Any Seaward owners here?

Tedd

.
Jul 25, 2013
745
TES 246 Versus near Vancouver, BC
I'm interested in the Seaward 26RK. I know there are a few Seaward owners over at trailersailor.com but I haven't been able to log in over there for a couple of years now. I'm interested in chatting with anyone who has experience with these boats, especially the 26RK.
 

Tedd

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Jul 25, 2013
745
TES 246 Versus near Vancouver, BC
I've actually considered buying a 25. But I decided that I can afford to spend more than I was originally thinking and can stretch to a 26RK. Might be my last chance in life to have something that nice!

Are you happy with the 25? It seems like a nice boat and probably not that different from the 26 once it's on the water.
 
Jul 1, 2010
962
Catalina 350 Lake Huron
We do like our 25 a lot. I personally prefer the interior of the 25 over the 26 as there's more room without the keel trunk in the way.

That said, the 26 should be able to sail better up wind than the 25 due to the deeper keel, and the 26 should have none of the arch compression issues that plauged some of the 25s.
 
Jul 1, 2010
962
Catalina 350 Lake Huron
I believe the 26 had several iterations / improvements of the keel and rudder over the years, so take that into consideration when shopping. Some of the very early keel bulbs fell off, so do your research.
 

Tedd

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Jul 25, 2013
745
TES 246 Versus near Vancouver, BC
Thanks, good tips! I would definitely be looking for one of the earlier years of the 26 because I can't afford a newer one.

How is towing and launching your 25? I see that it sits a little higher on the trailer and I'm wondering how much harder that makes it to launch. I currently have a Macgregor 26 classic that is a breeze to launch. We tow every time we sail so those are important considerations for us.
 
Jul 1, 2010
962
Catalina 350 Lake Huron
It's not as quick as rigging a Mac for launch. When we used ours a lot, we kept it in a slip locally, and trailered it for vacation cruises elsewhere. Unless we could at least plan on a 1 or 2 week trip, I don't think the hassle was worth it, so no, I wouldn't want to launch it for every sail.

Currently, our S25 is in our driveway. We moved to SC last fall and brought it. Haven't used it yet this year (much work to do on the house). Too soon to tell if we're going to keep it for the occasional trip or sell it. We spend the summer sailing our Catalina up on the Great Lakes, so we're not missing out. Just not sure yet how much we'll still use the Seaward.

Concerning towing, figure around 6k+ for towing weight. We tow ours with a Ford Expedition and it tows it fine. Actual launching is no problem on a good launch. We do have to extend the trailer (its built for that).
 
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Tedd

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Jul 25, 2013
745
TES 246 Versus near Vancouver, BC
Thanks again, that's great feedback. I plan to buy a pickup truck to tow it with. My current vehicle won't get the job done.

I made my own mast raising system for the Mac that allows me to rig the boat on the water. That was important to me because the boat launches we use are mainly used by power boats and I hated how we were in everybody's way while we rigged. Now we pull up and launch right away, just like a power boat. I would really like to set up the Seaward to be able to do that. I'm a mechanical engineer so I enjoy designing and building that kind of thing.
 
May 12, 2020
4
Seaward 26RK Englewood
I'm interested in the Seaward 26RK. I know there are a few Seaward owners over at trailersailor.com but I haven't been able to log in over there for a couple of years now. I'm interested in chatting with anyone who has experience with these boats, especially the 26RK.
I have a 2011 RK and love this boat, have made major mods to turn it into a perfect pocket cruiser,
Can’t say enough good things about the design
 

Tedd

.
Jul 25, 2013
745
TES 246 Versus near Vancouver, BC
@Islands : Good to hear! Thanks very much for the feedback.

I'm interested in hearing your experience with mast raising. We expect to tow and launch every time we sail, the way we do with our Mac 26S. Do you tow and launch regularly? How have you found the boat, that way?
 
May 12, 2020
4
Seaward 26RK Englewood
I don’t trailer sail my 26, but appreciate that is relatively easy to do with the factory rig. Contact the designer and ask his thoughts about raising mast with boat floating, the boat is exceptionally stable with the board partially down.
 
Jul 30, 2019
216
Seaward 25 777 Fort St. James
I think the 26RK and my 25 are very similar. Given that we just purchased the boat, I have the extensive experience of one mast raising to share.

