Fast and Weatherly
Don Hodges - Yankee 30 "Move"
Stone Mountain, Ga and Pensacola, FL
Fast and Weatherly
Don Hodges - Yankee 30 "Move"
Stone Mountain, Ga and Pensacola, FL
We are in partnership (of four) which owns Yankee 30 #45, a 1972 Mk I (?). The interior is a dinette convertible to a double berth, galley and sink/iceboxes aft, v-berths fwd. Atomic 4 mounted off-center to port to allow narrow sole with 6-foot-plus headroom. (This results in driveshaft angled 15 degrees; very interesting trying to back to port - she won't!). Tiller with Autohelm 850.
Given better sails than ours, the Yankee 30 is quite fast and weatherly, with moderate displacement, low freeboard, and low wetted surface. It's a small 30 footer - at our dock, we have our Yankee, next berth an Ericson 30, and next a Catalina 30. Each boat seems about 20 percent larger than its neighbor.
We have no significant blisters although we usually do the bottom paint at about 2 1/2 years in tough conditions for antifouling (Pensacola).
We have no serious structural or systems flaws, just the usual deck hardware leaks and nuisance battery/wiring maintenance.
We are the second owners, have owned since 1980. Gelcoat was crazed when we bought her, and we have painted the topsides twice (1983, 1995) with Interthane Plus 2-part polyurethane.
The 5-foot draft is the biggest drawback in our area, but at least the skeg mounted rudder and protected prop go aground and off gracefully!
Altogether, a very nice if smallish 30 footer,
has served us well as a weekender, short cruiser, and crash pad for wayward
teens and collegiates. We are looking forward to sharing her with
our (yet to come) grandchildren.