Does anyone have any experience of sailing NS14s?  What are they like to sail, compared say, to a RS200/400 or Tasar?   They look pretty cool and are undoubtedly efficient, but are they difficult/twitchy?  I imagine that the narrow waterline and unique rig may make them tippy.  I have been designing one for fun and may try to get it built over the winter, so any thoughts gratefully received.  I am toying with the idea of a swing-rig style set up i.e taking the boom forward of the mast so that the jib tack swings to windward.

I know we don't need any new classes in the UK, but I think they look more interesting than N12s - and cheaper than Merlins.

I seem to recall the tasar is the offspring of the NS14 check out the links through the Tasar website. Or look on the bethwaite site.

I haven't actually sailed one but they look good on the water. They are pretty efficent and ideally suited to enclosed waters as there is no trapeze or spinnaker.

In the right wind conditions they are amazingly fast upwind - they aren't as quick downwind due to the relatively small sail area. They don't seem to be too tippy from what I have seen. Good for a husband and wife team - as long as they aren't too "big boned"

Just goes to show what can happen when you allow the rig to develop so much more than the Merlin / N12 type rule...

Is the NS14 really a MG14 listed above?

I know the difference, I have sailed both.

For the northern hemi, The MG14 and the NS14 ARE the same but the MG has a kite and trap added. The sails are the same area but a bit more grunty on the MG.

Both are fun boats with close racing and were not real tippy are most had long, 6ft boards.

The MG is an NS14 with a trap and Kite, now asyimetric. I'm not sure of the size but I think its 10sqm

I think the kite size is measured on the perimeter i.e. luff, foot and leach measurements, rather than actual area.  I think the perimeter is 14m.  I believe it is done this way because it is easier to measure (and adds a bit of design flexibility).

By the way, thanks for your advice Chris and Skiffe.

The NS has smaller sails than the N12 (and almost any other class - just 9.3m^2), but is much quicker (Merlin speed) and has less restrictive rules (but bans carbon hulls to keep costs down).

My only time sailing against Tasars on the water showed them to be both about the same speed. bearing in mind the extra two feet a Tasar has on a 12 thats quite a shock really...

I'm sure the Tasars would just love a 12's handicap ... however it there was any real breeze somebody was doing something really really wrong !!  They did not get their punitive handicap for nothing and I've yet to see an N12 plane upwind alongside the Fireballs and 470's anywhere ..... also the 12 is a bit of a handicap bandit in very light stuff

Blaze '720'

The Tasar will do" what it says on the tin" but it still requires learning. Long, light and efficient.

" I  refuse to believe that the Tasar is really that fast.  Its a narrow beam 2 man hiking dinghy which was launched in 1975, average weight with average sail area.  It has no spinnaker.  Whilst I will say that it should take out a National 12, it is very unlikely to plane upwind without help from a trapeze or more extreme beam and will be pedestrian downwind due to it only having 2 sails, except in a stiff breeze. ....."

So you will be arguing of course for a PN revision downwards  as its a bit harsh !  However having a read of the Bethwaite bible might be useful first.  The Tasar is like many of their designs exceptional and while it will today struggle against MR's that is a function of many years further development of the MR and their current 'handicap' perhaps.

Yes they can plane upwind in the right conditions but that is as much to do with its ultra efficient mast/sail combination (over-rotating specialist section) as it is to do with an effective and very light hull - makes you wonder what other boats could be a lot faster with an updated over-rotater but for the current SMOD fare it would look a bit expensive for the manufacturers involved perhaps.  It was poorly marketed in the UK originally but thrived in many other countries.

As for refusing to believe ..... 30 years of Tasar racing on several continents has not softened the PN yet but like the Laser it a tough one to sail below - subtle technique required.

Blaze 720     

"I've yet to sail a Tasar ......"

At least that's simple enough to sort - the only way to assess any boat is to sail one first.  We can all have views about the Laser perhaps, but if you have not sailed a particular class, or perhaps even sailed against a good one, whether it be a Tasar, MR, N12 or whatever personal views can carry only limited weight.

A more reasonable question to pose is why are are many more recent boats so horribly slow with wider beam, a third sail, sometimes even a trapeze and the 'benefits' of a more recent SMOD manufacturer input ? It's not as if a Tasar is extreme in any real way or a handful for mere mortals to race.  Handicap on a gravel pit ? - depends on how much wind and how restricted the water - if its very small Firefly/Albacore are better handicap bandits (lower strightline speed and more rocker = relatively faster to tack and less cost) .  And another thing why exactly did the Firefly drop its rotating mast ?  And are they still legal ? 

Blaze 720

The rotating mast is still legal, but only if the mast is a Reynolds or one of the old gold proctor ones. Unlike the Tasar, though, the mast only rotated with the boom, and as the Proctor C section (and the similar sectioned Reynolds before it) weren't far off round, it made no real difference!

I think at Whitefriars we have enough space for a Tasar, and it would be in the medium conditions that things would be interesting, finding out at what wind strength the Tasar gains the advantage over the more highly rockered older designs. My crew is very happy in her Firefly, so this will be something to look into when my son is a little older!

I don't subsrcibe to this- planing can be defined it is just difficult ot model 'detahced flow' with current software and maths. hence big flat chine sections promote stable planing and bags of drag in light stuff.

Planing is visibly defined as overcoming a bump on a drag curve, climbing the bow wave and leaving the quarter wave behind you or rapidly accelerating away from predicted hull speed on a polar diagram.

No, no , no!  Overcoming 'hull speed' by getting through 'boat length = wave length' is not related to planing at all.  A catamaran can (and does) pass through this point, but it doesn't plane.  Planing is related to dynamic pressure, not bow wave formation.