Where to start… first dinghy

[doug748]

Actually, based upon the OP's weight I would definitely AVOID an Enterprise.
The have quite a big rig and need a bit of weight to keep upright.
Ex-owner of 2 Enterprises raced as a lightweight in my teenage years- and wasnt just lack of technique as was club champion one year.

It's one option, not perfect but with a Topper could work ok.

Can't win here last time I was hammered for telling an absolute beginner, with a nervous girlfriend , NOT to get an Enterprise. Pity you did not chip in then.

They can be sailed with a reduced rig, the OP is keen, has spirit, some qualification and is not a comple novice

The boat would not be ideal, but would be cheap, easy to buy and sell and has growing room.

.

 

[ashtead]

One source of cheap old Toppers are Sea scouts -they will be hard used but to get the feel of sailing by yourself or a small child in calm weather in say a harbour that cannot be beaten. Ideally choose a day with breeze blowing you onshore -it is possible for even 2 adults to sail in a Topper but sitting in front of mast tends to impact behaviour of boat. Clearly the other option is to introduce children to windsurfing as a starter . I really would forget any old wooden boat due to maintenance time .an obvious choice if sailing in seaside location is a couple of secondhand dinghies and then buy yourself a nice RIB to act as a club boat and watch the dinghies race and tow then back in etc. many mothers vicariously enjoy dinghy sailing from the helm of a RIB plus they can have fun with ringo rides. For you a rib rya course run by your club gives a social network as clubs can be cliquey in places.

 

[Greenheart]

kids...will soon out grow Oppies so I would not bother. If you have a 2 handed dinghy you can then get club members to crew you

Smart. Actually I reckon kids will rapidly outgrow Toppers too...the Topper is only better than an Optimist. It depends how keen the kids are to race with others in that class (not all, want that). If so, the Topper may suit until they realise those candy-store colours are their badge of immaturity.

Old fellows writing here only see the good in a zero-maintenance dinghy, but the Topper is a clumsy bit of design, discouragingly unresponsive beside other classes. The Laser is flawed, but it's a starship beside the Topper, and the Topper's virtue of simplicity is shared by the Laser.

If kids aren't competitively minded, neither boat is ideal. But if they do want to race, aren't they excited to race in an actual Olympic class? I don't believe the Laser's weight ashore will trouble any child that you'd want to let sail alone. Plenty of kids do sail Lasers, and they're immediately a long step above the baby-bath Topper. They don't want to go back.

My son recently bought a decent Mirror, in sailing condition, on a trailer, for £200.

The Mirror is an interesting idea - woefully slow and outdated in theory, but quite sophisticated on close inspection, and really versatile - quite unlike the Laser or Topper. Room for two - or even three on board, if they're petite - but not too hard for a small person to singlehand - several small ladies at my club, race their Mirrors singlehanded.

And if two kids (about the sames ages as our questioner's children) want to race together, there could hardly be a better trainer.

 

[Daydream believer]

The thing about 2 handlers for kids is that it. Teaches them. Team work. It can become exciting putting a spinnaker up once they get used to it
I recall a cadet open at our club when the main racing was called off. The cadet captain , however, said that the cadet racing would go ahead. 75% of the fleet went out and it seemed like a race to see who could get there spinnaker up first on leaving the shore.
There were flattened cadets everywhere. But I know my kids enjoyed coming fifth out of 45 boats. Totally knackered but still talk about it 40 years later.

 

[Gurrig]

Ok having done a bit more research on the club, I think this might be the right combo:
Year 1 / now:
- buy Oppie for 11yo - apparently all kids race them until 13/14 (assuming 11yo ok with it)
- poor neglected second child borrows club Oppie (for a while) to make sure they take to it
- buy Graduate for everyone which I can (just about manage to) sail alone

Roll forward 1-2 seasons:
- buy Topper for older child
- younger one gets passed down Opi

Sounds like a plan and speaking from experience, my kids are now over 30 and this is close to what we did moving on to other designs with experience and growth.

 

[Metalicmike]

I use to have a Marauder (Mirror 14) was big enough for me and my two kids and could step the mast further forward for solo sailing. It had a huge sail area and was fitted with a Trapeze when sailing with friends. Sadly I lost the boat whilst going through the trauma of a divorce but it gave me a lot of pleasure. So Ideally I would be looking for something similar but modern.

 

[johnalison]

Sounds like a plan and speaking from experience, my kids are now over 30 and this is close to what we did moving on to other designs with experience and growth.

There's no harm in committing yourself to single-handers, though I have seen both Oppies and Toppers (Toppies?) sail with a passenger. There is such a wealth of later designs that going with what your club does is the only way forward. Everyone talks about racing, but of course messing around is a part of the deal. Our children did both, though they never became fully competitive. Whatever anyone says, it is only by racing that you develop full skills.

Our children in their first year with a Cadet, cost £200 including road trailer, the same as what we sold it for. I have a sentimental attachment to these photos as they were taken a few weeks after our son was diagnosed as diabetic.

