Fastest dinghy?

i can see that my posts were ignored because of a total lack of
complicated formulae and promotion of cats. now i seem to
remember
that this thred is called 'fastest dinghy". i thought
that was refering to
monohulls.. obviously im wrong. its just in the ... aww forget it.

Edited by Brian

look a tornado is known as a dinghy catamaran as they are under 20 foot!!!

so dont get arsey here ok!!!!

We have been running a speed trial for fun at our club Dalgety Bay Sailing club on the River Forth and we have come up with some interesting results.

It has been done using handheld and wrist GPS units where we log the fastest speed sailed around club waters.

We have boats ranging from Hurricanes/Spitfire/18foot skiff etc.

So far the fastest boat has been a visiting Tornado that clocked over 23 knots but the quickest speed overall was a windsurfer at 26 knots.

You can see our results at the following website.

http://www.teamlbn.com/speed_chall.htm

There has also been alot of speed chat on the Moth chat rooms and although the top speed so far is around 21 to 23 knots the big thing here is the wind it has been done in (alot less than normal boat) and also the speed capable upwind. I'm sure there will be alot more comes as people get to grips with these fantastic flying boats.......

Interesting times, Kieth, but of course not a totally reliable method. Windsurfer forums talk quite a bit about the fact that it's easy to get a speed many knots higher just by moving the hand holding the GPS. I know I can get a decent speed out of mine just by standing still and flicking my hand around, and when you're pushing hard and working a mainsheet or something, your hand will also be moving fast. 10 knots + of hand movement makes speeds look bizarre!

The thing which shocks me a bit is the speed of the Lasers. A Radial at 16.2 makes the RS 700 (16.8), Moth (17.3) Spitfire (18.7) look a bit sick. I see you got the best Radial speed and the Moth speeds. What sort of Moth? HT or Axeman or similar? Did you set the Radial time in conditions too strong for you to take the Moth out? I know a Radial can be sailed in conditions so strong that the Thorpes won't take their Moths out.

Interesting also to see Ian Renilson's speed on the Musto. I was emailing him a while back and he has very big visions for the future of singlehanded skiffs. I think I'd be prepared to take on the Moths for top speed in an International Canoe (or p'raps a Radial), but that MPS pace would be hard to compete with.

The 18 ft skiff between two Tornado Sports looks interesting. Maybe it just underlines that the cat certainly wouldn't roar away?

Do you know what sort of board the "big kit" refers to? A short fat FW board, or a long skinny 12' raceboard?

Hi Chris,

The Radial at 16.2 was done in extremely windy conditions and I was hanging on for my life - great fun.

The moth is a conventional Axeman 6 and again was done in pretty windy conditions. The problem with the Forth is that when it gets really windy the waves also build up so boat speed can be limited by the waves especially in Moth.

I think the big difference with the Hydro's is that they can achieve those speeds in much lighter winds and also keep the speed on up wind when a convential boat would slow down upwind.

Anyway loads of fun and gives us exscuses to buy GPS's.

Keith....