Under $100,000 Multihulls

[jonarck]

There's always a multitude of old Geminis out there...

[kaimusailing]

I was able to get an unfinished Wharram project and it is still incomplete after 10 years, but I've been able to get out and camp/sail and get it closer to final. I've retired from the day job and able to do justice to the project. You have to admit that the production boats are built in a yard with wholesale materials and those experienced production boatworders are not really paid that much. I don't think a home built boat can compete with the professionally built boats. As time goes on, older pro boats are coming out of charter, coming out of estate sales, and the used boat market has been getting marked down lately. If you keep your eyes open you can find a gem in the rough. I like my Wharram catamaran and don't really feel envy on the many other boats I've sailed on or visited. There is that Maine Cat 41 though, that really looks good, but it was almost a half mil. With classic monohulls coming on market with ridiculous low prices, the price concious should look there, also remember that many of the early cruising sailors were in the 30-35 ft range. By the way, the early catamaran built in Hawaii between the wars was "Kaimiloa" by Eric de Bisschop and his book inspired Wharram. Eric became a huge French national hero by sailing from Hawaii to France just before WWII when the French were looking for anyone with "stones". His boat was kind of like a pair of Chinese junk inspired hulls, not like any modern catamarans. Gotta go, watching the San Diego AC45's online.

[clockwork orange]

Looks like a Bob Harris design, if so hes still alive i believe.
Steve.

[webejammin]

We bought our 02 Gemini 105Mc with screecher for Just under $100,000.00 last year and ended up paying about $20,000.00 for the extras. No matter what the price is on Yacht World you will need to figure in the price of state sales TAXES , transport to your marina, Survey needed for insurance, Insurance to just get into a Marina. Ect.

[Sand crab]

Steve AKA clockwork orange posted and PMed me that he thinks that the boat in my first post might be a Bob Harris design. I googled him and found this.
MacLear & Harris, Yacht Designers - Boat Design Forums
In that thread is this,
"His two books on multihulls, Modern Sailing Catamarans, 1960, and Racing and Cruising Trimarans, 1970, were recognized as pioneering work in the field."
I was not aware of either of these books. I'll search Amazon and elsewhere for copies. I like the now historical slant of "Modern Catamarans" Clearly these guys are forgotten pioneers and should be mentioned at the same time as Herreschoff, Choy, the Prout brothers and the rest.
I'm not saying the the cat in question is a Harris design just that it might be.
Thanks Steve. BOB

[Sand crab]

Lots of stuff on Bob Harris. I know it's thread drift but it's my thread, so there.
The cat-crazy men who got me sailing
How come I never heard of him?
His book is available on Amazon for $1.99. I'm gonna get one. BOB

[thinwater]

First built in US? No, I don't think so.
Choydesign - About Us
Untitled Document

I would be concerned about wood that old, as I'm betting it is ply/epoxy.

The reality is that crusing cats are very new on the scene compared to monohulls and that designers were still steep on the learning curve well into the 80s. Not that learning should ever stop.

[webejammin]

Back in the late 60's when I was sailing my first Hobie Cat I would hear about bigger catamaran sailboats having problems with the cross beams comming apart on off shore crusers and sinking. Sence the mid 1980's I think the industry has been working with lots better material and I've heard of no structural failures but don't know for sure. I guess the question is where will you be sailing ? Off shore I would not be wanting to be sailing in an older 1980's because of material and bridge deck design, On a lake other than the Great Lakes you would be ok if the boat doesn't leak. I think you will find on most older than mid 90's the bridge deck is much lower and get lots of banging.

[Sand crab]

From Wiki.

Early modern Europe's first documented catamaran was designed by the polymath and Royal Society member William Petty in 1662. It was designed to sail faster, in shallower waters, with less wind & crew than other vessels of the time, but the unusual design met with scepticism and was not a commercial success.[8][9]

The first catamaran built in the US was built by Nathanial Herreshoff in 1876. He also patented it back then. This link has a pic of a 1933 replica built of that boat. I'm not sure if he built more than these 2 cats.
THE MULTIHULL PIONEERS, MAGAZINE ARTICLE, JIM BROWN
Then came Eric de Bisschop in the 30s with his Hawaii built Junk rigged cat.
Amazon.com: Kaimiloa: Eric De Bisschop, B & W Illust.
This was built about the same time as replica mentioned above. I think the replica was first so that would be the 2nd cat built and Bisschops would be the 3rd.
Here is a excerpt lifted from Wiki.

In 1947, surfing legend, Woodbridge "Woody" Brown and Alfred Kumalae designed and built the first modern ocean-going catamaran, Manu Kai, in Hawaii. Their young assistant was Rudy Choy, who later founded the design firm Choy/Seaman/Kumalae (C/S/K, 1957) and became a fountainhead for the catamaran movement. The Prout Brothers, Roland and Francis, experimented with catamarans in 1949 and converted their 1935 boat factory in Canvey Island, Essex (England), to catamaran production in 1954. Their Shearwater catamarans won races easily against the monohulls.
The speed and stability of these catamarans soon made them a popular pleasure craft, with their popularity really taking off in Europe, and was followed soon thereafter in America. Currently, most individually owned catamarans are built in France, South Africa, and Australia.
In the mid-twentieth century, the catamaran inspired an even more popular sailboat, the Beach Cat. In California, a maker of surfboards, Hobie Alter produced the 250-pound Hobie Cat 14 in 1967, and two years later the larger and even more successful Hobie 16. That boat remains in production, with more than 100,000 made in the past three decades.

Bob Harris published his book, Modern Sailing Catamarans in 1960 and there is a pic on the cover so there must have been some of his designs built somewhere before then. I am going to go out on a limb here and say that the cat mentioned in my first post was probably the first cruiser cat to be built in the continental US. I have absolutely no evidence to back this up but it really doesn't matter does it? Anyway this was some gapfilling on the history of the modern cat. It's stuff I didn't know. Obviously there are much older cats, tris and proas that go back millenia. Thanks all

[wolfenzee]

The Polynesians, built multihulls long before the US was...inhabited

[webejammin]

The design of tieing 2 canoes together goes a long way back even in the USA as the Native Americans designed river canoe catamarans.

[Sand crab]

Originally Posted by wolfenzee

The Polynesians, built multihulls long before the US was...inhabited

Notice the last line of my previous post.
"Obviously there are much older cats, tris and proas that go back millenia."

[clockwork orange]

Hey Bob, i havnt seen that Bob Harris book, ill have to get me a copy, interesting that he used a photo of Aikane, a CSK design on the cover.
Steve.

[Sand crab]

Originally Posted by clockwork orange

Hey Bob, i havnt seen that Bob Harris book, ill have to get me a copy, interesting that he used a photo of Aikane, a CSK design on the cover.
Steve.

I never thought this thread would become educational. I think we should move discussions on the first multihulls to the thread aptly titled First Multihull.
http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ull-64796.html
Thanks guys. BOB

[mikereed100]

That add sounds a bit like it was translated from Mandarin by Google, but the point is valid that there are good multi's out there for under 100K

Mike