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Sorry, no pix on this one because the door on my carmera
broke off with the film in it. Wish somebody made heavy duty cameras
for surveyors. All we got are the above pix we stole from the Luhrs
catalogue. Since we're going to say some nice things about their
boat, we didn't think they'd mind.
The last Luhrs we reviewed was a 1993 Tournament
350, purchased by a friend, and a very similar looking boat to the
360. So when we got a chance to look at the new 360 we were quite
interested to see how Luhrs was doing these days. You may
be interested know that our friend purchased a Buddy Davis after
he sold his 350, the significance of which you may recognize in
a moment. Back in '93, we were quite surprised to see that
Luhrs had changed its tune and started making some decent boats.
We've never been impressed with their previous offerings. Floating
campers, really.
The first thing we noticed about the 350 was that
someone was paying attention to something other than the upholstery
and all the other prettiness, the shine of which might be good for
a year. The first thing we did was to pop down in the engine room
to see how things are done in the places where people don't often
look. Low and hehold, it was about as good as we would have done
had we been asked to do the design on the same budget. The engine
room was spacious, uncluttered and neat as could be. In fact, neater
than anything else we've seen in a long time. Every piece of equipment
was thoughtfully placed, every hose and wire routed and secured
the way it should be. No one piece of equipment blocked access to
another piece, and so on.
Perhaps the biggest surprise of all was that the
glass work was neat. Now you gotta know that, when they make the
inside of the hull nice and smooth and clean, without any barbed
fishhooks of glass to rip parts of you body open when you accidentally
brush against them, that somebody has their thinking cap on. And
that the Chief Financial Officer wasn't standing over the shoulder
of the designers and production manager. Never mind that
it doesn't cost but a little bit more to do it right than to do
it shoddy. Somebody around Luhrs apparently knows that God (and
a good reputation) is in the details.
Sure, we found things to criticize in the 350,
and we did in the 360 too, but most of these were in the trade offs
you have to make with any boat. Basically you got good value for
your money, though we felt it was kind of pricey for what was a
gas powered boat. Nor were we thrilled with the Marine Power gas
engines, one of which bang in the first 30 hours use in our friend's
boat, and which continue to manifest too many problems, too early
in their life. Though we've never seen one torn down, we have to
wonder if these are the same 502 blocks that Mercruiser uses with
the unstabilized main bearing caps. These we know about. We'll still
take Crusader any day. But this boat is a bit too big and too heavy
to consider gas power anyway. The 350 did fine with gas engines,
but we think it would be a mistake to order this boat without diesels.
The difference in weight is 3,000 lbs out of the box, but its going
to be considerably more with extras because its an overall bigger
boat.
Luhrs is still offering Marine Power as their only
gas option and here's the deal: MP is jacking up the CID and horsepower
of the basic 454 to 502 CID and 425 hp respectively. That's just
too darn much power out of that block. There is a principle about
marine engines we'd be happy to offer: Whenever one marinizer dares
to squeeze more power out of a block than the others will, beware.
Mr. Goodwrench don't come cheap.
Okay, so on to the Tournament 360. First
we were pleased to note that the deadrise at the transom has been
increased considerably. Our only serious complaint about the 350
was that her bottom was too much for speed and too little for waves.
In other words, too flat. We wrote at the time that Luhrs wasn't
going to be able successfully compete with the other fishfreaks
with a bottom like that. You want your boat to get attention at
Walkers Cay or any other big name tournament, you are going to have
to put some vee in it and say to hell with engine and fuel costs.
Compromises like that just don't cut it with the fishinfanatics.
Guess they wised up because there's plenty of vee
on this boat, as well as the rest of their new line. As usual, when
we want to try out a boat, the Gulfstream wasn't cooperating. The
winds were offshore from the west at 20 so we had to head out a
ways where the best we could do was a short chop with a bit of swell.
