1.: Taboo-clone? - Talamanca

First glance essentially shows You a nice copy of Taboo III with a deck house and dinghy-davits carrying solar-panels.

In 2017 Taboo III has solar panels, too, and H. says they work well, serving enough energy for fridge, freezer, and self-steering auto-pilot. In 2003 he ran his engine for one hour each day to keep his batteries charged. Not necessary any more. Usually I am not to enthusiastic about this "renewable energy"-nonsense. But here it works really fine. And then it is GOOD.

Too many mistakes were made in design and construction of "Talamanca"! - Sorry for that, Wolfgang K. My perspective is especially remarkable since I was on both boats within 4 weeks.

The first and most serious, most severe mistake was that Wolfgang K. did not what I did: he did not fly to the Phils to meet Hausner and experience Taboo III. This lead to several mistakes.

So You invest a lot of money and YEARS of hard work without visiting the REAL boat? You do not have a fraction of the money to fly there and see it first, talk to the author of the books? You build after the pictures, only? And in adition to that You skip some of the best ideas implemented in the real ship, as they are described in the books (so You KNOW!) and You make it more expensive, more heavy, and a lot WORSE?

a) Architecture after pictures.

In Germany we would say: "Malen nach Zahlen" (Paint filling numbered fields with colors.) Since K. was never sailing the REAL Taboo III, which I found to be a GREAT ship - and this is still what I think in 2017, especially since Taboo III has improved even more - he took the pics from Hausner's (H.) books. Then he paid a boatbuilding-engineer to draw plans for "Talamanca". The architect made the same mistake: he did not check Taboo III personally!

Thus he had no idea of the REAL boat, how and why it worked well.

Next problem: I do not know other yachts from this designer, so I can only give my views of the "Talamanca"-design. In my eyes the engineer had no idea of catamarans. He had probably never built one or even several, he was lacking experience. And he did not learn to improve later designs. He was young, I assume, and he needed the money.

His design was better than Taboo III, because "Talamanca" has a deck-house? I do not want to call it a deck-saloon, because it is only a settee with a very nice table, and a roof above. I did never like the open design of Taboo III, without a deck saloon. The open deck is good and fine for Wolfgang, but this is a no go for me.

But then: How stupid is a deck house like the one they designed for "Talamanca"? It only puts a roof on the settee! You still have no deck saloon, and You still walk thru the rain from one hull to the other. Silly? Silly!

I like the davits-bridge, which is ideal to carry solar-cells, antenna, and such.

If You skip the deck-saloon You sit in the cellar when it rains. I want to sit snug behind windows in the rain, and see the wheather outside, the bay, the marina. See pic below, the "Mumby": this is the deck saloon design that I LOVE! H. doesn't care, so it's good for him, but not for me.

Then I love the contact with others in or outside the saloon, especially when they wear bikinis, or when they don't. Cooking, eating, navigating, watching TV You are in contact with the others on the boat. Every now and then You look outside thru the windows to check boat, wheather, surroundings, the panorama, the harbour, other yachts, the girls on the beach: I LOVE that! In Taboo III the settee, the kitchen are down in one hull, the cabins down in the other hull. Same on "Talamanca".

Let's see it this way: the deck house does not have the spacey interior of a deck-saloon, and in the rain You still get wet whenever You wish to change from one hull to the other. Terrible. Especially when it is cold.

b) Essential factor in building sth: weight!

Any engineer/architect/designer MUST understand the unforgiving fact he must build LIGHT: doesn't matter whether he draws plans for buildings, cars, bikes (this rules out the archaic anachronistic junk Harley Davidson. Not my business! If Harley builds them and the fans buy them it's ok. I am NOT the one to tell them that the cheaper Suzuki Intruder is by far the better cruiser with more modern technology.), aeroplanes, and ships.

Naval engineers who do not understand that do not care. This is the majority. And, as often!, the majority is COMPLETELY wrong!

So the most stupid thing You can do in construction-business is to add UNNECESSARY weight. Or even dead BALLAST. Theoratically dead (lead!) ballast is the worst, because it does not have any function apart from being heavy. Are You associating "keel" now? You are RIGHT!

So what do such designers do? They put everything into the ship. Lots of unnecessary items, built to heavy. Look into "construction" in the site-navigation to find the basic advantages of catamarans. Light weight, no lead ballast, they do not draw deep! The KISS-principle.

What is not there needs no maintenance, and it cannot fail.

