[HellBentSailing]

I own Ranger 22 hull #207 that was built by the same company and the thing is built like a tank. From what I can tell the hull is much thicker than any of its competitors and it sails like a much larger boat. Used to sail a Yamaha 25 Mk 2 and I take my Ranger out in stuff I wouldn't touch in that thing. If yours is anything close to similar I'm sure you'll enjoy it a great deal.

[RayRodriguez]

OMG! A Ranger 26! My Dad owned and sailed one in the Great Lakes back about 1972-1974 +/-. I LOVED that boat.

There are a lot of people making wild assumptions about that boat that crack me up. Guess not everyone is familiar with boats that size and era. And simplicity.

"Battery under the sole." The only battery that would fit under the sole would be a D-cell. The battery was placed in different places on different owner's boats, but is usually in the (starboard?) lazarette or under the (starboard?) seat in the cabin. Ours was in the cabin. I think that was factory. Others moved theirs to the lazarette.

"The electrics." This boat was very primitive. (No offense intended.) The only modern boat similarly equipped would be a Colgate 26. The factory "electrics" amount to running lights & cabin lights. Pretty sure that the cable back to the outboard for starting / charging came with the outboard, not the boat. The step into the cabin was the icebox. No electric fridge. Even the water was hand-pumped.

Any knot meter / depth sounder / nav gear would have been added by the owner. Of course, in 40+ years, probably a lot has been added & then removed.

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Since the OP's decision has been made, perhaps a little drift is acceptable...

I'm kinda astonished by the above quoted statement. Why on earth would keel bolts be that expensive? They are just bolts, and in the case of this boat, neither very large diameter nor very long nor made of some expensive alloy. Because of the outward turning flange design of the Ranger's keel, they can be replaced without dropping the keel (as can many such designs).

Could you explain why you believe in your 10 grand price tag, please?

Jim

Exactly. The keel, looking from the front, is "T" shaped. The top surface extends several inches to either side of the fin. This "outward turning flange" is basically a rectangular (top view) flat plate that sits into a recess in the bottom of the hull.

The keel bolts are not cast nor embedded into the keel, but regular old 1/2" galvanized hardware store bolts that push up from the bottom, thru that "T" flange, into the hull. IIR the heads were recessed into the iron a bit and faired over.

You'd probably need a real big breaker bar to get those rusted nuts off, but two average shade tree mechanics could replace the keel bolts in an afternoon for $25 in parts while the boat sits in its cradle for the winter.

Above the water it looks almost exactly like a similar era Pearson 26, but I'm pretty sure the Pearson had a lead keel and *maybe* the keel & rudder were a more "organic" shape. (The Ranger had a very sharp, mechanical profile to the keel & rudder, like a jet aircraft.)

Yes, it was built like a tank. I used to look forward to "small craft warnings." That mean the wind was up and that tank would really start to move.

[rsn48]

I was on a 26 Tanzer sailboat when it hit a rock. The boat was hauled out and proved good to go. I still have the scar over my left eye to prove as I went flying forward and came down on the traveler.

Every year, thousands of boats hit stuff in North America and Europe with most results being somewhat benign. I also echo getting a survey while admitting I haven't always gotten one, and one that I did do was a waste of money.

The Ranger 26 has a hand laid fiberglass hull that is probably "tank" like given the genre of boat building it came from. You know, lets add another layer of glass just in case.

[clockwork orange]

Agreed, I pointed out the different keel structure back in post # 16. I was offered one of these Ranger 26's for free back in the summer with a late model mercury 5 hp, It was actually in pretty good shape and had recoring done on the decks a few years ago and we had sandblasted and painted the keel with it off and then reinstalled it with new bolts maybe 3 years ago. The only reason the owner was (very sensibly) offering it for free was that he had bought a 30ft S2 to live on in the summers and had tried to sell the Ranger for a year and needed it gone before he had to pay for another year of storage. It doesn't take many seasons of storage to exceed the value of a cheap boat. A Ranger 26 with modern racing sails and hardware and a racing bottom, well sailed of course, would be a formidable competitor in any phrf fleet imho.
I wish you luck.


Steve.

[rsn48]

I sold my last boat, a 1974 Catalina 27 for one dollar for the same reasons, keeping the boat for a year at Sewell's marina in West Vancouver (translation: expensive) would cost me more than selling it for the buck. Also, the boat had serious issues of which I had spent thousands to resolve and it didn't help, I knew the boat was going to have to be scratched.

I personally feel I ripped the guy off for that $1. It will cost him thousands to get rid of that boat and Vancouver is clamping down on derelict and abandoned boats.