Passport 42 Sailing Characteristics

[Kevin Taylor]

Hi,

My wife and I are considering the Passport 42 (Stan Huntingford) on
our shortlist of boats to purchase for a 1-2 year cruise in the
caribbean starting this fall.

We are hoping one or more Passport 42 owners can help share their knowledge with us.

I would be appreciative of any description of
the Passport 42's sailng characteristics in different conditions and
points of sail.

Specifically, any information you could give on:
- Ability to heave-to properly for long periods of time in bad weather
- Amount of "pounding" when powering into oncoming waves
- Overall "seakindliness" and comfort at sea
- Ability to point well and tack without extraordinary effort (for instance, having to furl the jib, tack, then unfurl the jib)

Thanks for any advice on the Passport 42.

--Kevin and Jennifer

[John Baudendistel]

Email you ph no we can chat.  I've had mine 12 yrs and sailed in most all conditions..
John
Jo...@greenshootsdistribution.com
P42
1985

--
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[Barry Kaplan]

On Tuesday, March 13, 2012 7:51:22 PM UTC-7, John Baudendistel wrote:

Email you ph no we can chat.  I've had mine 12 yrs and sailed in most all conditions..

Hey! Maybe we lurkers want a conference call....

[San Diego Viking]

if you are going to the carribean, really look into the draft that you want. i have a 84 passport 42 pilothouse and the draft is 6.5 feet. a good bluewater boat but not so much in shoal water areas. that being said i will take mine to the carribean, i will just ensure i am careful with the shoals and anchor in deeper areas. there are always work arounds. one of the things that impressed us the most was the build quality of this boat, it was built very heavy duty, and has a lot of high end features. i keep finding little details that remind me of this, IE dovetailed drawer joints, where hand holds are inside ect.hull is solid fiberglass below the waterline, airex core above, deck has a 1 inch plywood core, and is very solid. the only real problems i have had are the chainplates are fiberglassed into the hull, and it doesn't maneuver as well as id like while backing down. we are replacing the chainplates this year, likely titanium, and will install a bowthruster in the future to help when backing down. there isn't any pounding powering into waves, and it is good on sea kindliness and comfort. however coming into the channel at san diego i had waves that hit me on my port side that rocked and rolled us until we got past the protection of pt loma. if i remember right it scored mid range on the "seakindliness" ratio, when i was originally looking, with the formosa 50's scoring really high for reference. i don't have any problems with this aspect, but my wife doesn't like how it feels under power offshore and usually has to lay down. we have since found that keeping our main up really helps. sailing wise i have gotten her to 8.5 Knots verified on both the gps, and sensors, in 20 knots of wind. in san diego bay wind is typically around 10-12 knots, i normally can run around at around 6-7 knots. we do not sail as efficiently as we could however. our sistership "El Tiburon" won the Pacific Cup twice i believe, so it is has a fast hull. i have been on two deployments since we bought it in 2010 so i haven't been able to sail as much as i would like, and cant give you exact details of the different points of sail, but i can say it doesn't take that much effort to tack. originally i bought it in the san fransisco bay and it had a yankee, and the stay sail, tacking was no problem at all. since moving her to san diego we put on the 130 genoa, and during the really light stuff under 7 knots of wind i have had more issues if the stay sail pennant is out, kept catching and we would have to push it through. the 130 is way to big i think, lighter winds we just remove the stay sail and stay. i have a gennaker but haven't used it. overall i would reccomend this boat. it is a blue water boat more than a shallow water boat, so just remember that and you will be fine. we feel safe offshore! in san fransisco bay they hit bottom or drug thu soft mud all the time, all the boats we looked at there had 6-8 ft drafts. was a little disturbing going "bump" in the middle of the marina channel on our test sail. they said not when you hit bottom, but how often!

[Bill Schmidt]

Your boat originally belonged to Tebby & George Williams. To the best of my knowledge it is the only pilothouse ever built. It was kept up in Sidney, B.C. for many years, until George retired. He was a pathologist in San Francisco. It made several north coast passages over the years as well as cruises up to Alaska. BTW, El Tiburon never won anything that I know of. Original owner was Jere Patterson.The guy who could really sail the Passport 42, even beating 40s, was Tom Patterson. He owned Ace.

    I wonder if the rolling of your boat in cross seas might be due to the weight of the pilot house? I remember how heavily built it was when we were equipping it. I never sailed it with George, just sat around in the rain drinking wine. The pilot house was ideal for Desolation Sound.

Billy Manana

--

[San Diego Viking]

Yes, thats our boat, George kept very good care of the boat. we also looked at a hylas 42, but it had a funny cockpit arrangement. when i seen the passports pilothouse i told my wife, in reference to the hylas "I know who would get stuck outside in bad weather". the rest has been a enjoyable journey in the passport. its funny our broker had told us about the pacific cup and "El Tibron" when we looked at it. i had always liked that aspect about the passport 42's, maybe she was just looking for the sale or had bad info. i could be confusing it with Ace though, as i remember that boat as well. the rolling could be the extra weight topside. we were under power with no sails so i had assumed it was more from the direction we had to go in reference to the wind and waves to get in safely. eventually we will head to alaska and i am sure the pilothouse will come in handy. we had a stainless fabricator add "granny seats" to the stern push-pit. this has added more sitting and entertaining room for drinking wine. it came out very well. i seen recently a Slocum 43 with a pilothouse recently and was incredibly surprised. the layout inside was much different and cant say i liked it as much, however it did have more light available

V/R

Robert

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