Will a small sailing boat plane?

[bolinj]

I live in West Cork and am learning to sail. But on good evenings I would like to be able to get to one of our many islands quickly ie. using a 40/50bhp outboard. Is there a smallish, (14/16 feet) sailing dingy in which I can also motor?

 

[Twister_Ken]

Many sailing dinghies will plane under sail, but I think the problem with your suggestion would be the weight of such an outboard - probably close to the weight of the rest of the dinghy. Even if it didn't pull the transom off the dinghy it would give the boat such a nose up attitude that it would be reluctant to plane, except perhaps to loop the loop. And a capsize would be very expensive!

A better bet might be a beach catamaran like a Hobie or Dart which can easily reach double figure speeds under sail.

 

[SAWDOC]

how far do you need to go? If the distance is not too great a 12 ft dinghy wit a small light outboard suffice

 

[oldsalt]

The transoms on most sailing dinghies would not be strong enough.

 

[William_H]

The trick with a sailing dinghy to get it to plane is to move weight forward to allow the transom to lift out of the water. This is difficult as most sailing dinghies have an aft underwater area that curves up toward the surface from the midsection to minimise wave making.
Dinghies designed to plane with an outboard motor have very flat stern section on the bottom to give the lift needed to get the aft end out of the water. (this being where the weight is ie motor)

So as said the only sailing boat that could be made to go really fast is a cat. olewill

 

[oceanfroggie]

Here you go Planing Sail boats


A displacement hull cannot plane or exeed its hull speed no matter what engine you put in it, only a SD or planning hull or other lift mechanisims can get UP out of the water.

 

[neale]

Bit bigger than you were looking at but if you go to 19ft, you could look for one of these:


25mph sailboat

 

[bolinj]

Trouble with anything over 19' is that as a novice i may well struggle.
Thank you all so much, all your posts were very helpful. I suspected I was asking too much, looks like 2 boats then!

Colin

 

[seumask]

IMHO most small sailing dinghys will only need 10 to 15hp to plane if they are lightly loaded with people and gear.

 

[ningcompoop]

A lot of the "cruising" (as opposed to dedicated "racing")dinghies will take an outboard- wayfarers, wanderers, drascombs, miirors, herons, etc. Even some of the more modern designs. The various manufacturers and associations can give lots of info, but most don't go much above 4hp or what ever will get them up to hull speed - the wanderer for instance, is rated to take up to 3.3 hp. Even something like 10hp is going to add a lot of weight on the back of the boat, which will really affect handling and stability. The hulls also aren't built or designed to plane under outboard power and could be very difficult to handle in any sort of chop.

 

[Searush]

As already posted the mcGregor will do what you want, but may not be the best boat for a novice as you MUST remember to use the water ballast and keel correctly.

 

[oceanfroggie]

Just doesn't look right does it. There's a few of these on Lough Derg.

 

[Searush]

I think the concept is great, just as long as you can accept the compromises. It is a crap MoBo because of all the useless sticks & string, and a poor yacht because of the odd hull shape & weighty engine hanging off the stern.

But it does motor fast if you need to get home before the tide goes out (the one above lives at Red Wharf Bay, Anglesey) and it will sail over to Ireland on b*gger all fuel if you don't mind it taking all day.

 

[bolinj]

[ QUOTE ]
but may not be the best boat for a novice as you MUST remember to use the water ballast and keel correctly.

Hi Searush

I'm interested in these comments. Do you mean simply to remember to empty the ballast tanks when motoring and vice versa; and to lower the
keel when sailing, or is there more to it?