If you have raised the mast of any other 20+ foot sloop, then I think you'll find it similar. It is safe and straightforward with two people, but would be significantly more difficult with one. Our boat has the factory gin pole, but has a dedicated block and tackle rather than borrowing mainsheet or boom vang assemblies. This is a good idea. Again on ours, the roller furling assembly and track seems so fragile that I took considerable care of it during the process. This, together with the gin pole, and an unfamiliar new boat greatly slowed things down.

I can confirm what I have read elsewhere, that this is not the boat to take for a quick day's sailing or even weekend, if you must go through the mast raising process. No doubt we'll get quicker, but I don't see it taking much less than two hours to get the boat ready to launch, as opposed to 35 minutes for our O'Day 20. We were super cautious, and I confess it took us four hours. IMO it is a trailer sailer in name, but in practice I would say it would only be worth it for a week's sailing at least. We decided to rent a slip for the season. We'll buy a ComPac Horizon or other catboat if we ever want a true trailer sailer that we would take for a quick weekend's sailing, and still have comfortable two person accommodation.

But, they are lovely, spacious, high quality boats, and I very much like ours.

Here is the only picture I took during the mast raising process:

20200602_093733.jpg
 
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Jul 30, 2019
216
Seaward 25 777 Fort St. James
PS. Just to add, as a small but important point on the preceding picture: we used the mainsail halyard, attached to the gin pole, to raise the mast. In the picture the halyard hangs slack. Before attempting to raise the mast, all slack must be removed from the halyard and it be cleated off. If not, then you will bend the gin pole, which has no lateral strength, but whose job is to be incompressible.
 

Tedd

.
Jul 25, 2013
745
TES 246 Versus near Vancouver, BC
@Noodat Lady : Thanks, that is all great information! Gorgeous boat, by the way.

The Seaward will be our retirement boat, so we anticipate multi-day trips to be our normal routine. Even so, I know I'll enjoy it more if launching and setting up isn't too onerous.

I've got the mast raising on my Mac 26S down to about five or ten minutes, from the 45 minutes it took when I first started doing it. Even so, we rarely day sail and try to almost always go at least over night, to amortize the time we spend towing and setting up. The mast-raising system stays attached all the time--nothing to stow, no lines or poles to sort out. Well, almost. I do stow the baby stays while under sail, but they attach with carbiners so they go on and off in seconds.

I like to think I could get the Seaward mast-raising down to well under and hour, but I'd need to see more about how it works to decide if that's feasible. In principle, though, it doesn't look very different from how the Mac works.

Tedd
 
Jul 30, 2019
216
Seaward 25 777 Fort St. James
With the O'Day 20, mast raising is simple. No gin pole, although other people use them. We use the trailer winch to raise the mast via the forestay. My wife winches, I lift and steady the mast, so no "baby stays". Honestly I don't see why we could not do the same with the Seaward, and thus massively decrease the number of steps involved. The anchor is on the bow roller on the Seaward, so that would have to be pulled to one side, otherwise no difference except the added length and weight of the mast. I would consider Johnson quick release levers for the shrouds.

If you're a dab hand with a Mac 26, I bet you'll figure out the Seaward quickly. When you get your fast mast raising system sorted out, I would very much like to see how you do it.
 
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Jul 30, 2019
216
Seaward 25 777 Fort St. James
PS. If you have a spare 37 minutes, check out this Seaward factory video. I think you will agree that this must be the most complicated way to raise a mast! Even the S25 system is simplicity compared to it. Two quotes I like from this video are 1. "There ya go, it's as simple as that!", and 2. "Hardly any effort at all...phew.... gotta.....huh.... walk back and check to see.... nothing's caught...huh......."

 

Tedd

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Jul 25, 2013
745
TES 246 Versus near Vancouver, BC
When you get your fast mast raising system sorted out, I would very much like to see how you do it.
I keep meaning to post some pictures. I'll probably step the mast in the driveway one more time before taking it out for the first post-pandemic sail, so I'll try to get some photos and post them.
 
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Jul 30, 2019
216
Seaward 25 777 Fort St. James
Back to an earlier point: Have you compared the cabins on the 25 and the 26RK? Might be an idea, if you can find boats to visit. IMO that centreboard housing makes a difference to livability, so you should at least compare and decide what would work best for you. The 25 has a draft of only 25", and with the tongue extension I don't think launch/retrieval would be noticeably different.