If I have one main complaint about the Back Cove 37 it is that the master stateroom queen berth forward is very noisy. If you are anchored is so much as a 6” chop the water will slap against the hull and reverberate throughout the stateroom. I have been sleeping at sea since childhood, when we ran far out to sea at night on my father’s commercial fishing boat and I sleep like the dead on a boat in most conditions. However, I spent many hours awake in the Back Cove 37 master berth while little wavelets slapping the hull kept me from sleeping.
I had chartered a 37 before my purchase and I was aware of this problem before I bought my 37. I had the factory install soundproofing to the forward hull before the liner was attached. This did nothing to improve the situation. We eventually ended up solving the problem by either sleeping in the smaller guest stateroom or anchoring stern to, something I never felt completely comfortable doing.
A review of buying, outfitting and using the Back Cove 37 powerboat
Tuesday, June 25, 2019
Monday, November 27, 2017
Ownership Costs - Regrets
$300,000 to own a boat for 30 months? $600 per hour of operation? $1,500 per day spent aboard?
Crazy?
Perhaps.
Do I have regrets?
None.
I have no regrets because I did three things with Someday Soon that created what I call Bankable Memories:
1. Rounded Vancouver Island
2. Toured the Bahamas and the SE Intercoastal Waterway
3. Spent a day, alone on the ocean, far offshore from Uclulet, BC, riding to a sea anchor, catching salmon. Pure, unadulterated magic.
I would have regrets had the boat sat in a slip in Bellingham and been used for occasional jaunts to the San Juans.
One might ask whether or not I could have achieved the same result with a less expensive boat or a used boat. Yes, but there was one other thing for me - owning a thing of beauty and configuring and equipping it to perform optimally for the roles I intended to use it in. When it comes to boats and airplanes that is important to me.
So the evaluation of ownership costs is a highly subjective undertaking and prospective buyers need to weigh the costs against what is meaningful to their particular values.
Friday, November 24, 2017
Ownership Costs - The Facts
This is a topic that boat manufacturers and dealers would prefer not to have discussed publicly. I still have many friends in the marine industry and I hesitate to disclose any information that financially harms them. Yet I have a responsibility to share my experience with boaters to help them make a wise decision about venturing into boating. Boating already has a reputation for being expensive (A hole in the water...) so let's get the real numbers out there and have a conversation about solutions.
I purchased Someday Soon in March for 2015 $589,895 and sold it in November of 2017 for $475,000, an ownership period of about 30 months. I also paid $51,320 in state sales tax and $47,500 in brokerage fees when I sold the boat. I estimate that I purchased about $15,000 in accessories and equipment that went to the new owner with the sale. I also spent about $8,000 having the boat inspected during the build and upon my accepting delivery. I'll call the total of these expenses my "ownership" cost and it totals $236,715.
The remaining costs I'll call "operating" costs and they are:
Insurance - 2 1/2 years @ about $1,000/year = $2,500
Home Slip - 30 months at about $500/month = $15,000
Transient Slip - FL and the Caribbean = $10,000 (roughly)
Fuel - 500 hours of operation @ about 12 G/Hr x $2.50/G = $15,000
Maintenance = I estimate this at about $14,000 (other than engine I did most maintenance myself)
Transport = I spent about $25,000 transporting the boat to Florida and back to the Pacific NW.
Total operating costs = $71,500
That brings my total costs for Someday Soon to $318,215. I'll use $300,000 as that number certainly encompasses the error in some of my estimates and makes the math easy.
There are several ways to perceive this number:
Cost per mile
Our average speed was probably about 14 knots, so we covered around 7,000 miles in 30 months. That brings the cost per mile to $42.85
Cost per month of ownership
Easy math. It cost $10,000 per month to own Someday Soon for 30 months.
Cost per hour of operation (underway)
This is the shocker. It cost $600 per hour for each of our 500 hours underway.
Cost per day spent on the boat
Our number of days for this is probably higher than the average owner as we lived on the boat for 5 months in the SE for an estimated 150 days. In addition, I estimate we spent another 50 days total in the NW cruising the San Juans and in our trips around Vancouver Island and up the BC coast. That 200 day total brings the average day on the boat to $1,500 per day. Remember, we spent far more days on our boat than the average boater, so our cost per day is lower than it may be for others.
