Bob:
You're absolutely right about the fresh water pump. The thumping and banging sounds are simply awful on my R27/OB and more so when using the head sink especially. The cabinet under the head sink kind of acts like a boom box. :roll:
I was at the R29 S/CB & R31 S/CB factory in Monroe today and captured around 50 photos (without Andrew getting in the way :lol: ). Actually, Andrew was very attentive to where my camera was pointing and would quickly remove himself from the scene.
Gosh, there's so much more space in the R29 vs. the R27/OB model. The Cave is simply cavernous, wider and deeper and can easily accommodate 2 young children, and of course the dinette berth is wider also. I would have no trouble going into the end of the Cave head first to get at things.
The Webasto heater is located under the Refrigerator and with the Refrigerator removed (just 4 screws) and pushed aside (I noticed there was sufficient wire slack for this) access to the furnace is excellent.
Access to the Macerator, holding tank and associated pipes are all under the aft section of the island berth and easily accessed with the big lower draw removed and raising/removing the aft section of the 4" form mattresses.
The engine access is excellent and completely outside of the cabin and is fully contained in its own liner. The only opening I saw between the engine bay and the cabin area was a slight opening at the Cave's aft area for allowing fuel lines and some wires to route into the engine bay area.Engine oil filers (two of them), fuel filter raw water strainer, and raw water impeller pump and housing are all within easy reach. Without a Genset sitting aft of the engine there's plenty of room for a person to stand while working on the engine. One actually stands on the Genset tray. Behind this tray there's full easy access to rudder arm, autopilot hydraulic piston, rear thruster and hydraulic fluid tank. It's simply cavernous back there.
Batteries are somewhat hidden in and in forward sections of the port and starboard cockpit lockers. The battery charger is on full display in the starboard locker, but was unable to locate the Inverter.
Storage under the helm seat is very very generous, as are the two hatches to storage under the starboard side forward step (where sink used to be or where the aft steering controls would be located).
The two metal stanchions supporting the cockpit hardtop are very sizable and feel very comfortable and stable when grabbed.
I looked carefully on how best to have a full cockpit enclosure made and see that the cockpit hardtop sides aren't vertically aligned with the cockpit port and starboard side, nor is the aft lip of the hard top vertically aligned with the transom. Thus, without extending the hardtop in some way the full enclosure will have sloping sides and a sloping aft panel. The aft panel will also need to have an opening panel that matches the position and dimensions of the transom flip seat so that the seat can be deployed when needed. I've contacted Dave at King Marine Canvas and he has said no problem and he can easily template the enclosure for me and deal with the slopes and the aft panel issue for the transom flip seat. I'm very keen on having a full cockpit enclosure as it will be very useful during the PNW winter months when I cruise about. Incidentally, the Webasto heater provides heat to the cockpit area so that's a very nice feature to have.
Everywhere I looked and stressing panels and flooring felt rock solid.
I love the way the head door opens inwards rather than outwards on my R27/OB. So much more convenient and I would venture to say, safer when the boat is rocking about.
The helm console is nicely laid out and the one under construction I was viewing had the twin chart plotters which is one of my requirements as well.
The rudder is of sufficient size IMO and is around 1" thick. It looked very substantial and suspect quite heavy as well. I recall the rudder on my R-25 Classic which had a much smaller rudder area and was referred to as being too skinny by many people. The skinny rudder meant steerage was compromised some at 4 kts and below which when docking presented issues. A fellow R-25 Classic owner (was over 90 yrs old) at my marina actually was so ticked of with his skinny rudder that he hauled his boat out and welded (maybe bolted) a plate to double the surface area of the stock skinny rudder. :lol: He was so excited about his mod and kept telling me he does not use the thrusters at all when docking.
My overall sense was that the R 29 S/CB are well built boats with much attention given to easy maintenance along with its modern design. It also visually looks a great deal bigger than my R27/OB even though there only 2' in LOA difference. The biggest aspect of size comes from the R29 having a 10' beam.
I will post a link to my R29 S/CB photo album in a followup posting here.
