Ericson 46 on ebay

[bigtyme805]

I was surfing the ads and saw a 46 Ericson on ebay. At first I thought it was a misprint, but after reading what the seller said I was dead wrong. According to him they made 20 of them.

Being an Ericson owner for quite some time I did not know they made that size.

I wonder how fast they are?


Don Anderson
E-27 Amigo
Channel Islands

 

[Martin King]

Ericson 46-for men only!

Yes when she was launched in 1971, that was some of the sexist
advertising copy you could get away with back then, and the factory
took full advantage. I believe there were actually 21 hulls built- and
2 we know of went to the bottom. She is a rare bird, but they do come
up for sale from time to time. As stated in his ad, she was designed for
ocean racing and needs a fair sized crew on board to handle her. That
one has a teak interior, I know of only one other like her, most were
done in oak. She's a freight train going to weather and very comfortable
in a sea way but quite the handful down wind with the chute up! I'd
say at his asking price, it's a lot of bang for the buck!

Martin
E 31C

 

[bigtyme805]

Hey Martin thanks for the heads up. You said 2 went to the bottom, do you recall what the cause was? They weren't hit by a freight train were they?

Don

 

[Martin King]

I forget exactly why they went down, call it operator error. That 46
is built like a tank and I almost bought one but SWMBO didn't like it.

Martin
E31-C

 

[u079721]

Saginaw Bay had two of them

Only 21 built? Then it's fairly impressive that we used to have two of them at Bay Harbor Marina in Bay City on Saginaw Bay on Lake Huron. They were HUGE, and from what I could tell, pretty fast too. But I sure believe Martin when he says that they were a handfull, because it sure does not look like a friendly layout. One of the two was rigged for cruising by a family, and it did look like a lot for a couple to handle. Got to go aboard once, and it sure didn't have as much room as you would expect a 46 footer to have, but I would sure be tempted if one came on the market near me for a good price!

 

[Seth]

E 46

Martin is right on-20-21 boats. They are big, heavy boats that LOVE to close reach with a double head rig (so does the 35-2!). When he says a handful downwind in big breeze, it is function of the weight and hull shape-not deck layout, which is quite functional. The handicap rules in use back in the day produced fairly heavy boats (by today's standards) with pinched ends-especially transoms. Instead of surfing like modern boats, this generation of race boats settle a bit lower when pressed downwind which greatly increases the loads on the rig, sails, rudder, and deck gear. They are prone to roll side to side when sailing deep angles in big air-thus the "handful" comment-they are hard on helmsmen. When cruising and using less sail, this is much less of a problem, and being big boats they can maintain good average speeds-making them good passagemakers.

I think one of them was lost on a transatlantic crossing and I think the hull separated down the middle(where the 2 halves of the hull are joined) in very rough conditions. I know this happened to 1 or 2 of the E 37's during ocean crossings, but Martin may remember this better than I do-I'm not 100% sure on this, but I seem to recall one 46 had a similar problem to the well-known stories about the 37's. Note that I don't think this is a fatal flaw of these designs-I think they were individual defects on specific hulls.

Martin may be able to clear this up better than I can.
Cheers,
S