Gunboat 66 – the ultimate fast cruiser?

Or you have put up that question on too many other forums already?

Or we find everything to do with Gunboat distasteful and don't find their financial difficulties a shame for them although do for their customers and employees.

The way they ran their business. Their failure to oversea adequately their production. The boats they delivered that were complete disasters. The buyers who were out their money and had nothing to show for it. Their abandonment of those customers and of their employees. All those things. I don't argue they may be great sailors, I don't know that aspect. But the way they ran their business was horrible and many were hurt by it.

So, that's what I find distasteful and why I am not interested in their boat.

I wouldn't have posted in this thread but you wanted reasons no one was responding. I'm sure others have their own reasons. Once I see "Gunboat" in the thread title, I'm done.

What is your relationship with them that leads you to posting information on them on multiple forums? Just an admirer?

And Gunboat put all the blame on the Chinese firm. Those are the boats I labeled disasters as did Gunboat. Gunboat didn't properly manage or supervise the production. To my knowledge those boats have not been repaired and there is doubt that one or more can be made acceptable and safe. And my information is far more than rumor mill. If you want details, just find and look at the various court documents. I haven't googled today, but have previously seen details of the issues. Just read Gunboat's suit against the yard and the yard's suit against them. Regardless of which is right, the customers received very bad boat.

Gunboat is out of business because they sold and delivered very bad boats which they purchased from Chinese yards. Plain. Simple. The owners are stuck with these boats. Can't really sell them since they know of the problems. Can't get any help from Gunboat and can't get their money back. I don't respect people who do business like this. You make it sound like these were minor warranty issues but they were major.

Rainmaker didn't exactly come to a good end either. Gunboat could no longer make sales because the word was out. By bankruptcy, they are able to disavow all further obligations. Even by their own words, everything they did their last two years turned to a "perfect storm" of circumstances, mistakes and disputes.

By Gunboat's own admission and filings they owe people more than $10 million. Those are real dollars people will never see and that's not reflecting those who own boats that have zero market value now.

When they ran from Cape Town for China one night, their first bancruptcy left behind a number of unfinished yachts and a complete mess, that cost a lot of people a lot of money, incl local worker and trades. One case is still pending in RI courts, to my knowledge. Not enough publicity at that time unfortunately, to avoid the remake in the US a few years later.

A few weeks before they folded again in NC in November '15, they took a $1.5m deposit for a new build from an unsuspecting Swiss buyer. Their current 2nd bancruptcy is transparent, look up the bancruptcy court files, they show all names, amounts, status of yachts and contracts, etc.

Those involved might find stronger words than distasteful ...

I thought I was being mild in using "distasteful".

Was a sales guy for a dealer of trawlers built in Suzhou, PRC in the mid-2000s.
Boats were overall robust, but plagued with the typical warranty stuff such as mis-aligned struts, poorly-bedded deck hardware...the kinds of things that require serious roebucks to attain client satisfaction. This killed the Dealer-Builder relationship. "Ah, Joe, you buy next boat, we deduct repair costs". Great biz model!

Haier reefers = garbage.
PRC drywall= ditto.
PRC baby food, pet food, et. al. = ditto.

Would anyone on this forum buy a Chinese automobile and expect QUALITY?

If/when war comes to the Spratlys, are they gonna be bringing a tomahawk to the Cruise Missile Fight?

Hey, Carl! Kudos for a very cool Avatar.
SALUTE!

They never built in both locations, and left 4 unfinished hulls behind in SA. Google brings up quite a lot of info and links to other forums providing more detail. Status as I read it:
one 66 was shipped to the US West Coast to be finished at Westerley in Anaheim and is subject to the court case in RI
one 78 was years later shipped to NC to be finished there by Gunboat, the owner is now in his second Gunboat bankruptcy with his boat
two more 66 were finished locally in SA by other yards

the current bankruptcy case and boat history is quite well documented on sailing anarchy - caveat emptor ...

And, apparently there is an abundance of lead in China which they are desperately trying to get rid of. I suspect this because so much of what they export seems to be loaded up with it.

For very good reasons, the old Roman principle "caveat emptor" does not apply to non commercial customers within the EU and most other civilized countries. A company leaving clients behind like discribed above should be out of market ASAP and their COs penalized. That is fraud.

Brian, as You know, I am a big friend of large and fast multihulls. Even if I may get seasick by their corksrew type movements, their upright and fast sailing behaviour is fascinating for me.

I have never seen a Gunboat personally or have sailed one, therefore I cannot comment their build quality or handling characteristics. At first look, the Gunboat 66 is a nice looking boat and it seems to perform quite nicely. But I do have to question its handling concept and layout.

On any type of sailboat, the steering and commanding position is in the rear portion of the boat (except on the large schooner Athena, I know, but they have an additional dedicated crew member positioned on every mast, who handles its sails) in order to have a good view towards and over the sails. This front cockpit is the worst position, I can think of, steering a sail boat and handling the lines. Not only the all around visibility is marginal, it is the wettest point on the boat and any larger swell will break that front door and will flood the salon. But most of the green water will leave the salon at the rear end again .

Also the Gunboat 66 was for sure not designed as a cruising catamaran for comfortable family cruising, its layout is not my cup of tea. There are many better production catamarans on the market for that purpose. And for racing around the globe, I would take one of those french carbon monsters. But I am to old for 40 NM per hour under sail and 800 NM average per day AND sleeping in a hammock.

Just my 2 (Euro) cents