Advice for New Boy Please

[Soupy]

Hi,

Superb forum which I have been reading for a while. Great stuff and very comical at times!
Am new and have the opportunity locally of buying a Zodiac 6.5 with 150 Evinrude. Built 2000 with only 30 hours use. Includes radar, GPS, VHF, fishfinder, colour screens, lights, horns, custom covers, A-frame. etc, etc plus fully serviced trailer. Very high spec and hardly used (weather and age restrictions) by very careful owner who is retiring and going abroad. Asking 16K or nearest offer. I have not seen as I'm abroad at the moment but pal has and tells me its totally mint condition (also includes 2 s/s props as part of the deal).
Would be using east and west coasts of Scotland for cruising mainly. Any advice on suitability for purpose and deal (which seems good to me). Thanks.

[eupa]

welcome soupy. Join the mad lot.

i don't know how much yor are payiing for the zodiac- but although very good they are very pricy. You might care to ask for a quote for a new boat to see if the Zodiac is a bargain.If possible gor for 7.5m+ if you are going to do some wave jumping, and one last word- dont listen to everybody- DIY and find out the mistakes the hard way. All the best Jonathan

[Louise]

Originally Posted by eupa

i don't know how much yor are payiing for the zodiac

Read line 5 again, Eupa! £16k.

Welcome, Soupy!

[eupa]

Originally Posted by Louise

Read line 5 again, Eupa! £16k.

Welcome, Soupy!

Sorry Louise-didn't see it. I sounds very cheap.....

jonathan

[Louise]

No need to apologise Jonathan!

[Soupy]

Louise & Jonathan - thanks for the welcome. As regards the boat it does seem very genuine and a good deal (to a novice anyway). However, I need to decide quickly as I know there is other interest.
The same boat (2004 model) but with just the basics is up for sale at a local dealer for 20K.

[dodl]

Hello,

Which Zodiac do you speak of? The Pro Open 650?
A pretty nice boat. Although i read a lot about problems with leaking "valves" (hope that's the right word??). Some older PVC Zodiacs had leaking tubes. A guy from the netherlands who does tube-repairs for a living says, zodiacs bring him a lot of money.

Looking around in the "for sale" section here on the forum, i found a lot of boats i would prefer over the Zodiac.

cu
martin

[swginn]

Depends which zodiac it is, although that spec does sound good for £16k. If it were me it would have to be a SRMN (military/navy spec) or a Hurricane to tempt me away from other boats on the market. All IMHO of course!!

[EdwardH]

Hi Soupy, thats very interesting - a couple of years ago, when I first started looking at RIBS, I was offered a very similar boat (Pro Open 6.5) with similar high end specs , same age and similar miles for 40K AUD = (16K GBP).

On doing more reading/digging about, I found that the PVC tubes WERE seen as sometimes a bit of a problem. With the benefit of hindsight, I think this was only in the case of 'extreme' use, and a well cared for, well covered boat, shouldn't have any problems really.

However, I did come to the conclusion that that Zodiac model (this one was not a military spec) was a bit of a halfway house to a really heavy duty model and so I decided that i would hold my cash while I worked out what I really wanted and bought a 5m Gemini instead for a third of the price while I worked it out.

I now realise that Zodiac would have been more or less ideal for what I wanted as a first boat as the only thing more I need out of a boat is a bit more space and a bit more power...

It depends on the type of ribbing you want to do imho...

As a first boat that Zodiac sounds like an excellent choice and at 16K, I daresay you could use it for a year or so, get used to ribbing and then maybe even sell it on for what you bought it for IF you want something different. By then you will have worked out exactly what you ARE looking for in a next boat, will have ahad a great couple of years on the Zodiac etc...

Its not as 'extreme' as a lot of the stuff in the 'for sale' section, but I also expect its had an easy life (although thats admittedly hard to tell from the other end of the planet ;-) ) and may be a good intro.

Hope that helps...

[Pete7]

Soupy, is the engine an Ficht type or just straight carbs ? if its Ficht you might want to do some research and find out how old it is. Whether or not its the later bombadier version or the earlier OMC. That would certainly make my mind up.

Don't rush, lots of good ribs for sale at this time of year.

Pete