Even so, the CAT 3126's at WOT pushed her along at speeds that said
this hull is going to make a lot of folks happy. It sliced through
the chop and nosed through the swell just as nice as can be. She's
balanced with the weights way aft and her attack angle is pretty
steep, especially up wind with a pipeframe top providing plenty
of windage and the heavily flared bow scooping up a lot of wind
too. Lots of lift there. You interested in fuel efficiency? Go by
a Volkswagen and save your pennies there because this boat needs
some gas. But, you can't have everything; she's rides real fine
but you pay the price in horsepower and lower engine life. Speed
always means liberal doses of dollars. That bothers you, get a trawler.
And praise the Gods of boat design, the era of
boats with drooping noses is finally over. We never understood why
anyone would want blue water coming over the bow. Even Bertrams
can be irksom in this regard. High freeboard and bow flare
forward is making a comeback. The 360 has got it in spades, a la
Buddy Davis. In fact, you can't mistake what they were looking at
when they designed this one. Only the vee-sided sections aft will
throw you off.
Once again, the shortish deck house sacrifices
quite a bit of interior space, and for a serious fisherman, I cannot
understand why the cockpit is so small. Our test model did not have
a chair installed, but its pretty clear that its a very tight fit.
Especially with the molded in bridge staircase which we think is
a mistake. So too, is the large cut out in the bridge deck to accommodate
those stairs. At least they got a large railing in there to keep
you from accidentally stepping through that gaping hole like happens
on quite a few other boats. At least somebody was thinking about
safety. Maybe next year they'll go back to a plain old ladder. This
trade off is just too much.
The hallmark of good design is that years later
it still looks good. The current line up of Luhrs boats certainly
has that. Reminiscent of Rybovich and Merritt, twenty years from
now people will still think they're good looking, and that's one
of the things that makes for good resale. All that long length of
bow and shorter house is what makes it, but they have paid a heavy
price with a small cockpit. They guy who wants to drop a full chair
in there is going to look elsewhere, although one of the smaller
chairs will do okay. Barely. The other point is the full 24"
of house overhang that's likely to snag a few rod tips. That was
done to help make up for the big bite that the staircase took out
of the bridge area.
But the bow deck? Well, heck, Haven't had
that feeling since the last time I was on a Buddy or a Merritt,
blasting across the stream at 30 knots. Smooth, clean, expansive
and just plain nice. Maybe its worth the cramped cockpit, I don't
know. But it sure is a nice old deck, yes sir. Gotta be a real boat
nut to fall in love with a deck, but looking down on it from the
bridge can give a traditionalist goosebumps. The kind of decks folks
like to take the railings off of, just like as kids we took
the front bumpers off our cars for God only knows what reason. Maybe
cuz we just thought it looked cool that way. Just love that huge
amount of flair. Helps keep her dry, too. But that pulpit!
Anybody got a saw? What is that durn thing anyway, a dolphin spear?
Or just something to keep the boat yards busy everytime you get
caught by a crosswise current while docking? Something else the
fishinatics don't want.
Ergonomically, this is a considerably bigger boat
than the 350, with another 11" of beam, although the big bow
flare means that the extra foot in length is pretty much lost, the
beam more than makes up for it. We thought the 350 just plain cramped,
but with a nearly identical layout, this design is just fine. Clearly
Luhrs isn't making the same mistake that Bertram did by not thinking
of the ladies. While the interior is very conservatively appointed,
you'd have to have garish tastes to be disappointed. If you
like lots of teak veneers -- and nearly everyone does -- this boat
is loaded with it. Remember, teak is good on the inside, not the
outside. Holds up well and is easily refinished if you screw it
up. The woodwork is not fine art, but what they did, they did well.
It won't match up with what Viking does. Its comfy, hushed
with the motors roaring, and once again there's that unhindered
traffic pattern from bow to stern, so if you got to move in hurry,
you don't fall over the table or gouge your hips on an obstacle
course. Did you know that it costs a lot more money to make things
rounded than to make them square? Everything that needs to be rounded
in this boat is. Nice. Kids are made of flubber; adults aren't.
With the windows a bit larger, the 360 is not quite
as dark inside as the 350, except up forward where its like a cave.
