15 years. I bought my 26M from dealer Mike Inmon at the MacGregor factory in California in 2010. I owned a couple of sterndrive powerboats previously that I occasionally used in saltwater around Panama City and Pensacola Florida and had also done some very limited sailing in Hobie Cats and Lasers as...

The swim platform I made and posted to the mods section this spring has worked really well for me this summer. It doesn't interfere with lowering or raising the rudders when it is deployed down (as long as I have the wheel centered). The four-step ladder is deep enough to easily get out of the water...

While I haven't heard of any European vendors making 26M specific accessories, my recommendation would be to take a photo of the swim platform to a nearby custom fiberglass fabricator and get a quote on how much he would charge to make you something similar. If it's less than what this guy charges p...

I have the 18V Ryobi 1 gallon shop vac. I also keep a charger onboard, and also donated my Ryobi drill to the boat tool kit. I'm in the process of upgrading my home cordless system to Dewalt 20V. Figured the Boat will do fine with the less-nice Ryobi 18V, and gave me excuse to upgrade home system ov...

I have heard that heaters generate a significant amount of condensation on the interior surfaces of the hull. Have you considered the need for a de-humidifier?

On the older M masts i believe the opening is lower and closer to the mast base. In lieu of a custom fabricated mast gate (that would require a local fabricator), I believe the solution is a sail stop installed in the track to prevent the mainsail slugs from coming down to the opening. With the open...

All good points. As an emergency backup it certainly seems a lot more feasible, and assuming someone has already invested in some signficant amount of battery capacity/storage to run systems on their boat, applying that to a 5-10 hp equivalent electric motor for emergency purposes at hull speeds rea...

My experience with the 26M trailer is that most of the major components were commoditized parts bought and assembled by MacGregor. My trailer “manual” was a collection of sub-assembly manuals from the original manufacturers. Eg. the surge brake cylinder, axle, brake calipers, tongue hitch etc. you m...

I'm not an engineer (electrical or structural) but the physics of the energy storage and usage impose severe range limits on electric boat engine systems. Especially if you are expecting to power at planing speeds. The youtube creator, S/V Delos is building a custom cat with an advanced hybrid elect...

https://www.macgregorsailors.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=16601 This thread has an embedded video on the above boom furler Russ was talking about. the guy in the video, Mike Inmon was a longtime friend of Roger MacGregor and ran his dealership out of the MacGregor Corp. office spaces. I bought my 26M f...

MacGregor had a custom boom furler as optional for the 26M. Blue Water Yachts probably has the technical data to have a fabricator build it for you. I’m pretty sure it would work on an X. Otherwise there are several vendors (shaeffer, ronstan, etc ) that make them for all sizes of boats, but they’ll...

I've done a lot of homework of all the different versions of the Gemini Cat since the mid 90s, and have seriously considered going to that boat. It checks most of the boxes for our needs and its value proposition for coastal cruising, considering the costs to own/operate, is really quite good. For u...

Are you going to mount that on the mast or a stern mounted pole? I've considered how risky it might be to put a radar on the X/M mast with mast raising/lowering and trailering as well as complications of rotating mast. If I were doing it, I think I would have to do a stern pole, which I already have...

I looked at them again. They're 16 gallon tanks. Figure the tanks weigh about 10lbs each more than standard poly 12 gallon tanks, and carry 4 more gallons each of fuel at 6lbs per galloon. So completely full of fuel total weight would be about 70lbs more than full 12 gallon moeller tanks. Not a big ...

I have acquired 4 of the 1 inch track cleats, although I only usually use one or two at a time. Luckily for me I live near an awesome sailboat salvage yard in the Annapolis area, and can get used stuff like this for a fraction of what it costs new. I have found the cleats incredibly useful for docki...