Lagoon bulkheads

[smj]

Another update.

https://youtu.be/wgJn1f_ArFE

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by AKA-None

How well does that work when the company just disappears?

Well in my fantasy world:

The manufacturer would have to produce a recycling and disposition plan for every part of the boat when they build it and place in something like a trust account the money needed to execute that plan.

Of course the warranty might expire or the company might go out of business and it becomes the responsibility of the owner to fix things that failed when the warranty expires or the builder is no longer able to do so but if it comes to disposal the money and the methods needed would be available.

But this would raise the cost of the new boat dramatically and incent people to retain and fix up old boats.

And it might result in new business opportunities:

• Companies which write the recycling/disposal plans.
• Companies which speculate that they can recycle or dispose of a boat for less then the money set aside and profit from that.
• Companies which refurbish old boats for resale.

I do think that humans need to change from the "throwaway" practices, and I really feel that all the human creativity, resources, and endeavor to build a boat should not, in the end, be a waste.

BTW, It goes beyond boats, all products, especially plastic, should be covered by such requirements.

[impi]

Hi fellow sailors and boating enthusiasts.

It seems everytime there’s a post about bulkheads I get asked to please comment.

There’s not much to say except catamarans IN GENERAL are exposed to bulkhead issues because they are wide platforms flexing in heavy seas. This is the reason we took our brand new Lagoon 440 and strengthened the bulkheads for world cruising.

One has to be mindful of what one is going to be doing in terms of sailing grounds and conditions and adapt to those environments. After all if you take a 4x4 with narrow street tires into a muddy swamp you’re going to be disappointed and so you would change out to mud scupper style tires to fit the conditions.

I have family in the catamaran business, my son and my cousin at Just Catamarans and there’s a ton of evidence that catamarans need to be stopped once in a while and have a good inspection done if they are cruising the world - that means STOP and have your boat checked through by experts and make necessary adjustments or improvements after years of sailing.

Something interesting - bulkhead issues, whilst more prone on catamarans are not limited to catamarans and mono hulls can also suffer from bulkhead issues. I helped a fellow sailor in Fiji on a sturdy mono work to reset his bulkhead.

I see a lot being said about Parlay and for sure Colin raised an issue that was a design floor for the 450 but he raised it because his bulkhead failed in style having been a hurricane trashed boat which he freely advertised as being such on his channel.
Remember, its easy to make a scene about the trashed boat you bought and add value to it by making a documentary about how strong you’ve made your boat - it’s more of an issue to be someone who purchased his dream boat for a lot of money to then rag on the design bringing his higher paid value down.

Ive recently been asked by many owners to look at their bulkhead issues and these cats range from Lagoons to Leopards to FP to Privilege and other production builds having bulkhead issues.

It’s no secret that bulkheads can be an issue on catamarans - gosh - we knew this 13 years ago when we took our brand new cat and strengthened the outer bulkheads.

Here’s an interesting story for those who ‘rubbish’ other peoples boats.

I had mentioned publicly that all catamarans are prone to bulkhead issues and I set out the reasons for this , which ranges from : Over Tensioned Rigging to Hitting the ground at speed to improper haulage and storage on the hard as well as poor sailing techniques in rolling seas.
It’s quite obvious that when a loaded catamaran is sailing with wind from astern and all big sails raised that as one surfs off a wave into one ahead of it, that there is going to be resistance through the bows wanting to stop the vessel while the wind keeps pushing the rigging and mast forward.

That amount of force is going to transfer a downward movement on the mast into the bulkheads it ‘sits upon’ and if at that moment there is an ‘awkward momentum’ that creates a force from one bow to the opposite hull stern - well - there’s a serious recipe for something to break right there.

After publishing this comment the owner of a Leopard (newish model) challenged me to say he has checked his bulkheads and there is no issue at all.
I advised him that this is very fortunate - he is prominent on the social media pages for leopard.
Strange as this is, not long afterwards he sold the Leopard and unfortunately for him the new owner asked me to check what he suspected were damaged bulkheads. And … indeed - the bulkheads had separated.
It ended up with a huge debate by the current owner as to wether the previous owner had known about it, being the reason for the sale - well - I don’t know and I make it my mission as a full time sailor looking for peace and tranquility to keep my head out of these things, but it goes to show how owners can either be unaware or choose to remain silent on all of this.
In this instance Leopard immediately came to the party to rectify the issue because in my opinion unlike Lagoon they understand the consequences of social media making this public.

Now when it comes to SNoah let me say that I really enjoy these guys - they are humble, gentle people who admit right away that perhaps they lack some of the technical skills.
Ben has reached out to us to discuss the bulkhead fix but fortunately Lagoon in this case have stepped up to the plate to sort the issue - probably thanks to Colin, who managed to bring Lagoon to the table so kudos to him and grateful he did.

