Yes it is "Whoa Nellie". Have owners done a lot of modifications to the M17? I found a 2001 on the net on South Carolina for big money. The M17 sounds like a sailboat that I will like the question is whether it will meet our needs. How can I get in touch with Connie? Irv -----Original Message----- From: montgomery_boats-admin@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:montgomery_boats-admin@mailman.xmission.com]On Behalf Of htmills@bright.net Sent: Friday, July 10, 2893 6:44 PM To: >Mboats< Subject: Re: M_Boats: new to list Hi, Irv What I haven't told anyone is that the little rooster tail that BuscaBrisas was sporting came courtesy of the "ACME Cockadoodledoo Roostertail Generator" that I bought on sale for $9.99 plus postage and handling from a late night TV ad. :-) The seventeen is a stout little boat that you can have confidence in. A boat of that era will be pretty spartan but strong. In my opinion, based on what I've seen of Precisions at the boat shows, the Montgomery is quite a bit more heavily built. The Precisions I've seen at the shows seemed to creak a lot when stepping on them and some of the finish details were definitly not "yacht" quality....like the raw-edged floppy plywood panels that cover the aft cabin wall and held on with 3 or 4 screws and the fold-out shelf that didn't quite fold without binding. Some of the hardware (plastic horn cleats) I'd want to change out to higher quality as well. Still, I do like the basic design and layout of the 21 and think it would make a comfortable boat with quite a LOT more room than the 17, especially if the whole family is going for an overnighter. If everyone overnights you'll really want the 4-berth model. In my opinion, your best bets for quality that you can have confidence in are the Montgomery and the Compacs, but the Montgomery will be a little smaller but faster than the 19. Doug quoted you the max speed my GPS was reading, but perhaps a more indicative and accurate figure is the 6.1 kts AVERAGE speed for over 2 hours. That was a fun sail, for sure! An '82 17 would still have the cast iron board, so if it hasn't been re-done (cleaned and coated) it likely will need it.....the problems that people have with them are just due to neglected maintenance. Keel area is the only big maintenance discussion area for the boat it seems, but of course you want to check for spongy deck if bedding has not been kept up either. If that's "Whoa Nellie", Connie could probably tell you about her; I think he's seen her in person. There's probably even some correspondance about her in the list archives. Tod Mills M17 #408 "BuscaBrisas" _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats