Nothing fancy

No, not like that...

This principle is really pretty simple, but the amount of money it saves is phenomenal. Most commercially built sailboats have the pretense of being little yachts. Yachts are supposed to have perfectly shiny smooth gel coat finishes or paint jobs that require waxing, like cars. They often have exposed, varnished wood on the outside of the hull called “brightwork,” and keeping it looking good is a constant battle, especially in the tropics. They have expensive stainless steel rigging and stanchions, and maybe even some fancy pieces of cast bronze. Inside, they have cabin soles (floorboards) of plywood made of teak and holly ($350 a sheet last I checked!) and lots of fancy hardwood cabinetry with fancy joinery.

The simple phrase “workboat finish” gets around all that madness, reducing the cost (and the fuss) by a very large amount. If the topsides are painted flat black, then you can use old car tires as fenders (free) instead of buying fancy inflatable vinyl fenders that make annoying squelching noises and tend to pop during storms. A deck surfaced with diamond plate works just as well as a teak one. In the cabin, simple plywood paneling and cabinetry painted in light pastel colors brighten the place up. Rigging should be galvanized steel, not stainless: it is more reliable and a lot less expensive.

Another powerful cost-saving technique is to avoid the word “marine” whenever possible. Any product labeled “marine” automatically results in at least a 100% mark-up. Often a supposedly “marine” product is simply a relabeled and marked-up version of a product designed for the RV market. This is especially true when it comes to plumbing, electricity and electronics, but applies to almost all kinds of hardware.

The list of such cost-saving techniques is almost endless, and practical people who live aboard boats accumulate long lists of them, and spend a good deal of time swapping tips on what works and what doesn't. Such little discoveries are a point of pride; after all, you never know what might work until you try it. Over the years, I've tried a lot of things that didn't work, and that's useful too, because it has kept me busy, and humble.