Of course we do know, that less smart boat-buyers are asking for all the unnecessary gimmicks, beginning with superfluous engines! Because they and their friends are much more impressed by a wealth of unnecessary electronics, engines, over-dimensioned parts, winches than by "IID": I deal I ntelligent D esign. They want "wmd": W rong M ainstream D esign". Superyachts need the glamour.

This kind of glamour? Certainly NOT. I can build a ship without the nonsense, and still put a lot of effort and money into an advanced superior noble interior design.

Nobody sees unnecessary weight, superflous bells and whistles, the gimmicks, the electronics, all the lovely nonsense-gauges as sth that fails every now and then, needs maintenance, and is useless. Electronics? What You need on a good seaworthy ship nowadays are: two laptops (even only two tablets would do! You have at least one more -emergency- navigation device in Your smartphone(s) ), ONE small Diesel, engine revs, engine temperature, auto-pilot, fridge, freezer, solar panels, voltage, ok. Ten centimeters of wool thread.

Wool thread????? Wool-thread!

Costs? ZERO. You can steal it somewhere. Steal two: one as backup. Somebody might steal it from You. Sense: KISS, common, good! It shows You the apparent wind. No expensive electronics that can fail. Wool thread does NEVER fail!

I know that. Because I did aerobatics in the LOVELY Pitts biplane of the remarkable Dagmar Kress, who I still love. The GERMAN Extra 300 S is better of course, but the Pitts is the one You LOVE. He (decent pilots do not call a Pitts an "it", or a "she"! And he MUST always be RED, or YELLOW!) sports a wool thread, too. Because the thread tells You whether You are still flying, or already falling out of the sky. Apparent wind!

A Pitts! Good: one engine only, wool thread, lightweight instead of OVERweight!

Maybe You wish to add AIS, the great worldwide net displaying the positions of ships. Comes cheap, very efficient! See internet: AIS!

WORLDWIDE! Marinetraffic.com!

Puts Your ship into the moving map of all the other ones around with estimated track to make much traffic safer. They know who You are, how big (heavy), type of craft, and so on. Very nice!

So the boat-yards offer heavy boats, and the customers buy these! Everybody happy?

Not always, maybe. The famous german sailor Bobby Schenk, f.e. sailed the wrong boat most of his life. First a monohull (terrible mistake!), now a well reputed french catamaran which started to fail the day he picked it up in Brittany. And after only a few days the boom broke in the Strait of Gibraltar, if I remember it correctly.

I can well imagine a glamorous super-yacht without dead weight.

Then there's as often, real or imaginative "safety". Nobody blames an incapable car-mechanic for overtorqueing (wheels!) and the damage he thus does to the car. But everybody blames him if a wheel falls of the car - worst case. So they overtorque, the wheel cannot fall off. But the new cylinder head is killed. Or the rims. Good mechanics click-torque PRECISELY, they do not damage to the car, no wheel falls of, nobody can blame them.

Except in construction of race-yachts owners demand uncompromised safety of the ship. Because they are permanently worried that the forces of nature break the boat. So the worst nightmare of every engineer is if sth breaks (in heavy wheather). So the incapable engineers make everything STRONGER, as strong and as heavy as possible, much more than reasonable, just to make sure. They don't care for the negative side-effects. Not their problem. And most often the owner of the ship does not even notice or understand the problem.

In race-yachts the situation is different: in every TV-report of an ocean-race You see yachts floating bottoms-up because they lost their (heavy!) keels. Or without masts which came down, or with broken booms, rudders. Because the boss puts speed and lightweight over safety.

While having almost the same dimensions Talamanca weighs 50% MORE than Taboo III !!! Taboo III: about 11 tons, Talamanca 15 tons. This is a tremendous difference. When I asked Wolfgang Hausner about the weight he said if he'd build Taboo III again he'd make it even lighter.

My personal opinion: Taboo III is the safer ship with less overweight. Evidence: since I just visited Taboo III in 2017 I am sure she's still afloat and travelling.

But Talamanca was far to heavy, and thus far more expensive, too ( see all the BIG winches!) Overdimensioned. So Talamanca draws deeper, she needs heavier anchors, bigger sails, and so on.

Every mistake conditions the following additional mistake.

So to me the major flaw of Talamanca was OVERWEIGHT. With unforeseen consequences: Taboo III is a silent boat, You only hear the water when sailing, not the boat, no slamming. (In the extraordinary 70feet-Hawaiian trimaran "Volcano" I experienced SEVERE slamming right under my bed: every second a medium explosion. Bang. Bang. Wrong design!)

