Good day, all!

Some folks are all about racing the newest one design and others just want to sail something they built themselves. Myself and my family are in a strange subgroup that likes to homebuild fast boats on a budget and go race.

Once our Gcat was toast, I found a set of 18HT hulls w/ crossbars and tramp at an awesome price. With this as the basis of a new cat, here are the design ideas for a nice 18ft DPN raceboat-

1. Skipper is 75 and needs a comfortable drivers position, so no double trap. Hope to have a few more years driving competitively.

2. Low cost at all costs! Lots of horse trading and used parts deals.

Reuse rigging, mast, rudders from Gcat. Traded for spin gear and H17 wings. Used sails, squaretop main, spin.

3. Bias towards light air that is predominant on inland SE lakes.

A small front tramp will go on to allow comfortable crew position forward and cooler space <img src="http://www.catsailor.com/forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />


18 feet
8' 2" beam
Weight under 400 (yes. the al. stick and wings add weight over the stock 18HT setup.)
Sail area M/J around 225sq ft.
same for spin
Wings- either full length or possibly shortened to just helm position.
1 trap

If the rear beams are too low , then we can raise them.


I hope to be able to keep up w/ F18's around the course.

Long term it would be nice to actually have a carbon stick.