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Next slightly batty question from me - small cruiser in pictures below- Not quite as small as the last one I posted but...

 

This looks feasible for some serious exploration - go further than a canoe or dinghy (even with outboard), sleep for the odd night, probably can be trailed by a normal car. This specimen is moored next to Juno.

 

Questions - what is it? How much would it weigh on the trailer,  and how much might one pay for one with outboard included? I'm getting ideas...

 

(I think it's a shetland but that information in isolation doesn't tell me much)

20190424_095942.jpg

20190424_095947.jpg

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8 minutes ago, magpie patrick said:

Next slightly batty question from me - small cruiser in pictures below- Not quite as small as the last one I posted but...

 

This looks feasible for some serious exploration - go further than a canoe or dinghy (even with outboard), sleep for the odd night, probably can be trailed by a normal car. This specimen is moored next to Juno.

 

Questions - what is it? How much would it weigh on the trailer,  and how much might one pay for one with outboard included? I'm getting ideas...

 

(I think it's a shetland but that information in isolation doesn't tell me much)

20190424_095942.jpg

 

I had one of those on the Broads a long time ago, 40 years

 

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It is a Shetland - and I think a 535 from maybe the 1970s.  Price will depend on condition and fit out - and whether trailer and outboard is included but these gives an idea

 

http://www.jonesboatyard.co.uk/boat-sales/shetland-535-boat-for-sale-6865.htm

 

lhttps://boats-from.co.uk/not-specified/shetland-535-boat-fishing-boat-shetland-fishing-cruiser-24801

 

A quick google suggests 350kg bare or 650kg with a 60hp motor.  The engine won't add that much in isolation - so take you pick but should be readily towable behind a conventional car, particularly if you remove the outboard.

 

This type of boat is about the max (in my view) for towing, launching and recovery without being too much trouble - so a good boat to explore detached waterways.  Do you fancy a boat share?

 

 

 

 

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It's a 535 as already suggested. Also have a look for the 536 which has a single front window and two hatches on the roof. The 535 is a single skin boat and the 536 double. This evolved into the Family Four. The quoted figure for the Family Four is 565kg so the earlier 535 will be less I imagine. You could also consider the 570 (later becoming the Kestrel) at 619kg or the Black Hawk (again 5.7m) at 637kg if you're only putting on a small outboard for canal work. (figures from http://www.jonesboatyard.co.uk/boat-sales/documents/Shetland-Boats-.pdf )

 

With these boats most of the price is dictated by the engine / trailer quality and value. A project boat on its own needing refit, windows and canopy can be in the low hundreds. A good boat will be over £1k. A decent s/h braked trailer for one will be high hundreds, say £750. Then the engine. Anything with a clutch and forward reverse gears will move them so I guess the budget for the engine really depends on the mechanical competence of the buyer and the type of water the boat is going on. If you can repair a cheap 5hp for the canal, low hundreds, if you want a new 9.9hp over £2k.  Decent big engines, even old ones (40hp+ for coastal work) can be worth more than the boat and trailer combined.

 

Low end - Basic 535 shell on unbraked trailer with old two stroke outboard in the boot of the car for less than £1000

High end - Well presented 535 on good quality s/h galvanised braked single axle trailer 1300kg gross with decent secondhand main and aux engines at 50hp 2 stroke and 5hp 4 stroke  could cost over £3000 combined.

 

The 535/536/Family Four/ 570/Kestrel etc are all good boats from the 70s/80s and there are thousands of them out there. Absolutely fine for exploring the canals, not having to find a winding hole is great, not having standing headroom inside, not that great. With such low weights, any reasonable sized car should be capable of towing a 535 with a small outboard on a braked trailer. Easy enough to launch and recover, just enough space to overnight, simple and cheap to maintain.

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Interesting that you have posted this as we are giving serious consideration to selling Naughty-Cal at the minute to fund the purchase of a VW T6 Transporter to convert into a camper and we were considering also having something similar to the boat you have posted there as well to do a bit of exploration by trail boat of parts of the inland waterways that we have not yet seen. 

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Third party insurance under £100/yr, £35 year for BSS, 7 day CRT licence under £30, slipway fees I've found between £10 and £25 each way, so certainly a viable option for having a boat without having a lot of cash tied up in it or hefty ongoing costs. 

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1 minute ago, BilgePump said:

Third party insurance under £100/yr, £35 year for BSS, 7 day CRT licence under £30, slipway fees I've found between £10 and £25 each way, so certainly a viable option for having a boat without having a lot of cash tied up in it or hefty ongoing costs. 