Talamanca had no slamming. But the boat was extraordinary loud, because the wood was "working", winding, moving, screaching. Even at anchor, when the sea was flat the ship made loud noise. Not funny.

I think neither the engineer nor the owner had the slightest idea how to apply the epoxy the right way. The epoxy is mentioned in the books as essential. Epoxy is good for eternity, it does not change, even not in salty seawater. Stainless (!) Steel, alloy, alumin(i)um corrode or desintegrate because of different electric potentials, GRP is pretty good, too.

Recently. Early boats often suffered Osmosis. Delamination. I think they are better now. Wood rots, or is eaten by worms. In warm seawater it is the teredo's favorite food.

One of the MAJOR advantages of Taboo III is the unique hydraulic-drive-concept. When sailing the prop is out of the water, it does not apply brakes on the boat. Excellent. So you avoid all the problems of (less effective) folding or feathering props. And the holes in the hulls for the driveshafts. A hole in the hull always means: potential or real water coming in. The ship is not waterproof.

EVERY hole in the hull(s)is a potential disaster. You MUST avoid them. So I would not accept thru-hulls for: prop shafts, water drains (kitchen, shower, toilet, engine cooling water). No holes = no trouble. Forever. Ship waterproof and dust dry!

You'll have to bring Your vacuum cleaner!

Taboo III until today, June 2017, still has the first engine, a Mercedes 180 Taxi Diesel sporting 38 hp - undestroyable, perfectly reliable if well maintained -, and the fantastic hydraulic drive.

So WHO needs two of these excellent overpowered Yanmars and their thru-hulls???

K. did not understand that, or he did not care: he installed an engine in every hull, I do not remember type and power. Bad concept!

My VERDICT: I would not buy Talamanca!

After the Talamanca was brought back to Bremen/Germany in desastrous condition they tried to sell the wreck. I did not expect success. But there was: GREAT success!

So I am very happy to report that the Talamanca is back in sea-water! And what a beauty she became! She is looking a lot BETTER than when I was aboard.

This is a great story, because the Talamanca that I already had written off has undergone a serious und knowledgable restoration-job: she's better off and more beautiful than ever!

Nach so ernsthafter wie kundiger Restoration ist die Talamanca, die ich schon abgeschrieben hatte, nun besser und schoener als zuvor. Und, wie man in den Bildern sieht zur Freude ihrer Eigner und Gaeste :)

2.: The beautiful 15m-(45ft)"Mumby"

Mumby layouts

Isn't she a BEAUTY?

Not many know that there is an extraordinary boatyard (Dave Allen's) in the Philippines, in Carmen/Cebu Island. I was there.

First glance: I LOVE the boat! Second glance: hmmmmmm. Then the reasoning starts. To many engines, to many thru-hulls. The Mumby has two of these phantastic, expensive Yanmar-whisper-Diesels. Very silent, hardly vibrations.

Problem: electric currents, galvanic corrosion. Turms aluminum to white dust. The owner of a multimillion $ SUPERyacht learned this lesson the hard way. He made one VERY EXPENSIVE mistake. He fired his captain. If You fire the captain of Your ship You must IMMEDIATELY take him out, or even better tell him he's fired standing on the pier and have a stewardess bring his personal property. Same in Your company/office: do not give a guy You just fired the chance to use his computer! The fired captain threw a screw-driver into the bilge. Nobody saw that. The corrosion made a big hole in the hull, causing trouble at sea when water entered the ship, PLUS high costs for the repair. Haul out a SUPERyacht and You know.

Mumby layouts. Deck. Saloons. I LOVED it!

While working on Your boat You do not really wish a washer, bolt or nut fall from Your tool into the bilge. They use to fall to places You cannot reach. I just lost a 13mm-key unretrievable in my SUV. So I know.

Lastglance: I LOVE the looks, the materials, the quality-components. I LOVE the fixed-sunroof. The deck saloon. People say the Mumby is FAST. I LOVE that, too.

I HATE the second engine. 25.000 US$ wasted. Nonsense weight added. Space wasted. You lose nice storage-space in the unwanted second engine compartment. I HATE the strange kick-up-rudder-construction, look at these ridiculous slits in the rear hulls! You can see the mounts/bearings for the prop-shafts in that pic. I HATE the daggerboards. A good boat should not have daggerboards for directional stability. Daggerboards often rattle underway. You do not want that. The Mumby-guys swear their daggerboards do not rattle. I don't know.

