FINDING A GOOD SURVEYOR
Finding a truly competent surveyor can be a challenge. I found the best way is to talk with the staff at a good boatyard or reputable broker. They know which surveyors are knowledgeable and do a thorough survey. Once you have a list of possible surveyors, call them and tell them you are considering buying a fixer-upper and ask what they would do special or different in that situation. If you don’t like the answers, walk away and find another.
The National Association of Marine Surveyors, Inc. namsglobal.org
The Society of Accredited Marine Surveyors, Inc.® - (SAMS®) marinesurvey.org
Association of Certified Marine Surveyors acms-usa.com
Certified Marine Surveyors cmsurveyors.com Often these rusted engines can be started, which only leads to a false sense of reliability, since that seemingly reliable corroded engine will then fail just when you need it the most. A surveyor can give you an honest evaluation of the engine’s condition, and whether it just needs servicing or a far more costly rebuild or replacement.
If the engine has been neglected, so has the fuel tank, in which case it may very well have been left partially filled with fuel, water and other contaminants. If the boat has an aluminum or stainless fuel tank and has been sitting for a long time in this condition, corrosion of the fuel tank from the inside out will probably have occurred, and there is a good chance the tank will eventually develop a leak. With today’s environmental regulations, this could be an especially expensive disaster.
Of course, in all likelihood it will be impossible to even attempt to start the engine on a badly neglected boat, because the battery is dead or missing, and the fuel tank is empty, contaminated or leaking so badly that any fuel you add runs out as fast as you pour it in. While an engine replacement alone is not a show-stopper, when coupled with a fuel tank replacement and what will likely be the necessary engine bed modifications, you can quickly spend $15,000, $35,000 or more, depending on engine size and the difficulty of removal and installation. With no way to truly verify the engine condition, you are simply rolling the dice and praying that the existing engine is salvageable. I have firsthand experience with blisters and blister repair. Four times I have bought boats with varying degrees of blistering. A few surface blisters on a generally dry bottom are quick and easy to repair, and not a structural concern. Extensive blistering that has gone deep into the laminate, however, is not only very difficult and expensive to repair properly, but it can cause structural damage to the hull. Deep blistering requires “peeling,” or grinding-off, the outer layers of blistered fiberglass and then applying a new layer, or layers of fiberglass over the entire bottom to build it back up again. A boatyard will charge from $400 per foot to well over $1,200 per foot for a professional repair of extensive blistering. Ask your surveyor for a best guess on the cost. Be prepared to run.
Old wiring is not only unreliable, it can be a fire hazard. This is where “out of sight, out of mind” can be very dangerous. One common hidden defect in older wiring is internal corrosion. Most new boats are wired using “tinned” copper wire—wire in which each strand is coated with tin to prevent corrosion. Older boats, however, were built using bare copper stranded wire, which has an affinity for absorbing water through an exposed end. This moisture can then be sucked great distances within the wire’s insulation through capillary action, literally corroding it from the inside out. This, in turn, can cause intermittent failures, which inevitably happen at the worst possible moment.