The Tartan 48 was Sparkman and Stephens design No. 2060 and built by Tartan Yachts in Grand River, OH. The Tartan 46 is a nearly identical design, but with a reverse transom, thus reducing the overall length by 18 inches. We believe eight Tartan 48s and six Tartan 46s were built, as we own 48 No. 5, while our friends own "Cape St James," which is 48 No. 7. There is another Tartan 48 "Emerald Blue," which is located in Malaysia and consistently competes in the Kings Cup Regatta in that region. A few 46s have come up for sale throughout the last decade but we have not kept track of where they are. There were a few variations of rig setup and interior, as our friends on Cape St James have a ketch rig (although the mizzen mast has been removed) and the interior has two heads and a single bunk aft cabin.

1973 Sparkman & Stephens Tartan 48, Hull No. 5

Tartan 48

“Wait, you live on a boat? A sail boat—isn’t that really small?” 

I get asked this question a lot. When people find out I live on a boat they are often surprised, curious, and they probably think I’m a little weird (they’re not wrong.) I can’t say for sure if that’s what I thought when I met my friend Sonny in 2008, who was a co-worker at the time, but I know I was intrigued. I’ve always been one to embrace things that are a little unconventional, I find life is more exciting that way. Anyhow, Sonny told me about living on a sailboat for more than 20 years and sailing around the world with his family. I remember thinking that would be incredible, but it honestly seemed out of reach.

Craig and I both grew up with boats. I rafted rivers and camped along the way and sometimes kayaked. Craig’s family water skied and would often spend summer afternoons on the Columbia River with his family in their ski boat. Craig’s family also had rowing in their blood, he and two of his siblings rowed in college. Craig, his brother, and brother’s wife all won national championships in rowing at the University of Washington. But it wasn’t sailing-- until a couple years later, out of college, when Craig bought a Hobie 16 catamaran. He said his dad took him out on a lake and in about 10 minutes declared that he had taught him everything he knew about sailing. Craig spent the next several months figuring out how to sail and realizing it was a great learning platform- if you make a mistake, you are likely to go for a swim. Not to mention, Hobies are super fun boats to sail and it feels like you are flying on the water when you are out on the trapeze.

Fast forward to 2009. I met Craig online in January of that year and I’m not going to lie, the pictures of him rowing and sailing the Hobie Cat caught my attention. I guess for us it’s always been boats! It didn’t take long before we were “going steady” and making adventures together. We had a few shenanigans in the Hobie, only once capsizing and damaging a hull, requiring us to get a tow because one of the pontoons filled with water and we couldn’t right the boat, but that was the extent of sailing experience for us together. I had sailed a Thunderbird before, even raced it, and a Newport 33, but didn’t have a ton of sailing experience. I knew I liked being on the water and feeling the wind in my face, always up for an adventure.

As the time passed Craig and I established an annual tradition, or I should say Craig had a tradition that I adopted. Every January, he would take himself on a date to the boat show, followed by hamburgers to round out the night. I called this his, “man date” that I got to tag along for. Over time I started to really enjoy the boat show too, looking at the fancy sailboats and dreaming about owning one someday.

It was January of 2013, the Monday morning after we had gone on Craig’s, “man date” when I went to work and told Sonny, my liveaboard sailing friend, that, “I had found my retirement boat.” Sonny looked at me with a deadpan look and said, “You know, there’s a right now boat.” Thus started our hunt for a “right now boat” and our plan to liveaboard. It also is why we have the, “

metric which has really only been brought into play when we’ve had issues with the head, but that’s a story for another time.

After my conversation with Sonny, I went home and told Craig what Sonny had shared with me, “that there’s a right now boat.” All we had to do was be willing to roll up our sleeves and do some hard work, but there were some great older boats, blue-water built, out there that we could afford now. That evening we decided to go for it. We were living in a 4-bedroom, 2 car garage house at the time. We started in one room, going through our things and deciding what might make the cut for living aboard. It got progressively easier to put things in the donate pile. Living light is really freeing.

