MacGregorSailors.com

The other day I was reading an article in an extra number of "Voiles et Voiliers" a French sailing magazine (Hors-s�ie n 31). This extra is called (kind of literal translation from French) "Small sailboats, nice cruises", en it reviews the advantages of small sailboats, confort, issues, blue-water & coastal navigation, economy, how to manage & sail , etc. It also includes some histories of people, as the Etap 21 that did a round the world tour in 3 years, and a classification of boats in the "small" category, with selling prices, both new and second hand. Overall very interesting.

2 issues got my curiosity: the first one, it seems that in France it exist a certification for insubmersible boats. Examples are the Etap boats, Django, Challenger, Kelt, Challenger, Corsaire. The Mac was not in the list. Do you have such an official certification in the US? If so, is the Mac in this category?

The second thing is a classification in "blue water boats", where you can find the Hunter 27, "coastal cruiser" and "coastal camping". I have to admit that I don't know the differences in which this classification is based, but they put the Mac (7.67 meters LOA, aboujt 1,900 Kg displacement with ballast full) in the camping category (we have been with 6 for almost 3 weeks, and anchoring quite a lot; this is how I understand coastal cruising ), while in the coastal cruiser, you find boats as the Django (7.57 metyers LOA, 1,780 Kg displacement) or the Mistral 7.50 (7.50 meters LOA, 1,217 Kg. displacement). Difficult to understand the difference, seen that in acomodation, none of those boats is offering even the same living space. There is one difference with hte Django: this is a B CE marked boat (waves up to 4 meters, winds up to 8 B), while the Mac is a C (waves up to 2 meters, winds up to 6B). The Mistral has no CE marking.

IF I recall correctly, all the boats you mentioned as being in that article are fixed keel, displacement boats. I'm surprised that the Mac appears in the same categories at all.

Sorry, I didn't mention all the list (about 65 new boats and 76 models which are no longer in production (between them, the 26X)). They go from 20 foot (dayboats) to 28 - 29 foot. And some of them are "deriveurs integrales"; so retractable keel.

My real curiosity was in the submersible classification / homologation, as it seems that in France the Mac it is not certified, and I don't know if in the US there is something similar. In France it makes a difference having or not a certified boat, as you don't need a survival engine (those emergency boats that deploy when you throw them in the water) for boats that are cerftified insubmersible, if you are not going to do transoceanic navigations.

The other point was more of a difficulty in differentiating between a "camping cruiser", whatever this means, and a "coastal cruiser". What it counts today in Europe is the CE marking, and you can navigate as far as you want of a refuge if you can assure a weather window that fulfills your category, and you have the correct material on board.

Here in the USA we can pretty much navigate where we want with whatever type of watercraft we want. I do wish we had CE ratings though.

It's interesting to compare the systems of countries. In the USA, anyone is free to get in a bath tub with no food or water, no survival gear or navigation equipment, and set sail to cross the atlantic if they desire to do that. A boat maker can sell the same boat one year as a coastal cruiser, the next year as a blue water boat without changing anything except thier ad copy. Just look at the magazine ads for the same boat over a three year period. One year it's a racer, then next a performance cruiser, then finally a family cruiser. The buyer really has to ignore the ads, investigate, trial sail, and buy on his own advice.

Boats here do not have any good system of inspection for seaworthiness or capability. Government leaves it up to market forces, and a few dozen deaths, to force manufacturers or legislators to answer any need for safety in design, materials, etc. There are organizations to try to achieve standards agreement among boat makers, but they have no enrforement power, and there are no inspectors to see that each boat is in fact done as advised by their reseach directives. Again, market forces generally keep boat makers on their toes as what is harming their sales figures. Very excellent boats are made here, and some very poor ones. Management and their chosen amoutn of groveling to investors seems to dictate how much thought and engineering is done to insure a boat's performance, safety or practicality for an intended use.

In my use, the Mac is a coastal cruiser on big water, is a camper on estuaries, bays, rivers and small lakes.

Who can reason the logic of bureaucracies? Because it is a hybrid the Mac X is hard for some to define . Perhaps that's why it doesn't appear in more places in your listings. There is an adversion in some goverments to having a thing in more than one place. It isn't neat. A thing MUST fit into only ONE pigeon hole. I found that kiind of attitude when I lived in Germany, and traveled all over Europe. And also in some states here in the USA.

Many boats, including Macs are CE certified. They are built to those specs for shipping to Europe. For domestic use, they are not made to CE specs. Any boat can be retrofitted and remodeled to CE specs, I'm told.