Topper Spice

a 29er ruder is about £85 which is very resable

Yeah but as granite said one designs do have their place, I would love to sail a boat liek 14/cherub but i dont have the time or 'money' to start sailing one, also at the moment ji dont have enough time to seriously look at the class and work out what the boat should be like.

I think if i have understood everything everyone has said, you dont necerly have to have deep pockets for a development class but have to keep your eyes and ears open to what is changing in the class if youwant you boat to be 'up there'. If you have the motivation and ability to keep the boat up to standard then you aught to choose a class like that but other wise a one design seems like a good idea as a boat jsut to get you on the water at weekends etc. You can have good national circuits (not nec. International) if you want to become more competative.

As I have said before lots of what I say may be getting the wrong end of the stick as most of the things I know about development classes has come from reading this forum, Since Cadets are a RYA youth class all the boats we were kind of aimed into after them were all the 420 and 29er style boats with high youth training. Could some one clear up a few things like which boats are one design and which are development, I have picked up the ones that are mentioned on here a lot, But I know I will make a mistake along the way if i dont ask now.

Development classes - Merlin Rocket, National 12, International 14, Cherub and Moth.  But there are other classes where a little bit of tweeking is allowed, generally this is limited to cockpit layout and they tend to be the older One Designs that were built in wood, examples are, Scorpion, Wayfarer, Osprey Flying Dutchman, Hornet, Fireball, Phantom, Solo, but we should also include the Europe here.  Then there are the very strict One Designs, often called SMOD (Single Manufacturer One Design), of which the Laser is the best example but all the boats from Laser, RS and Topper fall into this category.

No doubt I've missed a few and got some small detail wrong but others will contribute I'm sure.  But I'm sure you get the drift.

Well in the Laser you aren't even allowed to put some tape at the corners of the transom to stop the mainsheet catching.  You have to admit that such strict rules have produced a succesful boat.

PS I'm at the club on Sunday.