This is part of our reason for considering selling NC. We really can't see ourselves using it as much as we previously have now that we have moved house. It is a lot of money sat there and the on going costs to not use it. 

 

We could buy a van and have it sat on the drive rather than paying extortionate marina mooring fees and use it as a second car as and when needed.  The small trail boat we can store at a local farm for less than £100 per year and get an explorer licence for the times we want to launch it.

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For putting in and out of the CaRT network they are ideal. However for leaving in the water their price structure means that it would be far preferable to have something a bit bigger eg a Norman 23, Dawncraft etc., boats that are too big to comfortably launch and recover on a regular basis.

 

eta. Shetland boats would be seen all over the inland waterways in the late 70s/ early 80s. I remember New Mills marina having the range in the showroom and drooling over them as a kid at the time. They were great trail boats at the time and still are. When the family narrowboat went last year, a small Shetland seemed the perfect place to start off again. Although a lot will have come off the canals as owners upgraded I imagine most of the actual hulls are sitting on driveways, farms and barns to this day, just waiting to be resurrected.

Edited by BilgePump
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It's an idea at the moment - Juno is a great boat but too big to readily trail - I may take her to the Broads for the summer in 2021 (I know I need to be in Norwich for a number of days that summer already) but I'm not going to trail her for five miles of canal in Stroud or Swansea, Lutine is going nowhere other than possibly a large barn whilst being refitted. I can see a boat like this could be used rather like a dinghy but without needing a tent. 

12 hours ago, Tacet said:

 

This type of boat is about the max (in my view) for towing, launching and recovery without being too much trouble - so a good boat to explore detached waterways.  Do you fancy a boat share?

 

 

 

 

Now there's a thought!

 

48 minutes ago, BilgePump said:

For putting in and out of the CaRT network they are ideal. However for leaving in the water their price structure means that it would be far preferable to have something a bit bigger eg a Norman 23, Dawncraft etc., boats that are too big to comfortably launch and recover on a regular basis.

 

Agreed, I already have a Viking 23 and it's good value boating - however any boat is only worth it is you get to use it how you want.

 

58 minutes ago, Naughty Cal said:

This is part of our reason for considering selling NC. We really can't see ourselves using it as much as we previously have now that we have moved house. It is a lot of money sat there and the on going costs to not use it. 

 

We could buy a van and have it sat on the drive rather than paying extortionate marina mooring fees and use it as a second car as and when needed.  The small trail boat we can store at a local farm for less than £100 per year and get an explorer licence for the times we want to launch it.

 Yeah, a small Camper Van would also be good - trouble is, like you, I have to work for a living!

 

Could a camper van pull the Shetland - now there's a thought!

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There are a ton of other possibilities also. What about some of the dinghy with a lid micro-yachts under 5m. Lift keel and lightweight, great for lakes and could go on the canals. Most will have provision for an outboard and small tent size accommodation. A modest camper could tow most of these boats (including the 535) I would think.

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I think the small boat idea is a good one, you could also trail it to other places and do the Nivernais and many other interesting waterways, The Wilderness boats have always struck me as a good idea. The Shetland with that fine entry of the bow (I think) make them a bit wobbly for canals with all the stepping on and stepping off that you need to do

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2 hours ago, BilgePump said:

There are a ton of other possibilities also. What about some of the dinghy with a lid micro-yachts under 5m. Lift keel and lightweight, great for lakes and could go on the canals. Most will have provision for an outboard and small tent size accommodation. A modest camper could tow most of these boats (including the 535) I would think.

How about this? (Its at the back of dad's garage) 

20190501_090553.jpg

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3 hours ago, magpie patrick said:

yeah, a small Camper Van would also be good - trouble is, like you, I have to work for a living!

 

Could a camper van pull the Shetland - now there's a thought!

I expect the Transporter would be more than capable of towing a little boat.

 

A quick Google suggests a towing capacity of between 1800kg and 2500kg for a braked trailer. So it should easily tow a little boat.

 

https://www.google.com/search?q=vw+transporter+towing+capacity&rlz=1C1GCEU_enGB821GB821&oq=vw+transporter+towing+capacity&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l5.7417j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

 

Something like this will probably do us for a bit of exploring.