What I know is: I do not want to see daggerboards on modern ships other than these old bathtubs, those shoe cartons in the Netherlands.

I think the Mumbys need the daggerboards because of their wide u-shaped round hulls. These do not provide much directional stability. I HATE the vertical bows: I've sailed two different cruising-catamarans with this design, and they both had the same problem: these boats "saw". "Surfing" down a wave they accelerate. Then they dive into the next wave which is rising. Since they do not have enough floating forces they brake down. So You have a permanent disturbing movement of the boat , accelerating/braking....., accelerating/braking....., accelerating/braking....., accelerating/braking.....

I had that for four weeks. You do not like that. Even though most of the time You don't care because it is not really bad. If it turns worse (higher waves!) You are disgusted twice: for the "sawing", and for the loss of performance when "braking".

A good bow that glides smoothly into the next wave-crest should have a look like a cruise-ship..... or Taboo III!

I HATE the lack of storage space. You have ample living-room in a "Mumby" but if You bring more luggage than a tooth-brush You're already in trouble.

Sailors are bringing lots of items into their ships when circumnavigating! They LOVE a good workbench, good storage for tools, spare parts. The less unnecessary gimmicks the less spare-parts You carry.

Ok, then: I did not sail a Mumby. I am being told though from a source that I consider reliable - an expert! He says: The Mumby has two more problems I would not accept: The aluminum of the boat heats up. Going inside on a sunny day - You want these! - You enter a sauna. You reach 50 celsius inside easily. Not funny!

Second drawback: The boat is fast, and that's what You want. But when You sail slower for whatever reason the daggerboards do not provide enough directional stability: the boat is being pushed to the side. Crazy?

Then I think: You usually are barefoot on a pleasure craft in nice wheather, in the Caribean, in the Philippines. Do You want to walk barefoot on HOT aluminum?

Mumby layouts

So You should certainly consider buying a Mumby. But NEVER buy without having chartered for 4 weeks before You underwrite!

My VERDICT: I would not buy a Mumby!

3.: The beautiful classic monohull Sakura

The bows look good to me. But the rear looks like the "slamming" design to me. Part is "soaring" above the water, then hit from below: BANG!

This very nice Formosa 31 or ct41 was for sale in Manila Bay Yachtclub: I could see it from my window. The broker to my right is a well reputed editor of a sailing magazine in the Philippines. I think he stopped that since nobody bought it.

The german owner bought it and started to renovate, first installing a good Yanmar-whisper-Diesel. Then he preferred to die. His widow did not pay the Club fees. My impression was that the Yacht Club was not to unhappy about the missing payments since that allowed them to lay a hand on the boat.

I was interested, and I even paid for a survey. As You can already see in the first pictures the boat was neglected and in deplorable condition. But the substance was good, the new engine expensive.

The FORMIDABLE NEW Yanmar. The non-existent cockpit. There was just a small hole where I could just put my feet in: a nonsense!

Another nonsense: it is a ketch, tsss. There is no reason at all in a ketch-rigg. A sloop, a cutter make sense, but not a ketch.

She was small inside, of course. But she was a beauty, and she could have got me going. Suddenly my tries to contact kept unanswered, and that was it. I was a bit sad, but happy, too: Much work, much money would have been to invest.

And a monohull will always be the wrong boat for serious cruising. Bobby Schenk knows that: he sailed the wrong boat for decades.

My VERDICT: Do NOT buy a Formosa 41 for cruising!

But she's a lovely boat as a daysailor, hanging out for some heeling.

4: ViennaCat: To many problems!

The now previous owner improved the boat a lot. Things worked, but not all.

Most serious problem: old, overdue Volvo Diesels. They ran a lot. On my trip one engine did 30days x 24h = 720 hours from Mir/Malaysia to Langkawi: we had no wind.

The second engine did nothing. Water pump broke. After only about 12years it was not possible to buy a new waterpump from Volvo. You do not want to experience that.

Then a bilge full of water, mixed with Diesel Terrible!

Then: engines right under Your beds in the two aft-cabins. You do not enjoy Diesel-smell in Your dreams.

Then: the bad vertical bows, causing "sawing" (read above!)

Even though ViennaCat is pretty short (11m, 39 feet) it offers good living space in the deck-saloon.

Bernd Lundkowski Buch "We LOVE boats!"