Our 1989 Blackfin 29 Aquarius
was purchased June 2012 from Winthrop, Boston where she was used for fishing/cruising the Boston Harbor, Massachusetts Bay and Atlantic Ocean area of Mass. Aquarius was built at Blackfin Yachts in Florida originally powered with twin gasoline engines. Sometime in 1997, the owner changed from gasoline to Volvo AMD 41p-a 200hp diesel engines and repropped appropriately w/3 blade bronze props.
The pics above were drydock pics after purchase but prior to preparing to ship by truck to Tampa, Fl. Tower is up and some pics with tower cut and boat ready for final ship by new ownership team to Florida.
Blackfin, as many other builders did in the 1980's, used many fiberglass IGU's (Integrated Glass Units), Lot's of teak wood, 3/4" marine plywood, and white formica which heavily dated the boat. The hull, made of solid fiberglass layup with glassed in longitudinals and stringers is extremely solid. Fastforward to 2021, this boat is a 29' Big Blue ride machine that can handle many conditions safely with operator experience and captains humbleness.
Our learning curve with the new boat was steep. There was much to know, especially for a marine professional with most of his experience in high end sail
powered racing yachts, not inboard ( diesel or gas) powerboats.
In the coming years we were to findout that the Blackfin production deck layout worked, but didn't flow very well. Reverse diamond non-skid pattern trapped dirt, and needed constant cleaning. Access to engines and bilge area was limited to smaller people because of 3 small hinged access hatches and poor layout of areas not needed back in the day. Maintenance to engines was extremely hard, as most of it was on knees. Battery boxes were mounted at floor level with a high center of gravity, and heavy 4d batteries that frankly could not be lifted by any single one of Aquarius new owners without injury risk. There was minimal storage in aft lockers and lockers adjacent to captain chair areas. Aft cockpit had an heavy IGU splash that was non-structural, would not allow aft deck to drain effecively as Blackfins have a moderate bow down idle ride, and took alot of space from aft deck. Front end of boat was heavy from stock materials used without any focus on weight, even with 75 lbs of fiberglass laminate/putty (IGU) in back end that made the cockpit 6" smaller in width and 3" shorter on length.
In 2012, we thought we had purchased a boat that was in good order
that had minor cosmetic or structural discrepencies noted, as mentioned in the pre-purchase survey. 2012 Blackfin Prepurchase Survey. Without much twin engine sportfish knowledge, we were quickly finding out only usable working items were: Hull, Engines, Tranny's, basic engine instruments, Furuno radar, antiquated head, steering and a few other items. Buy an old stock production boat, and you get pretty much what you pay for! Old, leaky, non-working, obsolete gear that needed upgrading! Aquarius had no windlass, no stern platform, no live well, bent non working outriggers, old moldy cushions (constantly needed cleaning), hard plastic barely moving helm seats, windshield that couldn't open because of poor design and placement of tower supports, Eisenglass cloth that was in tatters and cloudy with fragile fasteners, leaky cabin windows, teakwood trim everywhere with no sealant, leaky deck joint and hatches, leaky engines with problems (as we would soon find out) and transmissions with problems (as we would soon find out), old porous gelcoat, etc. However, through our breakdowns, we were never stranded and always able to limp home under 1 engine. Something a twin engine boat does well!
So we were on our way with a project as a "team", and working our butts off. We initially kept Aquarius on Manatee River in Bradenton Fl, which was close to our family and to the Gulf for fishing. Next Webpage (2013).