Where to start… first dinghy

[ashtead]

Would love to see the picture of a Mirror on davits- we have one and just waiting for the granddaughter to get slightly older but had always thought it would have to be towed behind .Clearly the book mirror mania shows even more options for fun in a Mirror though if considering.

 

[Greenheart]

View attachment 182280
Our 5 year old grand-daughter racing a Mirror at Stone Week with her dad. Prize (trophy and framed photograph) given for youngest competitor.

They also used it as a tender on their Beneteau 42, carried on davits with outboard in and around the Morbihan.

What a great pic, and a great prize that will still be a happy memory when we're all long gone.

I think there'll be a Mirror in my future. I haven't had a wooden boat since a ply pram dinghy 40 years ago. I've grown used to scratchproof fibreglass, but epoxy has made plywood practical again.

I don't know if newcomers to dinghies are prepared to embrace the (occasional) necessity to care for their boat as well as sailing it. But the glowing beauty of varnished decks may be one element of their decision to buy.

 

[vyv_cox]

Would love to see the picture of a Mirror on davits- we have one and just waiting for the granddaughter to get slightly older but had always thought it would have to be towed behind .Clearly the book mirror mania shows even more options for fun in a Mirror though if considering.

Here are two. I understand that the Mirror was easy to carry, although slight further modification to the arrangement will improve it. Apparently it was quite a handy tender for three.

 

[Greenheart]

I'm going to select my next yacht on the basis of its ability to carry a Mirror on davits.

 

[Sea Change]

Well if we're drifting this thread in to the realms of sailing tenders, may I nominate my Spindrift 11N which sails beautifully and has been known to carry six people under sail, and nine under motor. Same hull weight as a Mirror, but with a pointy bow. Unlikely to find class racing opportunities though...

 

[Puffin10032]

With genuine respect gentlemen, this is getting ridiculous.

If anyone was ready to recommend the boat they had themselves known and loved (and whose problematic size or weight, or virtual immobility ashore, or complexity in use, or challenging maintenance, they had somehow learned to deal with)...

...if any of those excellent reasons for not selecting a particular dinghy were not part of the reasonable process of picking a class, nobody would be quicker than me in suggesting the Osprey.

So sleek, so spacious, so quick and well-bred and so darned beautiful...

...and unless you're two sturdy fellows totalling about 27 stone in weight, a right royal pain in the ar5e!

I did it singlehanded for years, so I know it's possible, and equally I know it's stark lunacy. I launched and hauled mine out alone, and I swore it was worth it and with the benefit of hindsight I've no regrets, but in all humility, I can now admit it made no sense.

The same applies to the Wayfarer, Wanderer, GP14, and all the other biggish cruising dinghies that are glorious once you're aboard, but a nightmare to move on shore. Anything which really needs others' assistance or a car to recover from the water at the end of the day, will discourage the new sailor from going back for more.

I sometimes used to take mine out solo (I had three over the years, a wooden MkII followed by two GRP MkIIIs). The first problem I encountered was that when I went forward to set the spinnaker pole the rudder would go all over the place. So I simply sailed it without a rudder which had the added benefit of not needing an extra-long tiller extension when I was on the trapeze. Three sail reaching out on the trapeze with the spinnaker sheet on one hand and the mainsheet in the other was great fun I'm sure you'll agree. Not for novices though.

 

[Greenheart]

I loved using the trapeze, although weighing under 70kg (11 stone) on a boat that easily carries 200kg, I concluded that whether I hiked hard or was flat out on the wire, made very little difference - if it was gusting any more than ten knots (and it usually was), I had a tough time maintaining less than 20 degrees of heel. I devised effective reefing, but most of my memories are of thrilling and faintly terrifying times being blown home with too much sail up.

I never relished capsizing any dinghy, and rejected the principle that it was better to be adept at recovery, than to just prevent it happening. I did roll the Osprey once and recovered unassisted, but I've always preferred boats that self-right...which made the Osprey an extraordinary choice for me, but it was only £350 at a time when I was badly short of funds, and I had enough youth, strength and daft ambition to keep trying for a few years. I've no regrets.

But I never hoisted my Osprey's spinnaker afloat. Leaving the tiller unattended made it too much of a gamble. Plus I was obsessed with creating an asymmetric kite for the boat, which would have been a deal easier to hoist and drop, and no faffing about with the symmetric kite's pole. For the kite-sock I even bought yards of fiendishly expensive 'Phifertex' mesh from Kayospruce, but it's still on its roll in the cupboard. In March 2019 I eventually bought a yacht, and suddenly had neither time nor funds (and waning enthusiasm) for the 'little' boat.

Now, maybe I can fit a trapeze and asymmetric to a Mirror...
.