Some people like caves. But I think it really need some skylights
up here where glass prisms or a hatch would do just fine. One thing
for sure, the lack of window glass lets the AC keep her nice and
cool inside. Southerners will appreciate that, while the northern
ladies will probably cringe, and the guys could care less.
Here's yet another boat with a uselessgalley sink, no bigger than
a bucket. You could wash a couple glasses in it, but nuthin else.
Far better to have a large basin with a cover over it if you need
the extra space.
The master stateroom is satisfactory but the guest
"stateroom" is a hole with two bunks stacked in it. Give
heebeejeebies to anyone who's ever done submarine duty. I can't
remember when the last time I saw someone trying to sleep six in
a boat this size, but I guess their marketing people have a reason
for it. I'd rather sleep on the couch, thank you. She's got the
typical L-shape settee, but do you ever see anyone sitting at these
things? The table is always in the way, and being move around --
usually spilling everything thats on it. All over the white carpet
that shouldn't be there. And like a movie theater, people only want
to sit at the ends -- no one wants to sit in the middle. I still
think the convertible dinette is a better idea, and far more useful.
Yet that extra 11" of beam makes the difference between claustrophobia
and leibenschraum.
The glass work is not perfect, but its darn good.
Gel coat don't hold up worth a diddly though. No weak spots, no
footprints left by the bean counters we could see. Solid, decent
construction.
Engineering wise, we find just about everything
done the way it should be done, with little to complain about. The
inline 6 cylinder diesels don't cramp the engine room too much and
maintaining this boat will be about as easy as it gets. How do the
3126's hold up? Nobody knows, they're too new to have developed
a track record. But, Cat does a fair job honoring their warranties
. . . .
The price tag? Well, its probably not enough to
strangle a cat all by itself. Until, that is, you go haywire
on all those extra goodies that you really don't need but are going
to buy anyway to help all us good folks in the marine industry keep
our economy going. Once you start looking around at your options
you'll probably feel as I do that this is a pretty good buy, new
or used. For the price, you'll also find that there's a lot that
you don't get. Like there's dearth of hardware, and when you look
at more costly boats, you'll see things there that aren't here.
But what is there, is worth being there, and they don't try to fool
you by adding a lot of junk just in order to say its there.
Boy, haven't we had enough of that? Are people finally learning
that if it aint good quality, it aint worth having?
No feature stripe tape to crinkle up, no
cheap molded plastics, no aluminum, no die cast zinc alloy, no cost
cutting, bean counting crapola junk worthy of being mistaken as
a Chinese import. So you won't find a bunch of crappy leaky portholes
(there aren't any), nor a couple extra deck hatches (there aren't
any) -- you know the plastic kind you step on and you feel like
you're gonna fall through -- or aluminum window frames that corrode
like hell and leak like crazy and pour salt water all over your
nice interior. No crunchy, crumbly molded plastic ventilator cowls,
no mildew infested plastic inspection ports that aren't worth a
buck-and-a-half, no hardware screwed into glass that's going to
rip out. And there's some hand rails missing, too. Did I miss anything?
But so what? Yes, sir, I do believe I see a trend
in the making here. And its very definitely a welcome one. Keep
it clean, keep it simple, and if it isn't good quality, forget about
it. If you can't afford to put a good one on, then leave it off.
Don't appeal to vanity by doing something stupid. Boats are just
to darn expensive to be peddling junk for very long and get away
with it. Five years running now, what we got here is another very
credible effort by Luhrs to deliver good value for the money. Whatever
else her faults, there is some integrity in the construction of
this boat, and we're always pleased to report that. Twenty years
from now these boats will be selling just like 20 year old Bertrams
do today. Because they look good and they be good.
| These
are "reviews", not surveys, and bear no resemblance
to our survey reports.
We do not publish the results of the surveys that we perform.
Please note that the purpose of these reviews is educational,
to help you discern the differences in quality among boats generally.
They are not offered as a means to help you evaluate any particular
boat builder. We have no other reviews than those posted. |
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