Yamaha issues
Greetings, I've had three surveys done on Yamahas: two on the 30, and one on the 37. All three times, the surveyor was quite impressed with the quality of construction and design. In the seventeen years that I owned the 30, not one blister showed up in the hull. I really didn't have much in the way of problems, although the window plastic gives up in about twenty years. (The plastic vendor says figure on ten.) It has an exposed iron keel, and I never found the secret to making the keel waterproof. Every time I pulled the boat, there were blisters in the epoxy barrier coat and bottom paint on the keel, and behind them was clean water. The keel didn't start rusting until I scraped the paint off, so there wasn't any damage. The engine never gave me problems, but the local engine mechanic advised that because of the lack of parts for such an old engine, it would be easier to replace than repair, should the time come. The next owner did replace it with a smoother-running multi-cylinder engine. No problems with any of the items you mentioned. The buyer's surveyor pointed out to me that the boat had hit something with the keel, as the hull bilge section behind the keel had been painted, and this was a common way to hide surface cracking due to compression. I wondered what that was all about when I bought the boat, but it never became an issue. It was judged to be not significant, and the sale went through in spite of that one flaw. Good luck with the boat. When I was shopping for mine, I never found one which was being sold other than by reason of financial distress of the owner. In fact, the one I bought was that way. Regards, Bob