There are a number of conclusions one could draw fro this analysis and they fall into these categories in my opinion:
1. Accept these costs and be happy
2. Avoid owning a boat
3. If you must own, buy used (or small, or simple)
4. Charter
I'll explore each of these in a future post.
I purchased Someday Soon in March for 2015 $589,895 and sold it in November of 2017 for $475,000, an ownership period of about 30 months. I also paid $51,320 in state sales tax and $47,500 in brokerage fees when I sold the boat. I estimate that I purchased about $15,000 in accessories and equipment that went to the new owner with the sale. I also spent about $8,000 having the boat inspected during the build and upon my accepting delivery. I'll call the total of these expenses my "ownership" cost and it totals $236,715.
The remaining costs I'll call "operating" costs and they are:
Insurance - 2 1/2 years @ about $1,000/year = $2,500
Home Slip - 30 months at about $500/month = $15,000
Transient Slip - FL and the Caribbean = $10,000 (roughly)
Fuel - 500 hours of operation @ about 12 G/Hr x $2.50/G = $15,000
Maintenance = I estimate this at about $14,000 (other than engine I did most maintenance myself)
Transport = I spent about $25,000 transporting the boat to Florida and back to the Pacific NW.
Total operating costs = $71,500
That brings my total costs for Someday Soon to $318,215. I'll use $300,000 as that number certainly encompasses the error in some of my estimates and makes the math easy.
There are several ways to perceive this number:
Cost per mile
Our average speed was probably about 14 knots, so we covered around 7,000 miles in 30 months. That brings the cost per mile to $42.85
Cost per month of ownership
Easy math. It cost $10,000 per month to own Someday Soon for 30 months.
Cost per hour of operation (underway)
This is the shocker. It cost $600 per hour for each of our 500 hours underway.
Cost per day spent on the boat
Our number of days for this is probably higher than the average owner as we lived on the boat for 5 months in the SE for an estimated 150 days. In addition, I estimate we spent another 50 days total in the NW cruising the San Juans and in our trips around Vancouver Island and up the BC coast. That 200 day total brings the average day on the boat to $1,500 per day. Remember, we spent far more days on our boat than the average boater, so our cost per day is lower than it may be for others.
There are a number of conclusions one could draw fro this analysis and they fall into these categories in my opinion:
1. Accept these costs and be happy
2. Avoid owning a boat
3. If you must own, buy used (or small, or simple)
4. Charter
I'll explore each of these in a future post.
Sunday, March 20, 2016
Improving the Back Cove 37 - Upgraded Electrical Meters
First a disclosure - I am the founder and former owner of Blue Sea Systems and the meters I recommend in this article were developed on my watch while I still ran the company. I now have no financial interest in the company, so I feel free to recommend one of their products in what should be an unbiased blog.
The battery management system that Back Cove installs on the 37 works wonderfully, but the one critical element missing is a true battery state of charge meter. The standard meters on the 37 show only Volts and Amperes, and Hertz and Watts on the AC side. None of these values will tell you how much energy is remaining in your battery bank.
To accurately know the energy remaining in your battery ampere-hours consumed and recharged must be tracked. To be fair, there are a few instruments available that are able to calculate true state of charge using only voltage, but these should not be confused with ordinary voltmeters such as the standard equipment on the Back Cove 37. However, most state of charge meters rely on the principle of counting ampere-hours in and out.
On my 37, living aboard at anchor, I can operate for about 24 hours before I have depleted 1/2 of my house battery bank's capacity. This is the generally recommended maximum energy that should be taken from the battery before it is recharged. A stock 37 may go a little longer, but from reading other posts here you'll recall that I have structured the electrical system so that there is no need to run the generator unless I am at anchor for more than 24 hours. During that 24 hours I operate the refrigerator, freezer, as well as the cooktop and microwave through the inverter, and all the other loads on the boat. I make no attempt to conserve power. It's a powerboat! If I wanted to conserve power and forgo the comfort it provides, I'd go back to sailing. But, I'm older now and have delusions of being wiser.
But to live like this it is critical to know battery state of charge. For that you will need an ampere-hour meter. There are a number of these on the market. I chose the new Blue Sea Systems M2 Series, shown below.
The battery management system that Back Cove installs on the 37 works wonderfully, but the one critical element missing is a true battery state of charge meter. The standard meters on the 37 show only Volts and Amperes, and Hertz and Watts on the AC side. None of these values will tell you how much energy is remaining in your battery bank.
