storm petrel wrote:Jamie Mitchell is not your average coastal cruising Tophat sailor and he had the patience(and good sense) to wait for good weather and seasons to make his passages. Have you ever seen the Horn calmer than the footage Jamie posted of his rounding on youtube? When his parents circumnavigated, did their Tophat have an inboard?
Well posted Troppo, and welcome! My Tohatsu doesn't fit in the well, so it hangs on the transom mount. Not pretty, but much quieter, and because it's bolted to the transom, it's really hard to nick....(Touch wood)
Mark, we're not arguing the fact that a well looked after Inboard of good quality would usually be the choice. I'm also not professing to be an expert.
You reference Ian and Jan Mitchell, saying they travelled with an inboard. Re-read their story and see how many times they had difficulties with it, because again, it wasn't well maintained when they bought their boat.
The point Outboarders (as we may now call them) are making, is this. IF you have a limited budget, and your cruising weather is chosen as carefully as possible, an outboard is almost as good as an inboard any day, and YES, I've done the Brisbane Water channel against the tide at both high and low and never had a problem, even in a south swell. I've also done the Swansea Bar with an average East swell against an outgoing tide. One just needs to consider that the outboard behaves differently, and operate your boat accordingly.
If I had have stuck to my guns and insisted on finding an inboard for the money I had, I wouldn't have found a suitable boat at all. I'd still be a landlubber and wouldn't have joined this site and wouldn't have met so many wonderful Top Hat sailors. So far, I've owned Dulcamara for three years, this Easter. Including the purchase price of $10,500, a mooring service, mooring fees of $5,000 (we had a marina mooring for 18 months) three slips at $1,100 each and a re-rig with additional stainless and wiring worth $6,000, and a lazy stack bag for $500, plus some incidental ropes, halyards etc at about $600, plus Insurance, you can easily see we're still way under what it may have cost me for just the purchase price of a mint condition (if you could have found one at that price in 2009) Inboard Top Hat.
That's why they call them Pocket Cruisers, not only because they are small and compact, but easy on the pocket when it comes to getting professionals to work on them.
So, Miles, I hope this has helped in your decision process... If money is no object and you can find a well maintained Inboard, go for it. If you're on a budget, an inboard shouldn't be the ONLY consideration.
Wow, this is like an Oil thread on a Motorcycle forum
