Elm
We had a tour of the Amel factory in La Rochelle last year and saw the hulls being constructed on the 55. They told me it is the same way that my Santorin was built. Confirm the deck to hull bonding is the strongest I have ever seen.
The ketch has a manual system for the mizzen sail using a winch handle. The sloop obviously just has the two electric motors on main and Genoa, so totally electric. On the other hand the ketch has the addition of the lovely mizzen staysail which is simple to set and retrieve and a joy to use. So it's really a choice of ketch or sloop - but I have never sailed the sloop version.

Biggest disadvantage of owning an Amel? The time it takes me on a daily basis to read all these Amel posts!! But I have learnt so much from them that I am a much wiser boat owner and avoided many pitfalls and issues on owning the best make of boat at the price on the market. I haven't met any Amel owner from the Med to the Caribbean who would only replace their boat with another Amel.

Keep up the investigation and hope you locate the boat you want.

Ian

'Ocean Hobo' SN96