Beneteau 50 - Few Questions

[atoll]

Originally Posted by chucklet321

They are not very roomy, it's mostly made too fit more poeple, good for chartering, but I would go with a hunter if i were you, the interior is more roomy and they are alot cheaper than the oceanis's are the hunter 45' or 42' passage are highly recomended by me, on yacht world .com you can find some nice perfect condition ones for around 120k or less. They usually have 2 or 3 rooms depending on the design and a water capacity of around 120 gallons depending on the year, i find the older models hold more and are just as nice for cheaper, they are very good for liveaboard also. 40' might not sound like long but it's longer than a school bus.

I would highly recomend looking into some maybe mid 90's hunters!!!

chuklet you seem to have learnt an amazing amount in such a short space of time,since you posted this

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post1048118

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by atoll

chuklet you seem to have learnt an amazing amount in such a short space of time,since you posted this

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post1048118

Yep, it's a good thing that he told us that he was 16 and didn't know how to sail... otherwise we might have thought he was an expert!

The internet is a very strange place...

Cheers,

Jim

[MysticGringo]

Originally Posted by atoll

chuklet you seem to have learnt an amazing amount in such a short space of time,since you posted this

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ml#post1048118

Sounds to me like someone forgot which account he was signed in with...

[deluxe68]

Originally Posted by Knucklehead

Guys, I missed out on a B50 in Annapolis. It sold for $225, that was 3 hours before I had made the same offer. I then bought a B473, 2004. Love it, great boat for wherever I want to go. My previous boat was a B461. Talk about a quickly accelerating boat!!!
BTW - the 50 had it all. Four electric winches, remote chartplotter, dinghy, raft, watermaker, generator, and more, 2 cabin 2 head.
Going to a 461 is not a step down.

How did the 461 hold up offshore? We have our sights on one.

[DDabs]

I'd also like to know

[Mouse]

Originally Posted by DDabs

Dave,

You really think it's too much to be handled by two? What if electric winches were installed?

*edit* just re-read posting, the yacht has electric winches for main and headsail

I personally sailed the sense 55 for on a 9 day cruise to Miami for the Miami boat show this year. I can attest to the fact that the boats can be single handed. Two of my friends were with me and we took turns at watch but I raised the main and genoa myself easily when we departed and lowered both again myself when we arrived.
Large as they may be they are easier to sail than most smaller boats I have sailed.
I did not like the open cabin design myself. I was at a loss for a sturdy hand hold more than once and landed on my pride ever time.

[marina.alex]

We've had a 2003 Bene 50 for three years .. living on board for a year and then summering on it for 2 summers .. it is an excellent sailing boat. in addition to the far greater space on the 50 it is a dry boat and good in heavy weather. When a 25 footer is fighting to survive, we're comfortable ... when 40 footers are wet and overpowered ... we're still fine.

It is a relatively fast boat ... a Farr design .. it's way faster than a friend of mine's 47 clipper. We can power at 8, fastest crossing we averaged 7.8 over 20 hours from Italy to Albania.

Sailing with two is not a problem at all. The winches on the boat are Lewmar 66's 2 speed that have lots of power. It is a handful to short-tack but if you're crossing distances you're not tacking every 5 minutes anyway.

We have a roller-furling genny & mainsail. As a racer I was anti-roller main but have become a bit of a convert -- it makes it easy to use the main -- just roll it in and out ... it's a jib-driven boat anyway .. if we didn't have a roller main we might not use the mainsail much. The main us useful for up-wind work to help with point and speed. We've found using our full-sized gennaker with a snuffer makes it quite fast on a reach -- basically 8 knots boat speed in 10 knots of breeze. The key to staying safe is to always stay ahead of the wind ... we start reefing the main (roll it in 1/3 or so) at 15, Genny starts to get wound in at 20, then continue to get smaller as the wind increases. Funny thing is that the boat doesn't seem to lose much speed ... maybe 2 or 3 tenths ... from 8.2 to 7.9 when you do this.

Another thing to consider is the engine. We have a 4JH3-HTE that is about 100HP -- and can power us at 8 knots for 48 hours before refuel or 96 hours at 7 knots. A good cruising sailboat must also be a good powerboat (unfortunately).

We've done a 400 miler and several 200 mile trips -- the boat is in the Med, with no trouble as a family -- 2 adults, 2 kids under 14. We've been in 35-40 knots with 3-5 meter seas on one of the passages -- no problems, the boat tracks well and behaves the way it should. In 8,000 miles we have never lost the rudder and broached .. we're safe but not overly cautious so we believe it is a great family boat.

The comment about loads is true ... the loads on a 50 are much greater than a 40 ... I caution anyone coming aboard that they must be careful not to get inbetween the jib sheet and anything. Also coming into a dock there is no way anyone can hold the boat off the dock -- use a fender or let it hit .. you'll get crushed. We have a max-prop so propwalk is minimal and the thruster makes it very manoeverable .. but you have a lot of windage so know where you're going and have an escape route.

Hope that helps ..

[DDabs]

marina.alex, great write-up. Thanks for the info.

[Bo Stolborg]

I'm looking at some thing in the same lines, and it most be single handled by a (50 year) old man. So if it has furling main and genova ? and spiler with sock ?.
Any track record of osmosis ? was loking at an old one, that needed trement for osmosis.

[marina.alex]

We are really happy with our B50. No Osmosis on it. We had a little corrosion on the keel -- they're iron or steel not lead. We drilled a holed through and put a zinc on it and painted it. Seemed to do the trick. I'd be surprised if you find osmosis on a 2000+ yacht ... my buddies in the industry say that it is mostly in older boats and that the newer ones have a different formulation of resin that doesn't have the same problems.
Without the sock the spinnaker would be unmanageable for 2 people -- maybe even 5 if you had to pull it in ... Our genny is pretty big, no problems on furler & the furling main is useful -- once you learn how to furl and unfurl it easily.
There are lots of boats out there ... keep looking

[Bluewaters2812]

I'm not sure that this thread is where I should ask the question, or whether I should start a new thread? I am wondering if anyone has had experience of converting a 3 cabin Beneteau 50 to a 2 cabin version? Is this a relatively easy conversion or can it not be done without great difficulty and expense? Anyone done this or know of anyone else who has?