Sportfisherman Upgrade:

I had a 1986 48' Viking SF that I kept in Sag Harbor for some years. We used it mostly for cruising (Block Isl, Newport, Boston, Baltimore) and some offshore fishing (we're amateurs). The boat was comfortable, safe, spacious, and, with DD 710's ran a true 30 kts at cruise (34 kts WOT) under 'most' conditions. I believe examples of this model are available within your price range. Good luck.

You can likely find a very nice, older (late 80's) boat for well under your budget. I sold a 1987 Bertram 46 Conv. this Summer- our ask was $144,900. and we sold her for $120,000. She was a lightly used Chesapeake Bay boat in beautiful condition. There are some nice buys out there on quality well maintained boats.

I agree totally with the other posts here. In this market, you can get quite alot of late 80s to early 90s boat for the money. There are plenty that have been extensively upgraded and are within your price range.

Ditto on the maintenenace. Newer or older, the jump in size adds a jump in costs. If you are a do it yourselfer, you can mitigate this somewhat but when you start measuring oil in gallons rather than quarts...you get the picture.

I'm personally partial to Vikings and know alot of happy owners of Berts and Hatts as well. I'm not an Ocean fan but have no personal experience and I know others are.

This is a good time to be a buyer. Good luck.

have to go back to the 70d's to get solid

I'd stay away from any thing built in the 80's or 90's the start of cored hull boats.. If it has a core then you are better off buying new, boat builders have learned a lot of tricks and change methods and material more then once sens the 80d's.

your choice is between a
cored hull... light, fast, but less then solid
solid glass hull..... heavy, slow, solid as a rock and some times just as heavy


from 1970 to 1979 its a safe bet its all glass... the start of the 70's was a bit like the start of the 80's new materials no idea of how to use the stuff. in the start of the 70d's and late 60d's boat went from wood to glass no one had built a boat that way so the first boats are often as thick or thicker then a wood boat 1" 2" inches solid glass.
in the 80's it all changes and cores come in to play. 80's 90's 00's what changed? the use of epoxy slows or stops blistering,,, big deal when 90% of you boat is foam, you do know foam is like what a sponge is made of... carbon and some times kevlar play a large part in making that paper thin skin hold up when you dock a little hard. see them beer coolers work like an i beam, the top layer compresses and the bottom expands. so carbon means less flex that means less fall apart see its shear that kills cored boats that is why there are lots of impact reports out there its not one smack its day long flexing . The vac system used to day makes it all stick better see it can only get a bond to the top of the core so if it don't stick it don't work...

you know for a boat to be fiber glass it has to be 60% fiber and 40% resin if it has a core it is not a fiberglass boat its a beer cooler boat. or o ya sorry that right compost-it hull...

There are a lot of posts on this site and across the web that give clear photos of beer cooler boats with big holes punched in them or just falling apart and almost non of solid glass boats doing any thing but boating 40y later... that sold me...... but what you want is up to you and pends on your needs, where and how you will use it....

There are a fair number of well-built and well-maintained cored hull boats dating back to the 1970s with PVC coring such as Airex, or later PVC-polyurethane products like Divinycell or Klegecell. End grain balsa was common hull coring material in lightweight boats up to 35' or so since the 1960s. A few big name assembly manufacturers kept trying balsa coring below the waterline right up into the 90s, with terrible results. Water saturation and rot became problems almost from day 1 with these boats, and some people have since got it in their minds that ANY core is going to have these attendant problems of balsa.

The tremendous disadvantages to solid laminate boats include, but are not limited to, much heavier weight, lower efficiency (higher power to move the same length means higher fuel consumption too), less insulation (noise and temperature), less stiffness (necessitating far more stringers, longitudinal and transverse), and generally a smaller interior volume. The stringers are also typically made of wood, so any argument that a balsa cored boat may rot also holds true for the potential of rot in all those stiffening boards.

Solid laminate boats, when used hard and not well maintained (or poorly built to begin with), are susceptible to delamination just like any other manner of fiberglass boat building. Hulls blister, through-hull fittings leak from hull flex, stress points crack. Just because it's "solid fiberglass" doesn't guarantee it's a solid boat.

Your best bet it to find the boat you like best, have it thoroughly surveyed, examine how it has been maintained, and how easy it is to maintain. These two points often go hand-in-hand with higher end boats, and will give you a more rewarding ownership period. Always buy the highest quality you can afford, even if it's a slightly older but well sorted boat.

My recommendations are a 37' Bertram with 6v92's, a 42' Bertram with 6v92's, a 46' Bertram with 8v92's, or a 41' Hatteras.

Detroits are very reliable engines, cheap to fix, and parts are easy to find. Bertrams are great, solidly built boats(at least the old ones are) and I highly recommend them. The 41' hatteras was also an excellent boat in its time.

There are plenty of '80s-vintage boats out there with balsa coring in the hullsides that still lead happy lives.
There are some '70s-vintage boats--including Bertrams & Hatteras'--with mushy mahogany strut-backing blocks (brand 'B') and soft boatdeck balsa cores (brand 'H').

A 43 Bertram, currently under contract, has issues in the cored transom, where a jillion holes were drilled to install a TNT platform.

All can be fixed.

Have you decided if you want a production model or a one off Carolina boat.
There are lots of these out there and available. Many are in your price range. As with any older vessel it all boils down to how well it was or has been maintained. There are and will be associated cost with any boat regardless of age. Have you considered these?

I always thought Berts and Hatts and Vikings were really bullet proof and " Handsome" sportfishes ( SPORTFEESH ?) .
I am partial to Post Yachts because I have one and I think it is bullet proof and more " sexy" looking. Posts are sorta kinda semi custom.
Also I have had great customer service from Post even though I own an older model that I bought used.

I agree with Manny on Detroits here, I've got 6-71's with only 410 Hp which I love.
As Manny said, easy to work on...parts etc.
However, most everyone I know with 6-92's has had some sort of problem or another that required majoring at relatively low hrs.
The more HP you try to get out of the Detroits ( and others too I suspect )the shorter the lifespan if you run em hard. ie; 450 and 485 Hp X 6-71's
Post makes a nice 50 that is pretty darn fast too. Also 46's, 47's 55's although the 55's prolly beyond $ 225K

Also when looking for a boat, I always looked hard at how it was used by the former owner.
Hard core fishermen seemed to use the boat as a tool to get to the fish, not really " INTO " boating.
Most, not all, cruisers are more about the lifestyle and I felt, they took better care of the boast to begin with.
" Lightly Used ", if true, is key...........

my .02