We all know SNoah has had some hard sailing - I think too Ben is quite open to the fact that perhaps over tensioned rigging could have played a role and then to my mind with them hitting a rock / reef at speed also plays a part.
We need as people to be very careful how we judge things, judge products because many of the comments I read here, respectfully said, cannot be coming from people who actually are sailing boats or have experience of boats.

If we look at the video where SNoah hits a rock one quite easily sees how much of an impact the boat actually took as is evident by the comments Ashley makes : I think 9:50 into the movie ‘The whole right side of the boat came out of the water’ - 11:25 ‘it hit pretty fast’ -Ben at 11:38 “shit sometimes happens’ -11:57 ‘Felt like we were climbing a mountain on the starboard side’.

This is why I love these people - they are honest and open but they haven’t figured yet that perhaps that incident or others like it could have caused the initial damage to the bulkheads or other structure . Where the right side of the boat is ‘climbing up a mountain’ that exposes a broad boat like a catamaran to twist and break things.

So guys - I want this to be of value for folks who get confused about which boat to buy !
Buy a boat that feels good to you and then doing what is needed to make it a WORLD CRUISING boat with years of life if that’s what you intend to do.
The Lagoon 440 (our second cat - previous was a Catana 471 also a great boat) is a great base boat for world cruising and I’d buy another if the factory were making them to this day - On CF in the early days we were told there is no way a 440 will cruise around the world.
Well there are plenty who have cruised around the world and literally hundreds and hundreds of Lagoons sail around the world.

Sure - people criticise aspects of the design but we are all different and I feel she sails great and feels great on the deep oceans - but yes, for sure we have done modifications and last year we stopped the boat for 6 months and went through everything again adding strength for safe measure and years of continued passage making.

Lagoons, Leopards, FP - name it - if you like the design features buy it and make it a world cruising catamaran.

The reason we hear a lot of Lagoon owners coming forward is because they all speak about it nowadays - Lagoon owners have vast resources between owners to help each other and I love the community for this . Many other brands -their owners remain silent to protect their investment.

Lagoon being the biggest producer of catamarans world wide has a huge number of boats out there, so it stands to good reason your’e hearing more about all technical issues around Lagoons - this community help each other out with technical information.
With a factory that doesn’t easily communicate with owners - it makes it more so that owners publicise issues whereas cleaver production companies get it sorted before it hits social media.
But - not all of them get issues sorted because recently Ive been helping a mate with a brand new Leopard who feels really let down at factory level - even me with my contacts at leopard was unable to get Leopard to come to the party.
As for Lagoon - I think Lagoon are getting the message and for sure they better start attending to strong bulkhead processes and so should all production lines across all brands.

Let’s keep it real guys and let’s all keep a happy community as fellow enthusiasts sailing the oceans - PEACE !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qe_3jEafENQ

(Noah hit a rock)

[Chotu]

@impi

Any chance you could make me an introduction at Just Catamarans?

I have somewhere between two and four glassing projects I need to get done. I can’t go near epoxy.

these are very well defined projects. And I already have all the materials on board. This is more of a labor situation.

Thank you!

[impi]

Originally Posted by Chotu

@impi

Any chance you could make me an introduction at Just Catamarans?

I have somewhere between two and four glassing projects I need to get done. I can’t go near epoxy.

these are very well defined projects. And I already have all the materials on board. This is more of a labor situation.

Thank you!

Sure - My cousin Kent Grimbeek owns the company - my son Terry Grimbeek sells cats but worked in the tech department before hand. You are welcome to call them and tell them Brent on Impi referred you - they will steer you in the right direction to the responsible department leader. I hope this helps otherwise contact me on Facebook Cat Impi and I can hook you up directly through messenger shared messages Wirth Kent and Terry.

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by impi

Sure - My cousin Kent Grimbeek owns the company - my son Terry Grimbeek sells cats but worked in the tech department before hand. You are welcome to call them and tell them Brent on Impi referred you - they will steer you in the right direction to the responsible department leader. I hope this helps otherwise contact me on Facebook Cat Impi and I can hook you up directly through messenger shared messages Wirth Kent and Terry.

thank you so much! I have reached out to them already.

maybe this will help get my timeline back in order. If I can afford them. Hoping.

[ozsailer]

Well written Brent. No truer words spoken.



Ozsailer

[Uncle Bob]

Brent, I am not a cat owner however your post is, to me a breath of fresh air in this thread, rational and unemotive, unlike some here that can see no wrong, hear no wrong and speak with the wisdom of a blinkered outlook.
Thank you.

[Simi 60]

Originally Posted by impi

Hi fellow sailors and boating enthusiasts.

It seems everytime there’s a post about bulkheads I get asked to please comment.

There’s not much to say except catamarans IN GENERAL are exposed to bulkhead issues because they are wide platforms flexing in heavy seas. .

I'm sure Arber, Crowther, Pescott, Shionning, Simpson, Tenant, Chamberlain, Oram, Grainger and a multitude of other respected designers would disagree with your comment.

