Downsides to a catamaran

[Chtucker]

I have mostly heard the upsides of catamaran... What are the downsides?

Some that concern me is trailer width & possibly resale as it might be a smaller market.

If the boat was going to be used 75% cruising/25% fishing in the PNW, maybe a month or so out in Westport and someday an Inside passage trip.

Upsides is big cabin for the family, stable at rest..efficiency hopefully.

Any thoughts?

[3f8]

How big a boat? They turn flatter so hold on tight in the corners. Wave slap can be a problem. I think a well built alloy would not have a stress issue. I have heard of glass boats having stress problems from being torqued. The hulls span a larger area. Now that I have been so negative. Something like maxweld cat can be on my short list anytime. Before I got the aluminum bug. I was looking at a cat made of that other stuff.

[Chtucker]

30' or so.

Cats have big cabins for the family

[Chaps]

I had a Maxcat, a 27'. Loved it, very stable on the drift and underway. In the snotty stuff there was always a corner of the boat catching air but the other 3 corners in contact with the water made the boat feel like a 3 legged stool, solid and not the least bit tender. The things I liked the least were the flat cornering as 3f8 mentioned . . . crank the wheel over at speed and you felt like you and everyone else on the boat was going to get tossed out. Hull slap wasn't a huge issue on the boat as it had a healthy wave breaker in the tunnel and it was pretty buoyant. Not much below deck stowage. Super nice to fish off of, felt like you were standing on a barge . . .

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[spoiled one]

akcat here on the forum had a 30 footer built by Armstrong. He had twin DF300s and it was a sweet fishing machine. It was setup as a walk around, so cabin space wasn't maximized. It carried 360 gallons and had a lot of under deck storage. I was amazed! I have zero under deck storage on my monohull. You might shoot him an email.

[Katoh]

Cat's in that size should be Ok, I had a smaller cat and that I did not like at all, When I say smaller it was only 18ft. Must say was a very stable boat at rest, was Ok going into a sea, woeful and I mean woeful in a following sea. Was extremely lucky one afternoon coming back, was a bit blowy and my brother was at the helm, he hit this wave too side on and we had the one sponson digging in the trough and the other in the air, was just so close to the tipping point. The other thing that I personally didn't like about my cat was the way it walked instead of tracking straight, just something I never got use to, in the end I sold it.
I can only tell you my experience, in the 6-7m range (19'-22') I would go a mono any day. But I have read and heard many of these problems I found with mine do not exist on the larger cats, the size your looking at should be fine.
One last thing I found mine to be incredibly thirsty on fuel, I m not sure if it was just the motors, but it really did like to drink. I have seen some modifications to some here in Oz, where they have tried to put single diesels in them, but I don't think it worked all that well, sorry again I'm talking about the smaller sized hulls.
Good Luck

[3f8]

This is were I let my hull prejudice slip in. The Stabicraft hull design is also stable at rest.

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[Chtucker]

This is were I let my hull prejudice slip in. The Stabicraft hull design is also stable at rest.

vialula.jpg

I like the concept, just way to narrow and small a cabin... A 30'x10 is probably what we would need

[3f8]

The 2880 pilothouse is longer, but 6'7" is the widest inside width. They are trapped by the max size of a shipping container. I can attest to the fine ride and handling of this design. And at rest the air chambers provide a stable platform. Their down side is they suck up some of the inside dimension. If your looking at 30' I'm sure there are some really nice alloy cats out there. Keep us updated. http://yachtbroker.escapeartist.com/boa ... index.html

[ken210]

I agree with Spoiled One, get ahold of Akcat. He is a wealth of knowledge and an overall good dude. He's answered a lot of my questions when I decided to go with a cat. Now having said that, I don't own a cat at this point in time but soon will. I'm in the final stages of locking down on lay out, equipment and stuff like that. I'm back to work so it'll be a few more months before I can get everything going. I liked the fish killing machine Akcat had but I opted for the full cabin. You can trailer a 30x10 cat with all the oversizes load permits. I opted out of the trailer for the time being for my cat and my cats going to be 31x11. For me personally the pros out weighted the cons for my choice in going with a cat.