 

[B27]

Personally, I think the Topper is a fine little boat, it's not significantly slower than its rivals for the size of sailor.
Sticking with what's popular at the club is a good move. You learn more, you know where you stand and there's no bickering about yardstick numbers. The competition stays on the water, you come ashore knowing how you did, you're not waiting for the results to be worked out.

Entry-level Toppers can be bought and sold without losing much money, although there will still be costs in boat storage, insurance and things that need replacing like sails and covers.
In the long run, I think sailing some different boats is good, two handers particularly, but I think the model where younger sprog is expected to always crew for the elder is flawed.

It's good to sail different boats with different people, but to make that happen you may need to reach a level if competence and familiarity which only comes from sailing your own boat. But if there are club boats, then using them is a good way to get your face known and get to know the other sailors.

There's really no wrong way of doing things though, there are many boats to choose from and in most places, a choice of clubs.
Clubs vary a lot in terms of standards, people's budgets, the water they sail on, the wind they will go out in, as well as the choice of boats.
Over the years I've raced at several different clubs due to moving around for work, it's not something you have to join for life.

 

[Greenheart]

Since we have Topper fans here, perhaps they can answer an odd question. Browsing Google Maps years ago, I found in the port of East London, South Africa, a streetview shot that shows what definitely resembles an upturned Topper hull...

...but with a pivoting centreboard instead of a daggerboard? Surely nobody would bother to engineer such a complicated alternative in such a basic boat as a Topper. But what other class can it be?

The 360-degree streetview photo can be found here: 33°01'32.2"S 27°54'52.3"E

 

[B27]

There must be hundreds or thousands of models of dinghy around the world which are not really a 'class'.
Boatbuilder knocks up a mould and sells some dinghies, undercutting the likes of Topper and Laser.

Also there are small local classes, and classes which have never come to England.
Could be American scow influenced.

Also DIY efforts. People used to DIY GRP boats, either for cheapness or because they had bright ideas about what they wanted.
In the 80s, friends of mine built racing sailboards from polystyrene packaging , epoxy and glass or carbon.

 

[Greenheart]

I guess that makes sense. The further from high-volume production one goes, the more varied and non-standard the boats will be.

It's rather an attractive idea. Every boat I've ever seen or been aboard had intrinsic design points I didn't like, and which I'd sooner were different.

The pursuit of equality for racing, rounds off a lot of interesting individuality. I s'pose I'll have to start looking at plywood designs I can tailor to my own liking.
.

 

[Puffin10032]

Yes I agree re “me” or “us” - it might need to be “me” and “them” until I get some more experience.

Interesting re Opi/Topper. It would be great to hear your views on that.

Its not about the boats. They're both excellent boats for what they were designed for and the kids would have a lot of fun in them. The issue is with their use by the RYA to feed their youth squad. Some years ago there was a thread on Yachts and Yachtings' forum about the effect of the programme on sailing clubs. A number of contributors from different clubs said basically the same thing: The RYA periodically go around hoovering up all the promising young sailors they can to fill their youth squads. Most of these kids are quickly discarded. Instead of returning to club sailing the vast majority of them give up sailing entirely leaving the clubs devoid of young sailors. So we have children who had a sport which they loved and likely lived and breathed (because you have to to get any good at it) and they suddenly walk away from it. What happened to cause that change? I think it's telling that at the dinghy show a few years ago the RYA stand had a promotional banner saying "Become The Next Ben Ainslie" which shows where their priorities lie. It's all about the money (£21 million in grants from UK Sports for the last Olympic round) which finances their lifestyle jobs and requires a constant stream of gold medals in order to keep the funding rolling in and their jobs safe. Of course it's all came crashing down this year with only a gold in some stupid windsurfing event and not one single medal in dinghies where historically we've been very strong. I doubt they'll get £21 million next time around. Some of them might even have to get proper jobs

On the subject of dinghies you mention Graduates and Herons. Both good little boats. The Graduate is a bit more racey although it doesn't have a spinnaker so maybe not so much fun for the crew as a Heron would be. Also if you decided you'd like to take the boat away on holiday to explore creeks and estuaries with the kids then a Heron would the more suitable of the two for that. You first sentence makes little sense to me. Even with you limited experience you'd be OK taking the kids out in a Heron. I started sailing in the late 1960s. We went on a week's course (so basically the same as today's Level 2) then Dad bought us a Heron. We took that out and raced it in all sorts of winds and never capsized it. They are quite forgiving, certainly more forgiving than most single-handers. As for them being slow, yes they are but they're still slightly faster than a Topper (Topper PY 1370, Heron 1363 crewed, 1347 single-handed) and also faster than a Mirror which oddly never seems to attract the same criticism. As for what what kids find cool, that's invariably manipulated by adults for their own self-interest. If you haven't done so yet I recommend getting a copy of the 1970s version of Swallows and Amazons for the kids to watch. I doubt that they'll have a negative reaction to the lugsail-ed dinghies.

