How compact can a real sailing boat be?

[Greenheart]

Just saw the Gadget Show on Dave. The novice-sailing presenters were aboard something called the MiniCat - which, in its box, was worn like a 38kg rucksack.

So, it's very compact, and to be honest, it still looked mighty cramped with two aboard on one of the Cumbria lakes.

But this thing is said to reach 20 knots, so it's not quite the everyday blow-up beach toy...

...price is the wrong side of £2000. But, quite fun to arrive at the beach in your two-seater, with a real sailing boat in the boot.

 

[prv]

quite fun to arrive at the beach in your two-seater, with a real sailing boat in the boot.

I did a week's paragliding course ten years ago. Although it was mostly skimming down gentle slopes in a field and I only got one proper flight off the top of an alp at the end, I was rather taken with the fact that you could easily carry a whole aircraft around on your back. The rucksack is bulky, but not particularly heavy, and you could easily walk all morning to a remote launch site, set up, and fly away.

Pete

 

[Twister_Ken]

Memory lane. I did some marketing work for the Catapult company back in Thatcher's day. Inflatable catamaran, not backpackable but carbootable. Still around, I think. We even over-rigged one and entered it in Weymouth Speed Week. Can't remember the numbers - it went fast but we didn't win any biscuits.

http://www.catapultcats.com/boat.features.html

 

[dharl]

Just saw the Gadget Show on Dave. The novice-sailing presenters were aboard something called the MiniCat - which, in its box, was worn like a 38kg rucksack.

So, it's very compact, and to be honest, it still looked mighty cramped with two aboard on one of the Cumbria lakes.

But this thing is said to reach 20 knots, so it's not quite the everyday blow-up beach toy...

...price is the wrong side of £2000. But, quite fun to arrive at the beach in your two-seater, with a real sailing boat in the boot.

For a novice she seems to be doing quite well...dont remember the lakes having anchored Tankers around either? Perhaps they got the sea canal dug through from Barrow?

either way it does like a nice little boat...

 

[Greenheart]

For a novice she seems to be doing quite well...dont remember the lakes having anchored Tankers around either? Perhaps they got the sea canal dug through from Barrow?

That clip isn't from the programme. The Gadget Show novices were so lousy, they didn't do the boat justice. I found the clip on Youtube.

I remember seeing Catapult catamarans decades ago, but their size and 95kg weight seemed to me to reduce their ultimate portability...

...this little MiniCat seems quite a handy, happy blend of petite proportions and performance.

 

[Twister_Ken]

I remember seeing Catapult catamarans decades ago, but their size and 95kg weight seemed to me to reduce their ultimate portability...

No individual part of the Catapult weighed much, it was only when assembled it came to 95kg. Which is why we gave them wheels, which located in the centreboard slots when in wheelbarrow mode. Jon Montgomery (RIP, I think) made a very thoughtful design.

 

[Greenheart]

I wasn't disrepecting the Catapult - very fine bit of design, and known to have done some impressive cruising.

 

[oldbilbo]

Jon Montgomery did a fine job in designing the Catapult, and so did Topper International in marketing it. There is still a very active racing class....

I have had one for a lot of years, and got a lot of miles out of it..... I used it for dinghy-camping when I was still flexible enough to get into a tent and, perhaps more important, get out again in the morning.... It could go anywhere a car could go, without a trailer, then head off.... the Scottish Inner Isles - Eigg, Rhum, Soay, Skye - then the Lofotens, the Northern Baltic, around Corsica, the Swedish Archipelago, even past Cowes to 'The Jolly Sailor'....

The sharp-eyed will notice that the original una-rig has been adulterated to include a pole out the front, carrying a jib and an asymmetric, with folding hiking-out seats slung on the trapeze wires, and camping gear in a waterproof bag on the trampoline. Oh, and a young and lissom SWMBO.... Don't know about 20 knots - that was for the prototype 8 Metre that I had an option on, but didn't reach production. Pity.....!

Best fun with the proverbial clothes on!