Greenheart
Well-Known Member
Some interesting thoughts, thank you. I'm not wild about Lasers, either. I had a Topper in the 'eighties, and I don't want another drip-dry board-boat with no stowage space and a cockpit like a baby's bathtub. I adore the sheerline and shape of the Finn, but I'm stones underweight, and it's said to be a thankless bitch to beat hard aboard.
The Contender is certainly a beauty, (I've watched Garda 2004, about twenty times) but I hear it's mostly only the tall, bulky helms who can really make use of stronger headwinds, when that hull is so rewarding downhill. And again, no stowage. I certainly do want to trapeze - I used to wire up bits of line to the Topper's lower mast, when I was only seven stone! A lifetime ago, it seems, and no, that didn't work.
And, apologies to progressivists: I really don't like the skiffs with their inelegant racks and impractically slender forms. If I cared so little for shape, I'd spend half my budget on a top-notch wetsuit, and buy a Dart 18. Or a windsurfer! Likewise, foiling Moths and International Canoes...very impressive, but I'm happy just observing; they're not real boats, for taking a trip in.
I want a boat that will easily cope with friends aboard when I choose to invite one or two, and a hefty picnic hamper, but not be unmanageable when I'm alone. I had a book called (I think) This is Sailing, 25 years ago, with a cover photo of a chap deftly singlehanding a Laser 2, trapezing under all three sails. I've been keen to stay clear of una-rig designs, ever since! I really want the flexibility that a three-sail set-up provides, even if the consequent demands are at least doubled.
Luckily I haven't an atom of interest in the kind of formal racing where overgrown schoolboys spend ninety minutes shouting rules and protesting pedantically as they cover the same unadventurous half-mile, ten times back and forth across a reservoir. I enjoy performance for the increased reward and cruising range it allows, even in a very modest vessel.
My 40kg keel idea is intended very particularly not to upset trim - the weight would be much slighter than any probable crewperson's mass, and well forward in the cockpit, and always central athwart-wise. As I'm not a hot-headedly ambitious type, I relish a decent reefing system even on what may technically be a fairly cut-throat racer, and I'd always sooner take in slabs of sail rather than risk having to swim.
But I'm not yet convinced that 100lbs of ballast, held fast thirty inches beneath the centreboard slot, is anything but an improvement to the soloist's ease and comfort in a larger two-man boat, especially when eventually, she's knocked flat. Is any boat with that weight of centreplate, likely to turn turtle? The ballast must delay the rollover.
I've a growing interest in the 470...could it be the loom of Weymouth? I've always overlooked the class, possibly quite without reason, as being conspicuously less thrilling than the 505, and so I heard, a lot less durable.
Out of curiosity, what have you got against the Flying Fifteen?
The Contender is certainly a beauty, (I've watched Garda 2004, about twenty times) but I hear it's mostly only the tall, bulky helms who can really make use of stronger headwinds, when that hull is so rewarding downhill. And again, no stowage. I certainly do want to trapeze - I used to wire up bits of line to the Topper's lower mast, when I was only seven stone! A lifetime ago, it seems, and no, that didn't work.
And, apologies to progressivists: I really don't like the skiffs with their inelegant racks and impractically slender forms. If I cared so little for shape, I'd spend half my budget on a top-notch wetsuit, and buy a Dart 18. Or a windsurfer! Likewise, foiling Moths and International Canoes...very impressive, but I'm happy just observing; they're not real boats, for taking a trip in.
I want a boat that will easily cope with friends aboard when I choose to invite one or two, and a hefty picnic hamper, but not be unmanageable when I'm alone. I had a book called (I think) This is Sailing, 25 years ago, with a cover photo of a chap deftly singlehanding a Laser 2, trapezing under all three sails. I've been keen to stay clear of una-rig designs, ever since! I really want the flexibility that a three-sail set-up provides, even if the consequent demands are at least doubled.
Luckily I haven't an atom of interest in the kind of formal racing where overgrown schoolboys spend ninety minutes shouting rules and protesting pedantically as they cover the same unadventurous half-mile, ten times back and forth across a reservoir. I enjoy performance for the increased reward and cruising range it allows, even in a very modest vessel.
My 40kg keel idea is intended very particularly not to upset trim - the weight would be much slighter than any probable crewperson's mass, and well forward in the cockpit, and always central athwart-wise. As I'm not a hot-headedly ambitious type, I relish a decent reefing system even on what may technically be a fairly cut-throat racer, and I'd always sooner take in slabs of sail rather than risk having to swim.
But I'm not yet convinced that 100lbs of ballast, held fast thirty inches beneath the centreboard slot, is anything but an improvement to the soloist's ease and comfort in a larger two-man boat, especially when eventually, she's knocked flat. Is any boat with that weight of centreplate, likely to turn turtle? The ballast must delay the rollover.
I've a growing interest in the 470...could it be the loom of Weymouth? I've always overlooked the class, possibly quite without reason, as being conspicuously less thrilling than the 505, and so I heard, a lot less durable.
Out of curiosity, what have you got against the Flying Fifteen?
