Terry, by way of explanation, my involvement with 14ftrs (4.3m here in Oz) goes back some 14yrs. After a lifetime of sailing bigger boats including a 'B' class cat, I bought a Maricat, a one design Hobie 14 inspired Oz 14ftr. A nicer boat to sail than the Hobie 14 but I digress. I campaigned the Maricat for aprox. 8yrs winning the local club championship and class state and national titles. I decided that the 14ftr was a unique class in that it could be sailed easily single handed, was easy to trail, rig, launch and retrieve, and was overdue for an update so I designed and built the 430. It's uni-rigged and much influenced by the A class. It has some interesting features in that the main beam is at 50%, it has minimum 'rocker' i.e., it is quite straight along the bottom which in section is essentially an ellipse, has very little 'vee' and has powerful bows which resist nose-diving when driven hard. The hulls and foils are moulded epoxy E'glass, carbon reinforced foam sandwich, vacuum bagged. Some specs; Builder: Peter Skews Shipwright Services (lay-up) Designer: Bern Leslie (me) Length: 14ft nom. / 4.3m [LWL] Beam: 7ft.10in / 2.4m (max. Aus) Displacement: 107lbs / 75kg Sail area: main: 145sqft / 13.5sqm Spinnaker: TBA Mast Height: 24ft 7ins. / 7.5m Construction materials: Hull; Hand laid moulded Epoxy / ‘E’glass / carbon foam sandwich. Mast and front beam; 50x120mm chemically milled alum. Sail; Mylar.
It really is a great boat. It's just a gem to sail and it's the fastest 14ft cat in Australia by a street and is quicker than some 15ftrs. It actually runs with slower H16's and I have occasionally knocked off the odd TheMightyHobie18 though probably more from sailing skills than actual boat speed. It seems to have no real hang-ups and, in all the time I've raced it, I've never 'put it in'. While it is a challenging boat to sail, it is not difficult for reasonably competent persons to manage single handed from the trapeze. It is however a high tech. high performance racing sailboat incorporating many innovative design concepts and is suited to those who want excellent performance from a very fast and exciting sailboat. I developed a set of one design rules and raced the boat in three states over two years in mixed 14ft uni and sloop fleets and if I finished (and mostly I did) I won. Sadly, no-one here in Australia was interested! I tried to put a 14ft GP circuit together to promote 14ftrs and the 430 and again I got little interest and a week out from the first round the host club pulled the pin on the requirement for a separate start and course for the 14's. I lost interest, parked the boat under cover and went bike riding for two years.
Sale price was set in the range $Aus11,000 ($US6,500 aprox.) depending on hardware which was most likely the major stumbling block.
This season I'm back (still winning) and there's a second boat being built. I am at present 185lbs and the boat was designed for a crew of around 170lbs but it still kicks @r$. I'm also looking at a spinnaker but frankly at 62yrs I've got about as much as I can handle with what's already there. I see F14 as the way to go to get people interested in 14ftrs again and possibly a vehicle to get the 430 (or soon to be F14) back into production. I'm also looking at maybe doing a set of plans suitable for home building. Bern
