Only what is online
They used a few ideas that Wouter wanted to see in his F12, but not very efficiently: the mast is too flexible (obviously a windsurf model), no daggerboard, strange looking rudders, tripod extends too far aft, etc. Nice beach wheels, though.

Luiz
I agree with your comments but the thing still is pretty neat.. pretty fast to go together as well...The mast has to be its weakest point...as you say way, way too flexible....nothing a little extra carbon couldn't remedy...lol...if they get up and going into production maybe they can convince one of the windsurfing mast builders to make one suitable to the righting moment of their little cat. shouldn't take much to accomplish that with filament winding technology.

Yes, stiffen that mast, change the rudders, add a daggerboard or two and I'll like it very much. Found an expired classified add with a bit of data about it:

Length 3.4m
Beam 1.7m
Total weight 66kg
Maximum Load 150kg

It is shorter, narrower and 16 kg heavier than an F12. That video was probably made with a lot of wind, hence the flexed masts.

bump

I like it! Especially the way the beach wheels attach.

I like the way the mast bends, wouldn't that mean it depowers in a puff and makes the whole platform more stable?

fwiw, the Wave is a bear to manage on the beach, my F16 is easier.
I'm most interested in something light, that breaks down into the smallest possible road package and is still manageable at 20 knots.

I always envisioned it as a design tha would be almost perfect for the watertribe race. As Luiz will attest, I included a foot peddle option in the design similar to the Hobie miracle drive. Basically, I planned to have T-foil rudders on the boat that could double as a poor mans miracle drive. As such you would have spares on the board while doing to trek. I was even thinking of using the same profile for the daggers to cut down on cost and to again to have a spare for everything.

For reefing I choose to use a slip knot at the top hook with a release line running through the sleeve. That is a one way ticket I know, but you typically want to reef in sudden bad conditions where you can't justify complex manouvres, however when undoing the reef the conditions are back at being much calmer and then one can easily justify more complex manouvres. Tipping the boat and swimming towards the mast to encage the slipknot is a real possibility. Of course, dropping the mast is also possible with only 7.00 sq mtr. Sail on a rig that only weights 12 kg in total.


Mind you, I still want a boat like you describe myself. One tha is car toppable and with a truly shallow draft but still fun to sail. The F12 I was working on had all these traits I think and was also a promising youth boat. That was at the core of my concept. A design that was attractive to wide range of sailors, not only youths, altbeit for different uses. As such I hoped to emtlarge to commercial attractiveness of the design and class.

I'm still eyeballing doing a trek alomg the Dutch sand island (wadden) of which Texel is one. And trekking the finnish archipelago. I won't do those on my F16. Basically, if I habe to abandon ship I don't want to be in for 15 grand. 3 grand is a sum I can walk away from withou feeling too bad.


Over the years I haven't been able to shake this idea and I still want to do it. Putting such a boat into existance I mean.

Somehow I really do like the unstayed mast sleeved sail option, mostly because the mast can then be made of regular alu tubes that come apart for transportt.

However, I figured that a cut-down superwing mast WITHOUT diamond wires would be a good option as well. That would be a relatief powerful rig ! At 6 mtr it would not be caretoppable but not much of a hassle either. Weight of mast would be 10 kg or less. Finding some broken A-cat mast would be perfect at roughly 7 kg.

Of course it was to have a spinnaker. 10 sq. mtr or less. Just to be able to make distance on the downwind legs.

In my plans it was to be a hiking boat only (for adults) as the rig is just too small compared to the width of the boat to pull anybody over 50 kg on the wire. Let alone if the craft is weighted down by some 30 kg camping gear.

Personally, I won't miss the trapeze. I sailed the hobie dragoon a bit, a 14 footer with similar dimensions, and was never able to trapeze of that even in 30 knots of wind. Either there was not enough power in the wind or when there was the large amount of righting moment would put the boat nose down even upwind. So I just hiked of this boat and that was lots of fun as well. At some point there have to be compromises.

If only ... ... Ahhh

Wouter

I sailed a Sunfish a little last year and found a lot to like about it. So, I was thinking of a small cat using Sunfish parts, that would break down quickly and could be portable enough to assemble on the water. We don't have much access for cats here but we do have quite a few places for kayaks to launch.

Love love love the Katalyst H2 as a kids boat!
It looks super easy to rig, potentially cheap components that won't make parents cry when the kids break stuff. Used windsurfer masts are usually easy to come by, though even aluminum poles (partially?) filled with Great Stuff could be made to work (cheap and stiff and float!) Enough buoyancy that a parent could take it out when it's blowing hard and have a good romp.

Smaller kids or heavier airs could be compensated for with a smaller sail, though these bendy masts and powerful downhauls seem to make depowering a viable option.

Do we really want dagger boards on a kids trainer boat? Isn't the F14 supposed to be the real performance race machine and this is just to get them acclimated to cats until they weigh enough to move up?

How much do these cost?