 

[Puffin10032]

I use to have a Marauder (Mirror 14) was big enough for me and my two kids and could step the mast further forward for solo sailing. It had a huge sail area and was fitted with a Trapeze when sailing with friends. Sadly I lost the boat whilst going through the trauma of a divorce but it gave me a lot of pleasure. So Ideally I would be looking for something similar but modern.

Sadly none of those "pocket rockets" stood the test of time (with the possible exception of the 420 but that's a youth trainer so a slightly different target market). I think 14ft was just too short for the trapeze to give much of a speed advantage over a 14ft hiking dinghy such as a Merlin Rocket especially when you consider that for about the same money you could probably build yourself a Fireball instead. If you fancy a single-handed trapeze boat I think your main choices would be either a Contender or an RS600. If you're looking for a 14ft-ish hiking single-hander there's plenty of choice but I highly recommend checking out the Hadron H2

 

[oldbloke]

Since we have Topper fans here, perhaps they can answer an odd question. Browsing Google Maps years ago, I found in the port of East London, South Africa, a streetview shot that shows what definitely resembles an upturned Topper hull...

...but with a pivoting centreboard instead of a daggerboard? Surely nobody would bother to engineer such a complicated alternative in such a basic boat as a Topper. But what other class can it be?

The 360-degree streetview photo can be found here: 33°01'32.2"S 27°54'52.3"E

The South Africans are fond of scows, probably because it tends to be windy so that stability and planing are more important than sensitivity and wetted area.

 

[Daydream believer]

If you're looking for a 14ft-ish hiking single-hander there's plenty of choice but I highly recommend checking out the Hadron H2

Poor suggestion. Try Phantom. Much more active class friendly crowd and lots of strings to pull.
No I do not have one.

 

[DanTribe]

At your kid's age the social side is probably more important than the sailing. Find out what the kids in your club are sailing and go for one of those. They are likely to make friends for life
If your club doesn't have a lively youth section consider changing clubs.
Forget the advert images of happy families sailing and laughing in the sun, seldom happens. Kids learn fast and are unlikely to want to sail with a parent in a "perfect" safe boat.
Siblings in the same boat seldom a good combination.

 

[johnalison]

At your kid's age the social side is probably more important than the sailing. Find out what the kids in your club are sailing and go for one of those. They are likely to make friends for life
If your club doesn't have a lively youth section consider changing clubs.
Forget the advert images of happy families sailing and laughing in the sun, seldom happens. Kids learn fast and are unlikely to want to sail with a parent in a "perfect" safe boat.
Siblings in the same boat seldom a good combination.

Ha! Where ours were sailing the Cadet it was just about the only time they didn’t argue. It actually taught them how to co-operate. With a bit of luck it also got them out of earshot.

 

[dunedin]

Poor suggestion. Try Phantom. Much more active class friendly crowd and lots of strings to pull.
No I do not have one.

But things like Phantom TOTALLY wrong for a 55kg sailor. The Phantom is great for big (fat!) blokes

 

[Metalicmike]

Sadly none of those "pocket rockets" stood the test of time (with the possible exception of the 420 but that's a youth trainer so a slightly different target market). I think 14ft was just too short for the trapeze to give much of a speed advantage over a 14ft hiking dinghy such as a Merlin Rocket especially when you consider that for about the same money you could probably build yourself a Fireball instead. If you fancy a single-handed trapeze boat I think your main choices would be either a Contender or an RS600. If you're looking for a 14ft-ish hiking single-hander there's plenty of choice but I highly recommend checking out the Hadron H2

What I really liked about the marauder was the 6ft beam which gave it great stability, the Fireball was definitely faster. With a lot of ifs I would love to build one.

 

[Metalicmike]

Smart. Actually I reckon kids will rapidly outgrow Toppers too...the Topper is only better than an Optimist. It depends how keen the kids are to race with others in that class (not all, want that). If so, the Topper may suit until they realise those candy-store colours are their badge of immaturity.

Old fellows writing here only see the good in a zero-maintenance dinghy, but the Topper is a clumsy bit of design, discouragingly unresponsive beside other classes. The Laser is flawed, but it's a starship beside the Topper, and the Topper's virtue of simplicity is shared by the Laser.

If kids aren't competitively minded, neither boat is ideal. But if they do want to race, aren't they excited to race in an actual Olympic class? I don't believe the Laser's weight ashore will trouble any child that you'd want to let sail alone. Plenty of kids do sail Lasers, and they're immediately a long step above the baby-bath Topper. They don't want to go back.



The Mirror is an interesting idea - woefully slow and outdated in theory, but quite sophisticated on close inspection, and really versatile - quite unlike the Laser or Topper. Room for two - or even three on board, if they're petite - but not too hard for a small person to singlehand - several small ladies at my club, race their Mirrors singlehanded.

And if two kids (about the sames ages as our questioner's children) want to race together, there could hardly be a better trainer.

I raced a mirror in the club regatta with my son 5ys and daughter 7yrs and got third in class, it was the only race I have ever entered.