Sailboats Over 40ft

An innovative Ray Richards design built by the earliest Asian yard is a rock solid cruiser, but with a lot of teak to maintain as well as potentially troublesome metalwork.

There is no doubt about the Deerfoot 61's purpose in life. This boat is made for long-distance cruising. "We'd sailed thousands of miles on a 50' foot CCA-designed ketch and like most liveaboards we dreamed of the perfect yacht," says Steve Dashew, author of the Offshore Cruising Encyclopedia. "We never realized this dream would end in a boatbuilding business."

In the mid-1970 Dutchman Willem Eickholt, part owner at the time of Flying Dutchman Yachts, decided to build his dreamboat. A lifelong sailor, he knew he wanted an aft-cockpit, flush-decked cutter of moderate displacement and minimum wetted surface with a fin keel, skeg rudder, canoe stern, and clipper bow. "I also wanted her to be fast. Long passages bore me," says Eickholt. "Last but not least, I wanted her to be pretty in a timeless way."

The Cal 46 was introduced in 1967. One reader said he thinks about 10 were built. For several years it was called the Cal Cruising 46. The Cal 2-46, with a redesigned deck, cockpit and interior layout, succeeded it from 1973 until 1976. The Cal 3-46, virtually the same as the 2-46 except for some minor interior changes, was built in 1977 and 1978.

The Brewer 12.8 and the Brewer 44 are developments of the Whitby 42, a cruising boat from the board of Ted Brewer. Brewer is one of the great modern cruising boat designers. His boats are well-mannered, attractive and practical. To improve windward performance, a high aspect ratio centerboard extends through the bottom of the 12.8's shallow keel. Since the board is not ballasted, it does not affect stability, but can be used when reaching to shift the center of lateral resistance.

The Vanguard, designed by Philip Rhodes in 1962, remained in production until 1967, totalling 404 hulls. It was preceded by the Invicta, Alberg 35, Bounty II, Ariel, Rhodes 41, and of course the Triton. This line of fiberglass cruisers and sometime racers gave Pearson a strong position in the market. The pedigree of the designers was odorless, and construction quality was good for that particular moment in the timetable of plastic boatbuilding technology.

The C&C 40 entered production as a 1978 model, and was phased out in 1983, replaced by the higher-performance C&C 41. The 40 has good all-around performance upwind and downwind, in both light and heavy air. Despite a wide maximum beam, the boat's ends are fairly well balanced, and the rudder is deep enough to stay in the water in all but a flat-out broach.

The term "racer/cruiser" has been used by many builders to describe their products, with varying degrees of truthfulness. Some are really cruising boats fashioned after racing boats, but only competitive in races at the club level. Some are pure racing boats, with perhaps a dodger and an enclosed head added to qualify them as cruisers. This series of Frers/Carroll Marine boats, however, are "racer/cruisers" in the truest sense.