Sounds like a plan! I hope you manage to get your dream boat too! 👍

So… we took our Steel Callisto 385 to the canaries in September and had a couple of Orca attacks. The Callisto has a full keel with a keel hung rudder… the Orca still had a go, so the theory that they only attack spade rudders is out the window! The big deal was that even though the Orca grabbed the rudder and gave it a good shake back and forwards (not just a shove)and had a couple of goes, we had no damage, not a scratch… I checked afterwards, all they did was clean the rudder a bit where they tried to take a bite. The Orca got bored pretty quickly when the didn’t get nice crunchy entertainment, they went off and took a nearby boats rudder off, despite them using flashbangs and various other deterents. Maybe a resurgence in steel blue water cruisers is on the cards!

Defo a resurgence on the horizon!! As for the orca’s I saw quite a lot of damage when we were close to the Gibraltar straits for a year… It appears they will go for anything. Mono’s, cat’s, and of any rudder variant! No one is safe… Steel has always been the best off, in fact I have seen no life threatening damage on a steel boat, though I have seen a steel rudder bent. Mental.

@@SailingAquamarine that or a orca hunting season , maybe thinning the heard a lil would help them learn not to go near boats...

Noooo, you didn’t just say that😮🥺

Brilliant post! 👍

I worked in offshore oil & gas for 10 years in the commercial diving industry, IMCA Life Support Supervisor & Diver Medic. I spent most of my time on vessels kitted out for saturation diving. These are large offshore construction vessels made out of steel. Whenever I was working my way up through the ranks putting my time in there was always something to wire wheel, enrust, then paint. ALWAYS. Learn how to properly weld and finish off the work areas and you'll be golden. I only say learn to weld because you don't want to start paying a welder every time you need something done.

The 316 is just fine if you use a dissimilar welding electrode designed to join mild steel to stainless. a 309 SS wire is the correct one if my elderly memory serves me correct.

@@Thesilverrat Exactly correct. The only other detail I'd mention is to paint the weld if at all possible and it should last indefinitely. I've a number of 316 deck items welded to my steel hull just like you describe and they're still perfect 30yrs later.

@philipwilkie3239 great to hear this! Steel can easily last a lifetime, just so it right like you guys! We’ve seen some superb examples recently, like our friends on Belafonte (Instagram), these guys are showing the world how well steel can last when it’s done properly. Steel is most definitely real!

Hey!! Great to hear this, steel is an awesome material and it’s so good for people to hear positive comments like this! There is definitely a resurgence with metal boats right now and steel is certainly an option that interests us right now! Cheers for sharing your experience and knowledge 👍

Great device especially with the ultrasound

Your right! When in the right places hard chines are super for increased performance! Gotta love a BR mind! 👍🏼

And 38 is the perfect size👍

I was just thinking that same thing. Each chine can act as a point of stability in-motion.

@craigparse1439 too right, it can do exactly that, although when adding more chines we need to consider their effects on drag and skin friction too.

Fantastic advice! Thanks for sharing.👍

Thanks for the comment! What an awesome account of good practice! It’s just what people need to see too. Steel is fantastic when we’ll prepared and looked after. Mc materials and corrosion engineer.. This is super interesting, I would love to have a chat with you about your material/product recommendations for different materials!

@@SailHub

And you need to realize the properties of the building material from the very start. Just to avoid 'rust traps'., condensation a so forth. This spring I hit an uncharted rock. Thought the rig should go over the side. When Hulda was up on the hard this July, it was just some paint transfered from my keel and onto the rock. Not a scrath, not a dent, nothing. A standard glass fiber production boat would probably be on the brinck of being scraped.

Sure, as a bit builder I’m aware of most of the traps involved in building. As for the material science.. I always think it would be nice to expand mr knowledge 👍

@@SailHub It's all a compromise. I chose mild steel (St 37 variant). Main welding with Innershield. High high load areas, Stick weld (Baso). Philosophy: The hull should survive hard impact with no cracking in metall or HAZ. Even in sub zero temperatures. Though, bow in 12,5 mm St 56, with an 'Ice Knife' in front. Others will of course make other choices. And we can live comfortably inside in 22 deg C, heated with an Eberspächer 4 kW diesel heater with 10 deg below freezing on the outside. And RF 50 %, or lower.