Lagoon are the ONLY cat I have heard of that has recurring bulkhead issues.

As a boatbuilder by trade who has built multihulls, main/mast bulkhead repairs is something I have never seen, until seeing the Lagoon pics which, are nothing remotely similar in "construction" to any bulkhead I have seen

This is the reason we took our brand new Lagoon 440 and strengthened the bulkheads for world cruising

So one of the main things that holds your boat together was not up for the job in your opinion.
How can that not be seen as a design/build issue?

[impi]

Originally Posted by Simi 60

I'm sure Arber, Crowther, Pescott, Shionning, Simpson, Tenant, Chamberlain, Oram, Grainger and a multitude of other respected designers would disagree with your comment.

Lagoon are the ONLY cat I have heard of that has recurring bulkhead issues.

As a boatbuilder by trade who has built multihulls, main/mast bulkhead repairs is something I have never seen, until seeing the Lagoon pics which, are nothing remotely similar in "construction" to any bulkhead I have seen



So one of the main things that holds your boat together was not up for the job in your opinion.
How can that not be seen as a design/build issue?

You've not read my comment in it's entirety so it's senseless for me to say add to the statement I've made.
Wether I purchased the Lagoon 440, the Catana 471 or the Leopard 48 or whatever I'd be strengthening it for the style of cruising we do.
I can assure you Lagoons are not the only multihulls with bulkhead issues
but clearly you won't agree and that's fine by me

[Simi 60]

Originally Posted by impi

You've not read my comment in it's entirety so it's senseless for me to say add to the statement I've made.
Wether I purchased the Lagoon 440, the Catana 471 or the Leopard 48 or whatever I'd be strengthening it for the style of cruising we do.
I can assure you Lagoons are not the only multihulls with bulkhead issues
but clearly you won't agree and that's fine by me

I did read your comment in its entirety
And there are plenty of catamarans cruising the ocean and many also flogged hard in racing, I don't know what makes you think your style of cruising is so much more stressful on structure.

My point is, none of the other designs I mention need *extra" added to bulkheads to keep them in shape, none that I am aware of, it's done at the start in the initial design and build

I can assure you Lagoons are not the only multihulls with bulkhead issues

By all means provide details, keen to see it.

[ozsailer]

Simi,
I dont know if you are aware of Cat Impi's cruising and sailing background, Brent and his wife Anna are no slouches when it comes to sailing the world. Their adventures, which are well documented on youtube and on their blog do not hide behind trying to impress anyone other then tell the world what the real world of cruising is about, warts and all. Brent only spoke the truth based purely on their extensive experience and cruising. Apparently this is not enough for you. Your great loss.


Ozsailer

[smj]

Having owned 11 used and abused catamarans, none with bulkhead problems, I believe a well designed and well built cat shouldn’t have bulkhead problems. If a brand of catamaran has numerous boats with bulkhead problems they either weren’t well designed, well built, or a mixture of both. One should never have to purchase a new or used catamaran thinking the bulkheads need to be strengthened before sailing her.

[NaClyDog]

Originally Posted by impi

Hi fellow sailors and boating enthusiasts.

It seems everytime there’s a post about bulkheads I get asked to please comment.

There’s not much to say except catamarans IN GENERAL are exposed to bulkhead issues because they are wide platforms flexing in heavy seas. This is the reason we took our brand new Lagoon 440 and strengthened the bulkheads for world cruising.

One has to be mindful of what one is going to be doing in terms of sailing grounds and conditions and adapt to those environments. After all if you take a 4x4 with narrow street tires into a muddy swamp you’re going to be disappointed and so you would change out to mud scupper style tires to fit the conditions.

Now, this is an interesting response. The fact that it's also a Lagoon adds to the "interestingness", if you will. You stated what you did to your catamaran after it was purchased but not what you purchased. What did Lagoon sell you?



Did you buy (were you sold) a coastal cruiser that would be great for parking near the closest sandy island with a palm tree or did you buy (were you sold) a blue water catamaran ready for world cruising? If you say the latter, I would counter with a big fat NO you did not because if you had, you would not have needed to do any of those modifications.


How many manufacturers are selling their cats with this caveat - "catamarans IN GENERAL are exposed to bulkhead issues because they are wide platforms flexing in heavy seas"? I'm going to hazard a guess and say none. None of those I dealt with did.

[NaClyDog]

Originally Posted by ozsailer

Simi,
I dont know if you are aware of Cat Impi's cruising and sailing background, Brent and his wife Anna are no slouches when it comes to sailing the world. Their adventures, which are well documented on youtube and on their blog do not hide behind trying to impress anyone other then tell the world what the real world of cruising is about, warts and all. Brent only spoke the truth based purely on their extensive experience and cruising. Apparently this is not enough for you. Your great loss.


Ozsailer

Oh yea, of course... youtube (again). Youtube, the only true source for accurate and unbiased information on all the internets.