We also started looking obsessively at boats online, deciding which ones we wanted to see in person. Soon we had lined up a handful of boats to visit, Sonny and his wife Margie, joining us to weigh in and share their experience as we toured our first boats in person. As fate would have it, the first boat we looked at was a Lafitte 44 named SOHCAHTOA, owned by a group of young engineers. When Sonny and Margie stepped on-board they both declared, “this is Margarita!” It was the same boat they had buddy-boated with during much of their circumnavigation. Although that was a magical coincidence, alas it wasn’t the boat for us.

We kept looking and seeing boats in person, in fact it was a rainy day in February, my birthday actually, when we found ourselves up in Anacortes, Washington at Marine Service Center to look at what I considered to be a derelict vessel. This large blue hulled boat sat lonely in the far corner of the yard, her deck covered in little black lichens and what remained of her bottom paint looking like some kind of tie-dye art creation. We climbed aboard and I remember the faint musty smell of a boat that’s been closed up for too long. I promptly sat down at the nav station, and I’m not proud to admit, pouted. I sat there while Craig crawled through the boat, looking in all of the nooks and corners and getting excited when he could stand up throughout the boat, quite a feat when you are 6’ 5. He could also lay down in all of the berths without having his feet touch the bulk-head, another winning point in his mind. I did peak into the galley fridge and look about a bit, but mostly just pouted and stayed at the nav station. Craig was hooked, he loved this boat, and he had the vision to see past the lichens and the dusty spot in the yard, he could imagine her in the water, sails flying. As we walked back to the car all I could think about was this derelict boat that had been sitting on the hard for 5 years, rotting in place. I declared to Craig, “This would be the worst financial decision of our lives to buy this boat.” Luckily for me, Craig wasn’t deterred. We kept looking at boats online, visiting many of them, I think over 50 in person, before we decided on our 1973 Tartan 48, SJ. I couldn’t even keep all of the boats straight, but Craig could, there were only a few that he could stand up in, and the Tartan 48 was one of them. Of course that wasn’t the only thing that sold Craig on the boat, but it sure helped.

Fate had a role to play in the Tartan 48, too. Craig asked Sonny, “what do you know about Tartan 48s?” Sonny smiled and said, “That’s a great boat, our friends Jim and Fran who used to live on the dock with us circumnavigated the same time we did in their Tartan 48.” This was wild to us, since there were only 8 of the Tartan 48s ever built and Sonny knew people who had sailed one around the world!

By this time Craig was honing in on the Tartan as the boat for us and I was starting to warm up to her. We made more trips to Anacortes to thoroughly inspect the boat, Sonny joining us on more than one occasion to lend his expertise. July of 2013 rolled around and we decided to take a leap and make an offer on the boat. It was the Fourth of July holiday weekend when we faxed our offer into the selling broker. By August of that year we were the proud new owners of a Tartan 48!

After spending many nights on the hard, working to get the boat ready we splashed her in September. All of the staff at the yard came out to see this classic boat finally back in the water. I think many had grown fond of her over the years and were saddened to see her deteriorate, but thrilled to see her back in the water with two new ambitious owners. After a small engine set-back while she was still in the slings, we had an uneventful sail down to Everett, WA, where we were living at the time.

Back in Everett we started moving the things we were keeping aboard and donating or giving away the rest of our belongings. You don’t need to keep any furniture when you move onto a sail boat! By the end of September, we were living aboard full-time and in October we joined Sonny and Margie on J-dock as live-aboard tenants at Shilshole Bay Marina in Seattle (Ballard) Washington. January to September of 2013 was the start of an epic adventure that promised to challenge us, delight us, and take us places we’d never imagine.

Wait, You Live on a Sail Boat?

How We Found SJ

When we bought our 1973 Tartan 48 the boat had been stored on the hard in Anacortes for the last 5 years.  Our Tartan 48 had solid bones and a gorgeous interior that was in great shape, but was in need of a refit and equipment refresh.  The previous owners had spent over $100k in 1996 doing a major refit at a yard in Everett, WA, but that was 17 years prior to us purchasing SJ.  See below for the equipment we've added and the key systems that we use on SJ.

We have a few items that are just for fun on SJ.  These are largely geared to helping us enjoy the oceanic playground that we call our home. See below for more.  

