Macgregor Owner Reviews

Serving sailors online since 1997

Review of the Macgregor 19 by Jeremy Smith

Year built	1995
Location of boat	Southland New Zealand
The boat is sailed on	Lakes
How the boat is used	Weekends and longer
Normal wind strength	10-15 knots
Average size of crew	2-4
Liveaboard?	No
Owner bought the boat in	2012
If the clock could be turned back, would owner buy again?	Definately, I have been around lake boats my entire life, of all sorts, we wanted a boat that could sail but we also love fishing, particularly harling is good where we are. this boat allows us to do both well, with a great cabin layout and affordable price. No other boat ticked as many boxes.
Gear that's been added	rod holders, detachable front boarding ladder, flag and flagpole, tiller extension,extra fuel tank, more planned as finance allows.
Structural or complex improvements	Want to get a real trailer, double axle with proper side arms on it and better suspension and boat support capability. one we have is just too light weight for how many miles we do with it. Also ventilation is terrible in cabin so going to add front hatch when we can.
The boat's best features	the overall design. so well thought out. Designed for the average person to use not some specialist sailor. The best thing about it is it is a fun boat, can fit in with what you want to do, not the other way around. A whole lot of different features, different ways to use the boat, so all of these have been made as easy as possible. Cabin is large and layout is good. Love the collapsable mast that folds away into boat, and tiller steering system is great.
Problem areas in terms of design, materials, maintenance, etc.	the electrical panel is in a stupid place and was cheaply done, like most people going to change, rudders are hard to put up and down, so is center board. bit weird having a trailerable boat without a bung, real chore to empty out water that gets in to bilge as is. Mast joint a bit wobbly and spreaders ends flimsy. large genoa could really do with a window in it. Hull could have been thicker in places I feel. Overall a very good design, love it.
Sailing characterisitcs	Very heavy at back, due to motor (honda 45 four stroke) and two fuel tanks, does not like to close haul at all, (but a bit irrelevent really with a motor there), Have had it going respectable speeds, and controllable at speed. Does not like to be overpowered, and always needs a jib of some form up to counteract the weight at the back. Enjoyable to sail, then as soon as it is not, change to power. We always motor until clear of everything before sailing, takes all the stress out of it. So sailing has been very pleasant, and relaxing as sailing should be.
Motoring characterisitcs	Used to very powerful Jet boats so this is slow, epescially slow if you have to drop ballast before it will plane. Having said that it does plane, and the speed it reaches gets you where you need to go, job done. noisy but otherwise very comfortable ride, handles waves very well considering it's power levels, very dry also. Very easily pushed around by the wind at slow speeds, very high wind profile. Tiller works well for steering set up, but vision is not so great. Great set up to fish from, water ballast makes boat very stable platform to land fish on.
Liveability	it is only 19 feet and is surprising how livable it is, all space is used, like the double bed under cockpit. Would never even smoke on board, let alone cook. sink is a joke and only waste of space, also do not use that silly table. always just take off main hatch as we have a spray dodger, so have removed dodgey lift mechanism completely, hatch works well now, on or off. Love how many cushions are supplied. Ladies love the head, although we use it with the door open as feels too confined and dark otherwise. overall very good even in wet conditions.
The owner's experience in dealing with Hunter (if any)	We live in the deep south, as far from a macgregor outlet as it is possible to get without going to antartica so no experience dealing with them.
The owner's experience with the boat dealer or broker, if any	Person who set this boat up here did well, made a couple of tweaks to boat, which after reading others reviews of mac19's, have saved us common problems others have had. also supplied a narrower spray dodger than standard spec one, and it is better I think
Other comments	We love it, really thrilled with it. Looked a long time for one here in NZ, (only seven here we found out later) and got a good one when we did. Can do all sorts of things that other boats cannot. A trully great design that deserves further work by other boats designers. The 26 is too big for here and lake use, and still to small for the oceans we have here. The tiller steering is excellent, very usable boat for lakes.

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