[C320-list] Cracking in sump area and the Wing Keel debate (again)

[Jeffrey Hare]

Hi Stephen,

   The bilge is sprayed with a fairly thick white paint of some kind and I
find cracks and chips like this in lots of places.  They're benign and may
not go much past the paint layer.  Transportation, storage on stands, rig
tuning all flex the boat in slightly different ways.

In any event, I'd be *really* surprised if any of them were structurally
significant.

I like the wing keel in our cruising grounds.  The boat sails well and after
some headstay turnbuckle adjustments I can point about as well as I'd
expect.  ~45 degrees.

-Jeff



-----Original Message-----
From: Stephen Cox [mailto:sgcox at velocitynet.com.au] 
Sent: Thursday, November 23, 2006 10:59 AM
To: 'C320-List'
Subject: [C320-list] Cracking in sump area and the Wing Keel debate (again)

I am still not a C320 owner but am getting far closer.  Although now that I
am ready to buy, have sorted out a mooring and the money, there is a dearth
of 3 to 4 year old C320's for sale on the Australian eastern seaboard!
There's only been a couple in the last three months.  I missed the first one
but now a 2002 build / 2003 launch C320 has just come onto the market.  I
did the 375 mile round trip today to check it out and it appears to be a
very nicely looked after boat.  I have only two concerns:  

Firstly, some cracking in the sump area, which the salesperson assured was
just the bonding of the furniture mould to the hull and of no consequence.
A survey may comment otherwise.  I would be interested in the List's views.
See a picture at http://tinyurl.com/yj98jg  (This is a 67K picture).

The second concern is that despite the advertising to the contrary, it
turned out to be a wing keel.  I have always had some concerns about the
wing keel from a performance point of view, the extra weight carried on wing
keel boats and the potential stresses if it took the bottom at an angle
should the skipper get the tides or depth wrong.  Am I being overly
concerned given that I don't intend to race the boat?  

Stephen G Cox
Canberra AUSTRALIA