Yup, steel is REAL! It’s a superb material for sailing. The hard you go the more confident you are in it!

That’s true actually, thanks for pointing it out! It’s strange how some boat yard are like that, they must think boats are born. 😆

So pleased to have helped! Mind you… There’s plenty of steel or aluminium boats with super fancy interiors out there too! 👍

Agreed! 👍

It’s quite a common application to be honest, it works a treat if you can sandblast beforehand, without the blasting it’s not so effective though.

It’s a romantic idea however, the tig and mid welding process for aluminium takes longer due to the natural heat dissipation. Basically we need to preheat thick alloys and leave then to cool again naturally, in general it means that despite the material costs an Aluminium boat takes more time to fabricate and therefore will always cost more than a steel boat. Painting though, yeah it’s a win for the ally here! Another thing to bear in mind though is that a well blasted and sprayed steel boat will last an awfully long time before it needs a full repaint again so it’s not really a cost consideration for most metal boat owners. Still, your right that it could make the difference for some people.

Hey, yeah.. for our boat materials series we joined up with a KZfaqr for each episode who are actually doing it at the present moment - so you can actually follow it and speak with these guys! You can find their channel link in the description! Say hi from us! 🤙⛵️💨

Wow! That sounds fun! Your sure about weight aloft? Seems pretty like quite a compromise to me but that’s just my two cents. Is that increase the beam by 2m? Crazy talk! I love it 👍

@SailHub the mast would not be as heavy as you think I work in nuclear plant and let's just say Access to some rocket scientist engineers

@user-gg6om8vp4f sweet, your lucky! We’re looking at a carbon mast at the moment and the saving over aluminium is not huge but the effect in the righting moment is, get those guys to calculate that too as I would be surprised if it makes sense. Mind you, if it works for you, go for it. I would be really interested to see how you get on!

@SailHub I would be doing a ketch setup so that can help to start. Carbon nice, my only concern is ultraviolet degradation is an issue Most do not look at that.

@user-gg6om8vp4f Nice! 👍 Yeah, not sure how we are painting it yet. UV is a bugger mind!

Hah!! Fantastic, cheers for sharing that Mark 👍 yeah, the Dutch certainly mastered the steel world!!

I also wondered that Corten or shipyard steel wasn't mentioned. As any steel build things the kind of construction is very important. And at least the first treatment of the inside of the hull. My boat was sandblasted inside when the hull was finished and then shielded with 4 coats of 2k epoxy primer. Never had problems with corrosion inside though I had some saltwater already inside. Corten steel is corroding 0.1mm/year in saltwater, time enough for mainrence. And the notched impact strength of steel is much higher than aluminum at the same thickness of material. I hitted the ground several times, up to 5kn speed, never a problem. Ask a owner of a modern plastic boat about the damage, many of this stories here on YT. And galvanic corrosion isn't a real problem if there are zinc anodes. In comparsion to aluminium I never heard that a steel hull became a Emmentaler cheese, but aluminium does if not perfect prevented. Apologize my poor english!

Some great points there! Thanks for sharing 👍

Nice! Thanks for sharing too 👍

Couldn’t agree more ! 👍🏼💯⛵️

Whatabout the chemicals used in the paint preserving the steel? I'm not sure it's as simplistic as you make out

By that I presume you are referring to marine contamination? I would suggest there’s certainly a pollution element from paint but not a spot on what a grp boat causes. Generally because, steel boats are very good when painted properly first time and not often at all do you need to take a great deal off, where as grp boats will at some point in their life need the gel taking off and that’s horrendous. Repairs are a lot worse too. Still, there’s no perfect boat. On KZfaq we put out our findings as boatbuilders, trying to just speak the facts that we have experience with.

