As someone contemplating buying a Potter, I have some
concerns and questions about the WWP-15 that I'd like to
discuss, if it's OK. I'd appreciate any responses...
To start with, I read this from Geoff...
>Knowing what I know now about HMS marine makes it even chancier. The
>improvements made by International Marine are quite impressive.
Can someone tell me (or point me to a list of) the improvements made
by International Marine?
Specifically, I have been a sailor for, oh, 25 years or so, and I currently
have a Com-Pac 19, a small open daysailer, and an Ericson 29. Since
I am now expecting child #5, I'm finding that the Com-Pac 19 is too
small to carry the entire family, and too big to daysail easily. (That's
why she's for sale.) When I sail with the entire company, I'll take the
E29 out, but that still leaves me looking for a little boat I can daysail
and take one or two kids on an expedition in.
I've owned a Com-Pac 16 before, and my general feeling is that
it's built like a rock, but it's still a little more work to launch than
I'd like, since it has a fixed keel. It also has pretty heavy-duty
hardware compared to the last Potter I've seen in person. In
general, while I'm a big admirer of Potters, I've been aware that
there are a large number of posts that say, basically: I was out
sailing my Potter and something fell off/came apart/tore out of
the deck/broke outright/etc. If you look in the archives of the
famous long distance voyages, you find a litany of things breaking:
rudders, stays, etc. I hear (read, actually) of rivets coming out of
the boom, goosenecks parting, etc. In many years of sailing boats,
I've never seen hardware even come close to coming off the
boom.
Another example: backing plates in the transom; my Com-Pac
16 had a ladder on the transom I could climb, and I'm 200+ lbs.
Never a problem. I read about people going to all kinds of
trouble to put a reasonable load on the transom of a P15. Why
aren't they built strong enough in the first place?
So, OK, now I'm thinking about buying a Potter for all the reasons
you know about, but I'm kind of wondering about what your
experiences are with the reliability of various years of Potters.
I know Larry Brown (where is he these days, anyway?) towed
his boat all over creation, and I know the Potter can do fine
things, but I'm just wondering how people are addressing the
current quality issues, and what your experiences are currently.
I suppose I could call IM, but I have real problems with the
credibility of their advertising, so I don't really know if I'd give
a lot of weight to their opinions. What I'd _like_ to hear is,
yes, the 1985-era Potters broke left and right, but IM has
upgraded the hardware and the boats are now very sturdy
and reliable. True?
I'd be interested in hearing any comments you might have.
Thanks!
Best wishes,
-greg