 

https://www.apolloduck.co.uk/boat/shetland-kestrel/603347

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I had a Shetland 4+2 for a year, a bit bigger than that one. It came with a 4 wheel trailer. The idea, at the time, was to launch it and recover it whenever I wanted to go on the water. I thought I could trail it wherever I wanted to use it. Easier than taking silly times to get anywhere, which is the case with a narrow boat. It would also save me mooring fees. It didn't really happen. It was a nightmare on the canals unless I got it on the plane which, because of the speed needed to do that, is illegal  (having said that cruisers on the Goole Canal seem to have their own agenda as far as canal speeds are concerned.) The other problem I found, and this is probably me, was that it was awful to get out of the water. Easy to launch it from the trailer but not so easy getting it back on. I sold that combination for £6000. I wasn't going to go back on the canals but I have gone into a shared narrow boat with a friend of mine and just waiting for the real summer to arrive so we can use it properly. 

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Ill throw the idea of a Norman 20 into the mix, sold mine in perfect nick last year on its trailer £3.5k :(

Should be ok behind a decent tow car I used a Rav 4 and all up it was getting close to the limit of 1500kg

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10 hours ago, crosser said:

i always liked the little dawncraft dandy...   lots of space for a small boat and lots more headroom...

Quite stable for their little size as well with the cathedral hull.

16 hours ago, pete.i said:

I had a Shetland 4+2 for a year, a bit bigger than that one. It came with a 4 wheel trailer. The idea, at the time, was to launch it and recover it whenever I wanted to go on the water. I thought I could trail it wherever I wanted to use it. Easier than taking silly times to get anywhere, which is the case with a narrow boat. It would also save me mooring fees. It didn't really happen. It was a nightmare on the canals unless I got it on the plane which, because of the speed needed to do that, is illegal  (having said that cruisers on the Goole Canal seem to have their own agenda as far as canal speeds are concerned.) The other problem I found, and this is probably me, was that it was awful to get out of the water. Easy to launch it from the trailer but not so easy getting it back on. I sold that combination for £6000. I wasn't going to go back on the canals but I have gone into a shared narrow boat with a friend of mine and just waiting for the real summer to arrive so we can use it properly. 

I don't think that flighty handling will really concern us with a smaller boat as we have that with our current boat anyway.

 

We have only trailed our current boat a couple of times so far but can't say that we really found getting it on and off the trailer to be too much of an ordeal. Mind you we didn't have to do the driving with it behind as we got someone else to do that. Realistically our current boat although within the legal limits for towing would just be too big to do it on a regular basis.

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Norman and Atlanta 24s are both good solid cruisers with a decent internal layout (and more cabin headroom than a Shetland) and a nice amount of cockpit space, but just short enough to trail with a suitable vehicle and make use of most slipways. A good compromise and they'll turn just about anywhere.

 

Example of a Norman 24: http://www.boatinland.co.uk/norman-24-miss-bonnie

 

Example of the similar Atlanta: http://www.jonesboatyard.co.uk/boat-sales/atlanta-24-boats-for-sale.html

 

I think Viking 23 is a similar model, but don't know much about it.

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On 02/05/2019 at 16:17, Loddon said:

Ill throw the idea of a Norman 20 into the mix, sold mine in perfect nick last year on its trailer £3.5k :(

Should be ok behind a decent tow car I used a Rav 4 and all up it was getting close to the limit of 1500kg

Brilliant boats, built in my home town, but passing up to the too much hassle to tow around level for me (but if anyone found me a Conquest 2+2 I would make room for that beauty) Like the Dandy, great boats, but for a trail boat it needs to be a quick launch and recovery and anything nearing the one ton level makes life harder for launch/recovery and the vehicles capable of towing them need to be bigger.

 

The Kestrel mentioned earlier on looks a fine boat, although I would think a fair bit overprced.  (there is a 570 on ebay at the  moment  https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Shetland-family-boat-60hp-evinrude/143228175847 ). The money with boats like these is in the engine and trailer. I spent last night on a Shetland 570 (Kestrel predecessor). It cost  a few hundred quid on an unbraked trailer off ebay as a shell. I threw £100 at perspex and timber, paint etc and put it in the water. Pick your own budget for engine. The Houdini hatch leaks a bit and it's been hacked about, but the canal is still the same! Why was the boat so cheap? No windows, no doors, no interior, no canopy etc etc. If I spent thirty hours on the windows and door that's pretty much all was needed to put it in the water for a weekend. It was a rush bodge job and not something I'm proud of but 3rd class boating at Bank Holiday is better than first class landlubbing. A canopy would cost about £500 so I'll pass on that (or have a friendly word with W+T for some advice on making a DIY one).  

 

eta: small boat behind large car = loads of fun

big boat behind small car = mistake

If you have a one ton car, unbraked trailer at 200kg, boat at 500kg, it's illegal. If the car weighs two tons it's legal. (50%, max 750kg)

Edited by BilgePump
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