dancrane
Well-known member
...the simple act of letting the kicker off is more likely to assist in getting the thing upright compared to the centre-keel (which incidentally would snap right off it was as thin as you propose!)
Thanks Iain, I'll keep the kicker in mind. Actually I doubt my practical skills, re. carbon fibre, so if my centreboard ever gains weight, it may be by cheaper & less technical means.
But let's keep the point theoretical, it's more interesting for me and for respondents, than issuing instructions on what dinghy sailors are expected to do, which I know already...
...my outlook is not quite ordinary, so the possibilities are potentially more interesting than long-practiced actualities which mayn't have explored options outside class rules, etc.
I'm interested in the effect of ballast in small light boats & why it is that there are so few designs in the 'crossover' zone between 'heavy' keelboats and wholly unballasted dinghies.
I mentioned a boat I'd seen with a ballasted daggerboard. I Googled, found something similar...http://forum.woodenboat.com/showthr...-dayboat-from-BlueLightning-s-Keith-Callaghan
It's interesting (to me) that some of the voices on that thread seem so irritated by being asked to consider an idea which falls between historically established types of sailboat...
...and the unreadiness of certain posters there, to accept that a lifting ballast keel may offer as much benefit to certain users as it denies to others, sounds familiar!
It's quite a long thread, but worth a read. The boat in question looks nice, though not quite what I'd want, and I never liked vertical-sliding boards.
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