 None of the links we list below are affiliate links, we are just sharing what we like and what works for us.  Your mileage might varry.

Equipment & Toys

Twin Balmar high output alternators, one is an older 130 amp auxiliary that came with the boat, and we recently replaced the stock engine alternator with an XT-170 and serpentine belt upgrade.

Alternators

A 66lb Bruce (claw) is our primary anchor... it's never failed us!  

Our secondary anchor is a 75 lb CQR (hinged plow) that is stored in the aft lazaret and ready to be deployed when needed as a second anchor on the bow or a stern anchor if we are somewhere that we shouldn't swing. 

We also have a 14 lb Danforth fluke anchor that can be used with the dinghy.

Anchor

Garmin Reactor 40.  An electric powered hydraulic driven ram that ties into the existing steering quadrant of the vessel and is controlled by a series of computers and the onboard existing chartplotter.

Autopilot

Bicycles

Bocce Ball

Achilles HX300 (10') inflatable with a fiberglass hull and a folding transom.  This stows nicely on the foredeck when underway as it is only 8" tall with the transom folded and tubes deflated.

Dinghy

1996 Perkins Prima M50.
Tohatsu 8 hp twin cylinder four-stroke outboard
Suzuki 2.5 hp outboard

Engine

Garmin 740s at the navigation station, and an 8610 at the helm.

Hiking Boots

We use an Iridium GO! for satellite communications.

Internet

Kayak

Rock Climbing Gear

SJ originally had 16 sails on board when we purchased her.  Al were old, well used, and carried the same 6995 racing number.  She had six spinnakers, all symmetrical, a drifter, a reacher, a jib top, a staysail, five head sails, and a well worn main.  In the end, only one spinnaker and the drifter will make the journey with us.  These are both original to the built when new (1973) but are in good shape and would be expensive to replace.  We purchased a new 125% genoa, a new staysail on a furler, and a new mainsail, all from Zoom sails.  We also will carry a spare 100% jib, which we received in near-new condition from a friend.  With a heavier-than-typical fabric used on the main and staysail, we should be able to use the third deep-reef in the main, and a partially furled staysail to guide us through most storms, the spinnaker or genoa/drifter combination for the lightest of airs, and a full main and genoa for most everything else.

Sail Inventory

12 (yes twelve) 110w flexible panels tied into three separate Blue Sky Energy 3024 controllers, all linked to a ProRemote panel.  Under sail we show four panels to the sun, while at anchor an additional eight fold out to the cover the cockpit with shade, while making nearly 100 amps of power.

Solar

While not comprehensive, the following is a list of the major spares we will be leaving Seattle with:

Starter motor
Alternator (and alternator rebuild kit)
Jib sail
Engine belts
Outboard carburetors
Propeller
Shaft through-hull kit
Engine relays
Water pump rebuild kit
Fridge compressor pumps
Toilet rebuild kit
Hoses, electrical, and misc others

Spare Parts

Stand Up Paddle Boards

A Tippy Canoe T50 remote control sailboat that Craig built from a kit. 


Tippy Canoe T50

Aboard SJ we have the tools to tackle almost any repair.  From drills, grinders, sanders, and hand tools, to a pair of sewing machines and electrical supplies, we should be covered.

Tools

SeaWater Pro 12v 17gph DC model.  WIth two 20" membranes we can make enough water for a day (or two even) in about an hour using roughly 50 amps of power.

Watermaker

We have a monthly subscription to PredictWind for all our weather needs.

Weather

Length

Beam

Cutter rig with a double spreader mast, mast head roller furling genoa, roller furling staysail, and triple reef main.  All standing /running rigging replaced in 2022, complemented with new sails from Zoom. 

Year Built

Originally equipped with a 36 hp Westerbeke, but replaced with a new Perkins Prima M50 in 1996.  The engine only had 300 hours when we bought the boat in 2013! 

The hull type is a fin-keel and a skeg-hung rudder. As was customary in the early 70s, the hull of our boat is made of thick 'glass reinforced plastic' known as GRP or what we commonly think of as fiberglass.  



About the SJ

Tartan 48

1973 Sparkman & Stephens Tartan 48, Hull No. 5

Tartan 48 Specifications