Blue Sea Systems 8000 Series meters installed standard on the Back Cove 37
To accurately know the energy remaining in your battery ampere-hours consumed and recharged must be tracked. To be fair, there are a few instruments available that are able to calculate true state of charge using only voltage, but these should not be confused with ordinary voltmeters such as the standard equipment on the Back Cove 37. However, most state of charge meters rely on the principle of counting ampere-hours in and out.
On my 37, living aboard at anchor, I can operate for about 24 hours before I have depleted 1/2 of my house battery bank's capacity. This is the generally recommended maximum energy that should be taken from the battery before it is recharged. A stock 37 may go a little longer, but from reading other posts here you'll recall that I have structured the electrical system so that there is no need to run the generator unless I am at anchor for more than 24 hours. During that 24 hours I operate the refrigerator, freezer, as well as the cooktop and microwave through the inverter, and all the other loads on the boat. I make no attempt to conserve power. It's a powerboat! If I wanted to conserve power and forgo the comfort it provides, I'd go back to sailing. But, I'm older now and have delusions of being wiser.
But to live like this it is critical to know battery state of charge. For that you will need an ampere-hour meter. There are a number of these on the market. I chose the new Blue Sea Systems M2 Series, shown below.
There are three things I like about this meter:
- It is a drop-in replacement for the 8000 Series meters that are in the BC37 electrical panel
- It has a terrific big, bright OLED display
- It has alarms and an internal relay that function independently and can be triggered by any of the measured values.
The third feature I mention above dovetails well with the Maretron alarm system I discussed in another post. Both of the M2 relay outputs are wired to the Maretron SIM100. The relay function on both the AC and DC M2 meters can be triggered by any value read by the M2. On the AC meter I set for low voltage (<90) and on the DC meter I set for low SOC (<60%). If either of these values are exceeded I receive a text message from the Maretron SMS100 unit.
Friday, December 18, 2015
Improving the Back Cove 37 - Engine Room Floor
Before I purchased a Back Cove 37 I chartered one for a few days; an action I highly suggest. Throughout this charter I had trouble with the engine not being able to exceed 1000 RPM. After my charter, it took considerable effort for the local Cummins dealer to locate the problem. It was eventually determined that the engine wiring harness running along the port side of the engine above the stringer had been damaged, most likely by someone stepping on it while working in the engine room. On my Back Cove I had aluminum diamond plate installed with the wiring harness running beneath it. This achieved several things:
1) It protected the wiring harness.
2) It made it far easier to work around the engine, providing a flat place to stand and place tools.
3) It dressed up the engine room dramatically, giving it a serious big boat look.
1) It protected the wiring harness.
2) It made it far easier to work around the engine, providing a flat place to stand and place tools.
3) It dressed up the engine room dramatically, giving it a serious big boat look.
Someday Soon engine room floor
Sunday, November 1, 2015
A Break From Improving the Back Cove 37 to Praise It
Lest readers have an impression from previous posts that I am unhappy with my Back Cove 37 let me interrupt the "Improving" section of the blog to emphasize how much I like the boat.
In September, we completed an 800 nautical mile trip around Vancouver Island, about half that in open North Pacific waters. In the open ocean portion of the trip we encountered only 2 other pleasure boats making the passage - a large Nordhavn and a cruising sailboat. Although on the inside passage along Vancouver Island one sees scores of pleasure craft, conditions on the outside of the island keep many away, yet I was very pleased with the 37's performance in these waters.
The most wonderful thing about the BC37 is that in flat sea conditions we can make 20 knots. This was fairly rare in the open waters, but much of the time we were able to do 15 knots in 2 foot chop on 6 to 8 foot swells. Beyond those conditions, being conservative, we throttle back to 10 knots. We would obtain 1 NM/G at 20 knots, about 1.2 NM/G at 15 knots and perhaps 1.5 NM/G at 10 knots with our 600 Hp Cummins QSC 8.3. These are lower numbers than you'll see in the performance chart on the Back Cove website, but I expect that. Although Back Cove performance tests were done very honestly in 1 - 2 foot chop and quite fully loaded and with 4 aboard, a boat loaded for cruising running in open ocean conditions with a helmsman not trying to optimize fuel efficiency is not going to perform as well.
