Criteria New Boats 09 Hunter 170 JY 15 Catalina Vanguard 15
    CL 14/16 Wayfarer Precision Jet 14 Daysailer Mutineer
    Transfusion Johnson 18 Harpoon 4.6/5.2 Albacore Comet Tanzer 16
    Tasar American 14.6 Rebel Vagabond 14 Lido-14 Bombardier 4.8
    Snipe Interlake 18 C-Lark 14 Pintail Point Jude Windmill
    Galilee15 Luger Leeward Melges 17 Sport 14/16
    Other Boats Links Sailing Page Update: 02-15-09 email

             INTRODUCTION: In my childhood during the 50s, my father frequently took me sailing on the Duemmer See (site) in Northern Germany in his PIRAT, a 17 foot wooden dinghy with 10 m2 of sail. The Duemmer is a shallow but natural body of inland water, a kind of reed lake, surrounded by the marshy lowlands and bogs & swamps of Lower Saxony. The winds are usually brisk and conditions for dinghy sailing are close to perfect. Despite my youthful appreciation for the sheer beauty of the lake, I remember mostly the two emotions which for me as a youngster dominated these outings: UTTER FEAR and/or TOTAL BOREDOM.

        However, unbeknownst to me, there must have been another very positive underlying experience which did not surface until much later in form of this newly found passion which arose quite unexpectedly when I more or less by chance sailed a Sunfish during a family vacation on Cape Cod. It was a blast and my sailing passion was ignited. By the way, the sunfish is a fun boat. And the Pirat of yesteryear is still enjoying quite some popularity (site) throughout Northern Europe albeit as a fibreglass racing dinghy.

        NOTE: In order to make best use of the information offered on this page, please begin by clicking on the CRITERIA button as to understand the premise of this page. You will notice that I have included some boats in this lineup which upon further reflection are really more racers than daysailers. In fact, many boats (and its designers) intentionally blur this distinction and, in many cases do so quite successfully. The Comet, Tasar and Snipe are racers which still make very decent daysailers whereas the Buzz and Windmill will be hard pushed in the service of family daysailing.

        On the other hand, some dinghies are strictly daysailors while still others lend themselves to even bigger dreams. I came across one delightful and well-written account by Craig Ramage of a cruising adventure on a CL-16 (the Canadian version of a Wayfarer) which is a case in point.

        Please note that this is not a commercial page. The material contained herein represents "one person's opinion" and must not be construed as professional advice.

        It has been challenging to keep up with many of the links as sailboat manufactures and one-design associations are updating their web sites and products. Maintaining links to other sites is done strictly on an occasional amateur basis.




          My first own sailboat was the Zuma made originally by Alcort Sailboats. This boat is now manufactured by Vanguard. This Zuma is a great starter boat and many sail their Zuma for years with great enjoyment. The sail area of 65 sq. ft. is a bit smaller than the sunfish sail of 75 sq.ft. but the cockpit (length=4'9") has a lot more room. The wide beam (5') and hull design makes for good stability. Still, the boat zooms along quite nicely and the 129 pound hull can be brought on a plane rather easily. For me it proved to be the ideal starter. Other great small single-handed dinghies are the Force 5, Laser and of course the most popular of all, the above mentioned Sunfish. More recently, a number of exciting small dinghy designs have appeared on the sailing horizon. So, there are some excellent contenders for getting one's feet wet and even old salts would enjoy knocking around in the bay.

          As for me, I needed a new challenge so, I began looking for a boat in the 14-15 foot range which I later expanded up to the 17-18 foot range.



    Laser 2 Regatta

          The following three boats were considered as well and are listed here even though they really turned out not to fit my more generic criteria.
          Buzz           Laser II       One Design 14




          Boats 2009


          GOOD NEWS for US dinghy sailors who are looking for modern dinghy design options which have been abundant for years in the UK and Australia but were hard to come by in the US.

          Retractable bow-sprints and gennakers will finally become more common even on non-olympic centerboard dinghies. Vanguard Sailboats USA joined forces with Performace Sailcraft Europe and as a result, some exciting new dinghy designs are being marketed in the US.

          We wish LaserPerformance much success because this is the kind of company that we have been awaiting for a long time here in the US.

          A number of these new products would have fit right in my original search criteria. It seems clear to me that LaserPerformance is a dinghy sailboat and sports sailboat manufacturer for the 21st Century. At last!

          Here are some of their new offerings. The gennaker option makes all of these boats very exciting to sail off-wind. For a complete listing of available designs check out their web site.

          Laser 2000 Stratos Bahia


          Another company that must be mentioned here is Melges Performance Sailboats. Scows have dominated inland lakes in sheer speed and power for decades. Yet, while Melges produced modern sports boats such the Melges 24 and 32, the dinghy sphere remained stuck in the "olden days". No longer!

          Now, Reichel Pugh has catapulted the basic scow design into the 21st Century with the Melges 17 which I fully expect - much like the Melges 24 - to become a dominant force on this continent. It would appear that this non-trapeze design picks up where the SuperScow 16 and Johnson 18 \ left off. No need to list the specifications. Check out their web site for all the details if you are in the market for a high performance dinghy with newest design features including super light carbon spars, retractable bow-sprit and single-line dousing mast-head gennaker. The high aspect main will provide tremendeous drive in light air yet this boat should still be manageble by a skilled husband-wife team in heavy air - even without trapeze. An open transom would have been preferable but other than that, this is a state-of-the-art dinghy which promises to deliver speed and grins of delight.



          I do not know much about the following boats but they would appear to meet the list of criteria in as much as I can tell.

          Designer's Choice Sparkman Stephens 1977, 1500 built, 14'11", 315 lbs, sails: 120 sq.ft.
          Town Class Pert Lowell 1932, 2500 built, 16'6", 800 lbs, 152 sq.ft.
          Mobjack Roger Moorman 1961, 550 built, 17', 450 lbs, 180 sq.ft.
          Hampton One-Design V.J. Serio 1934, 900 built, 18', 500 lbs, sails: 175 sqft
          Geary 18 Ted Geary 1928, Star Trainer ? built, 18'1", 525 lbs, sails: 200 sqft
          Exploration 18 Jean Grenier 1996, 6 built, 680 lbs, sails: 172 sqft


          Another attractive boat that came to my attention (1997) was the SuperScow 16. Alas, this boat has since then already been discontinued which proves that it takes more than a fine design to build and establish a successful one-design dinghy.

          For those who are interested in boat owners opinions on their boats, you may find the SailNET Boatcheck site highly useful:







            The following sailboat sites will prove very useful to anyone in search of information about dinghies:

            Mark Rosenstein's Sailing Page
              Every E-sailor should have this site bookmarked. It is an extremely valuable resource and worthy of exploration.
            Boating Links
              BoatingLinks.com is a complete directory of Boating Links for boaters who wish to compare boats, charters, products, and information sources available on the web.

            My Idea of Fun

            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxRgaJJ86_8&feature=related
            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxN33qW-n4E