Hello again! Yup, I would agree with that! If you do it right first time though it will last a lot longer than most people think!

@@SailHub True, you just cannot stop ever and have a break. It's like the Eiffel Tower paintjob: you start at the bottom and once you've finisshed the top you start again at the bottom.

@@diotough 😂 sailing… it’s as much about enjoying the maintenance as enjoying the sea!

Hi! By that I presume you mean a stainless hull? It can work and I have seen an awesome newly built adventure cruiser made out of it but.. it doesn’t seem to be selling, after years. Personally I don’t really understand it. As a material, stainless is brittle and it needs oxygen to maintain its corrosion free properties. I guess the main problem will if the hull becomes compromised by crevice corrosion through lack of oxygen. When it happens crevice corrosion is really not easy to see until it’s potentially too late. There are some stainless steel variants I presume 316L that will be better. There are also stronger alloys such as 318 but they need heat treated to gain their strength which won’t be easy on a hull. Sadly, I know about a lot of steels and have welded many stainless grades but when it comes to building a hull, it’s not something I have done and I am not able to say much more other than give my honest opinion. - I see opportunity for more trouble than good.

Yeah! That makes sense! 👍

😂 I agree! On a positive though, they are easy to fix.

Sure, rolled steel is a good option although certainly not as common hence I generally talked about the more commonly used hard chine. Me personally, I’m totally for metallic boats and steel is certainly superior to a traditional wood or fibreglass boat for the cruiser. Electrolysis will be covered under aluminium, we should have covered it for steel too. - lessons learned every week here👍

We have a callisto 385, designed by Bill Dixon before he did Moody Yachts. All rolled hot aluminium sprayed steel, you can't tell she is steel until you knock on the side (or know what to look for) it's another level of solid cruising yacht. No creaks in big waves, no worries about hitting anything and with modern paints, no rust.

@droneonamission Wow, it sounds amazing! I would love to see this 👍

@@SailHub Galvanic corrosion is similar for all boats. Any two metals with different galvanic potential in contact with seawater forms a battery. Zinc is low potential so is used to protect all boats: plastic, aluminum, steel, wood, cement, etc.

@@LoanwordEggcorn yup, only with a metal hull the consequences are potentially greater

😂🤦‍♂️ sometimes best to ignore the other options… To be fair, those guys are pretty handy with a piece of steel. Fabricating with aluminium is very different and I imagine they decided to stick with what they are specialist in and do it well!

I’m not sure I found the right one but all the same. That’s bonkers! I imagine they must have money to burn!!

Now there’s a question. Such a rare build! I believe Bruce Roberts designed some. 90-10, possibly a close to perfect material? Pretty much no growth below the waterline, heavy but sting so the plate is quite thin. I believe you can use a 70-30 for extra strength too. Possibly the only downsides are the cost. There is galvanic corrosion too but it does appear minimal too. Are you thinking of building one?

@@SailHub I am "gently probing" the possibilities, yes.

Amazing, keep us posted. I would love to watch this unfold! 🤞👍

@@SailHub Thanks for the reply. I'm hoping the Metal Boat Society will be a good resource. I would be open to any and all suggestions at this point. Thanks,...fair winds!

They hung copper plates on the hull of wooden war ships to resist marine growth.

Wow, what a boat! Not really my ideal boat but it’s an awesome machine! Just look at it! I bet you. I bet you could go anywhere in that… if you have the time, money and your happy belting 35 ton of yacht around! What a machine!

Pretty good build construction that’s for sure. But… The only way to go? Really?

@@SailHub Strongest construction, lowest overall maintenance, easiest repair [plug with Epoxy], heavy weight hull - great underway and relatively easy to do as a home build. A properly constructed hull will last decades, there are hulls in the pacific left over from WWII that are still serviceable and they have sat unserived probably since WWII! No other boat construction material will last that long.