 

[dunedin]

I loved using the trapeze, although weighing under 70kg (11 stone) on a boat that easily carries 200kg, I concluded that whether I hiked hard or was flat out on the wire, made very little difference - if it was gusting any more than ten knots (and it usually was), I had a tough time maintaining less than 20 degrees of heel. I devised effective reefing, but most of my memories are of thrilling and faintly terrifying times being blown home with too much sail up.

I never relished capsizing any dinghy, and rejected the principle that it was better to be adept at recovery, than to just prevent it happening. I did roll the Osprey once and recovered unassisted, but I've always preferred boats that self-right...which made the Osprey an extraordinary choice for me, but it was only £350 at a time when I was badly short of funds, and I had enough youth, strength and daft ambition to keep trying for a few years. I've no regrets.

.....
Now, maybe I can fit a trapeze and asymmetric to a Mirror...
.

I never did that, but I once did race a Mirror with an Osprey spinnaker! It was the original spinnaker, so marginally smaller than today's one. But even so, attached to the top of the gunter in a near calm it still touched the water when the wind dropped.
Caused a few surprised looks, but was my last race in Mirrors before moving on to Enterprise.
(And I did pass outside the finish mark to make clear retiring, as not entirely class legal.)

 

[Greenheart]

Oh wow! I still have my Osprey's spinnaker! It has the measurer's signature...from May 1986. So, still pretty crispy! Everything is telling me to buy a Mirror.

I already have trunks full of salvaged hatches, ratchet blocks, bungs, shackles, cleats, huge self-balers, hundreds of feet of unused braid-on-braid, acres of another dinghy's sailcloth, three anchors, a foghorn, a masthead float, a pair of 8ft oars, and a nice 3.5hp two stroke. No overkill anywhere there!

It may be time I rejoin the Dinghy Cruising Association. Apologies to Madam who asked the original question, I hope she's benefited from the thread.

 

[ashtead]

Thanks for sharing the photos of the steel frame -I suspect that’s a £6k frame but maybe I’m overpricing the cost of stainless - do you have details of the fabricator? We are 12.8m so much the same size I guess. As I have the mirror plus outboard etc and half daggerbord etc to have a frame to carry the mirror in a few years time is certainly worth investigating . I think I paid about £ 250 for the mirror in white as well but we had the road trailer and trolley already . Granddaughter has a few years to go though. I also apologise also given we were talking Lazers 4.7 etc and toppers .
Maybe the OP can advise as to location as that might elicit club ideas.

 

[Chiara’s slave]

Thanks for sharing the photos of the steel frame -I suspect that’s a £6k frame but maybe I’m overpricing the cost of stainless - do you have details of the fabricator? We are 12.8m so much the same size I guess. As I have the mirror plus outboard etc and half daggerbord etc to have a frame to carry the mirror in a few years time is certainly worth investigating . I think I paid about £ 250 for the mirror in white as well but we had the road trailer and trolley already . Granddaughter has a few years to go though. I also apologise also given we were talking Lazers 4.7 etc and toppers .
Maybe the OP can advise as to location as that might elicit club ideas.

She’s joined a club. She just needs to buy the boat that’s the best fit there. Made of plastic.

 

[vyv_cox]

Thanks for sharing the photos of the steel frame -I suspect that’s a £6k frame but maybe I’m overpricing the cost of stainless - do you have details of the fabricator? We are 12.8m so much the same size I guess. As I have the mirror plus outboard etc and half daggerbord etc to have a frame to carry the mirror in a few years time is certainly worth investigating . I think I paid about £ 250 for the mirror in white as well but we had the road trailer and trolley already . Granddaughter has a few years to go though. I also apologise also given we were talking Lazers 4.7 etc and toppers .
Maybe the OP can advise as to location as that might elicit club ideas.

The arch came with the boat. As it is a Beneteau in France there is lots of choice, often off the shelf.

 

[boomerangben]

I remember watching a large fleet of mirrors at Wroxham, crewed by extremely keen and competitive crews. It maybe a slow boat, but slow is relative and when sailing slow boats, small tweaks make a difference. My grandfather commented on how the kids learned to sail by feel, leaving them capacity to sail strategically - in other words how to really race. I wish I had spent more time sailing in our mirror when I was young.

Budget, distance to club, different club options and so on will have a major impact on final choice. But if you can find a local club with a significant mirror fleet, I think there’s lots of fun to be had.

 

[B27]

If you're looking at different clubs, it's a good idea to look at their websites, FB pages etc to establish what boats they are actually putting on the water. Some even have webcams so you can see what's happening in real time, but there's no substitute for seeing race results, to see actual turnouts..
Lots of clubs make a lot of sound about the fleets they have in the boat park, but boats on the water is what matters.

Regarding Mirrors, they are great little boats, but most of them are quite old plywood and are now 'high maintenance'.