Much cautionary advice has been issued on rounding the two great capes mariners fear on the west side of Vancouver Island - Cape Cook on the Brooks Peninsula and Cape Scott on the northern tip. The 37 isn't a boat I'd want to pilot in nasty conditions often found in these places - high, steep, short period seas, but that is not this boat's design mission. Those things that make the 37 so great in sheltered waters and at anchor - the big cockpit with dainty scuppers, the walls of glass and the huge bi-fold cabin doors are not the hallmarks of a heavy weather design. The 37's hull design forward will scoop green water when bashing into short, steep seas more than boats I've run with higher, wider bows. That's fine; the only time these conditions turned us around they also turned around a boat twice our size.
The trade off you make in the 37 is that, although she may not be the boat you'd want offshore when there is no refuge, she's a great boat for limited open water cruising when refuge is at hand. The 37's speed can get you out of weather's reach as long as sanctuary is planned and you have good weather information. Often overlooked, is that running against a current the time required to cover distance is greater than the ratio of the speed of a faster boat over that of a slower boat. In calm conditions an 8 knot trawler takes 4 hours to cover 32 NM, while a 16 knot Back Cove 37 takes 2 hours; a difference of 2 hours. Throw in a 2 knot current and the trawler takes 5.3 hours while the Back Cove takes 2.3 hours. The no current 2 hour time difference swells 50% in a 2 knot current to 3 hours for the trawler. In a 3 knot current, common where I live in the Pacific Northwest, the time difference doubles.
It was in part thanks to this speed potential that we were able to have such a pleasant trip along a coast that has ended the lives of so many boats and ships ever since modern navigation began here and continues to keep many pleasure boaters from these waters.
In September, we completed an 800 nautical mile trip around Vancouver Island, about half that in open North Pacific waters. In the open ocean portion of the trip we encountered only 2 other pleasure boats making the passage - a large Nordhavn and a cruising sailboat. Although on the inside passage along Vancouver Island one sees scores of pleasure craft, conditions on the outside of the island keep many away, yet I was very pleased with the 37's performance in these waters.
The most wonderful thing about the BC37 is that in flat sea conditions we can make 20 knots. This was fairly rare in the open waters, but much of the time we were able to do 15 knots in 2 foot chop on 6 to 8 foot swells. Beyond those conditions, being conservative, we throttle back to 10 knots. We would obtain 1 NM/G at 20 knots, about 1.2 NM/G at 15 knots and perhaps 1.5 NM/G at 10 knots with our 600 Hp Cummins QSC 8.3. These are lower numbers than you'll see in the performance chart on the Back Cove website, but I expect that. Although Back Cove performance tests were done very honestly in 1 - 2 foot chop and quite fully loaded and with 4 aboard, a boat loaded for cruising running in open ocean conditions with a helmsman not trying to optimize fuel efficiency is not going to perform as well.
Much cautionary advice has been issued on rounding the two great capes mariners fear on the west side of Vancouver Island - Cape Cook on the Brooks Peninsula and Cape Scott on the northern tip. The 37 isn't a boat I'd want to pilot in nasty conditions often found in these places - high, steep, short period seas, but that is not this boat's design mission. Those things that make the 37 so great in sheltered waters and at anchor - the big cockpit with dainty scuppers, the walls of glass and the huge bi-fold cabin doors are not the hallmarks of a heavy weather design. The 37's hull design forward will scoop green water when bashing into short, steep seas more than boats I've run with higher, wider bows. That's fine; the only time these conditions turned us around they also turned around a boat twice our size.
The trade off you make in the 37 is that, although she may not be the boat you'd want offshore when there is no refuge, she's a great boat for limited open water cruising when refuge is at hand. The 37's speed can get you out of weather's reach as long as sanctuary is planned and you have good weather information. Often overlooked, is that running against a current the time required to cover distance is greater than the ratio of the speed of a faster boat over that of a slower boat. In calm conditions an 8 knot trawler takes 4 hours to cover 32 NM, while a 16 knot Back Cove 37 takes 2 hours; a difference of 2 hours. Throw in a 2 knot current and the trawler takes 5.3 hours while the Back Cove takes 2.3 hours. The no current 2 hour time difference swells 50% in a 2 knot current to 3 hours for the trawler. In a 3 knot current, common where I live in the Pacific Northwest, the time difference doubles.
It was in part thanks to this speed potential that we were able to have such a pleasant trip along a coast that has ended the lives of so many boats and ships ever since modern navigation began here and continues to keep many pleasure boaters from these waters.
Someday Soon as always on west Vancouver Island - alone.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)