I know about them for sure. Just before I give my thoughts on them… I just want to point out the video is about a particular material as opposed adventure boats. So I’m not so sure that ferro cement builds are the only way to go for adventure cruising but they have their love and the material is not a bad choice for adventure cruising, although they are personally not for me. Personally I think they are very good, the main limitation being weight (like steel) which… although being often overlooked by adventurers does mean slower passage times and longer weather windows.. lighter adventurers tend to get places quicker and easier but of course, weight is good when the going gets bouncy (so long as the weight is in the right place of course) There is of course the strength question, they are very strong, very strong but.. cracking on impact is a potential, and of course we can’t forget the internal steel structure. How do you definitely know what’s going on in there? The other thing to note is hull shape, it’s relatively limited due to the nature of the material needing to dissipate energy over a large area. Modern lines are not likely to be common part and fin keeled boats are not likely to take a grounding too well. Swing keels will be good and of course relatively common for the material. I’m not saying they are bad, in fact I would suggest a well built and well designed one will actually be exceptional! However, it’s a sad fact that’s there a lot more boats that do not fit into the well built category than do. My thoughts are that’s if your building a new one your into a winner, however I must ask how it is actually better than steel?

Epoxy is becoming more popular, however it’s expensive due to the fact the hull needs to be blasted before application for a good bond. As for fibreglass, not sure - as a boatbuilder I wouldn’t recommend it, similar to sheathing wooden boats, it’s all good until it’s not. Then the whole boat can become saturated, making repairs harder and also meaning it’s still wet when on the hard. For me, the real beauty of steel is how easy it is to fix, keep it simple, the repair work is easier and it will look after your for years.

@@SailHub thanks for your reply 🧡, I am looking at steel as the superior choice 🙌

@silentlamb7043 cool, I think it’s a good option. Check out cementous coatings - age old tech getting re launched, apparently a game changer (according to nasa and bowing) someone like eoncoat. Not really been used in the marine industry as yet but I’m sure it will come soon. 👍

Exactly!

What’s that then?

Forget it! Stainless steel corrodes too, but in tiny holes you hardly see. The same with ss anchor chains, same dicussion.

@nispuck3241 yup, crevice corrosion of stainless is a real issue! Not sure it’s the same for an anchor chain though as it’s rarely submerged for long enough for it to be starved of oxygen. If it were a stainless chain on a permanent mooring though, that’s a different thing - a big no no!

Hard to understand why all steel boats don’t use Corten steel. I looked at one , built in Holland where they know their steel boatbuilding, about 15 years old, it was even unpainted in some internal areas, no rust! It does, similar to aluminium get a protective coating of oxide. Another advantage that it is stiffer than mild steel, so holds shape with thinner plate.

@markthomasson5077 it’s amazing stuff right. To be honest I’ve no idea either. I presume cost but then there’s the future maintenance of the other option to add too… In the other hand, if you look after any steel, it will last a long give for sure. Maybe that’s the thought? No idea really 🤷‍♂️

We just covered the main builds that I have experience with. Stainless I’ve welded quite a bit but I can’t see it being great for a hull. Is generally not very good when constantly submerged. I’m ware there are boats out there but it doesn’t make sense to me. Like I said earlier though; I’m not qualified enough to talk about them so I will leave it to someone else… or, if you really want to know I will hunt someone down and interview them 👍

Steel is a labour of love and not for us. However.. That could be changing - check out EonCoat, its age old tech that has been reborn. According to nasa and bowing this stuff is amazing!

We’re the same!

That’s a fair point! Mind you, I was amazed to see some steel work that was damaged by those whales! It’s amazing how powerful they are! I wouldn’t the uk they would destroy a steel rudder but I would suggest they could bend it pretty easily!

@@SailHub Agreed 😊

I have callisto 385, all steel. We were attacked twice by orcas. They don't like steel rudders, they try... it doesn't crunch... they leave. No problem.

Geoff, get over yourself, cheers 😀

Sadly.. your not wrong! Finding a good used boat is getting harder and harder to find.

Dude the number of boats I have looked at that are covered inside in rubbish and junk is insane, they can't even be bothered to clean and wash the boat for sale then want 10 times what it is worth! @@SailHub