I race my laser in interclub races under sufferance, and sail my Melges 14 at every other opportunity, including in yardstick races at our club. It is simply the most beautiful dinghy I have ever sailed, and I often find myself in a trance going upwind watching that bow cut through the chop....
do you think the melges 14 will catch on?
- Thread starter frozenhawaiian
- Start date
Tink
Member
Also from the UK fully agree, IMHO it completely lacks any styling from a European perspective. It is a big boat, if you’re heavy you would go for a Phantom over the Gold, Aero / d-zero rather than the blue and if you’re in the red 4.7 because of the youth system.
This arrived at the party when all empties where being taken out. On the plus side in the UK being an Ovington it will be the best build of the newbies - (that said not currently listed on their website) the do phantoms also
Bill5
Right now
Wisconsin is a long way from the UK, gents! As CheeseHead stated, the manufacturer is just down the road from him, Melges have always built quality boats, they offer tons of support and there is a fleet scene in WI. You might find an Aero fleet race in the midwest in 5 years, and probably never for the Devoti. The Devoti wins the beauty contest by a mile over all these, but, alas, it appears destined to be another "UK only" boat.
Tink
Member
Czech manufacturing, Italian boss, English designer and European distribution. The D-zero has it’s work cut out against RS but it’s not just a UK boat
Daniel Holman
Anarchist
- 568
- 134
Think its Polish mfg and Czech administration to be precise!
Cosmopolitan in anyones book mind.
Cosmopolitan in anyones book mind.
Dan , I think you have designed a great boat . I tested Paul Jefferies boat, back when he had one of the first pre prod boats but I couldn’t justify spending that amount of money at that time. I am hoping to have another go in Nigel Austin boat at cransley in may with a view to spending some of my redundancy money on a d zero. At the moment I am sailing a British moth, I love them but I don’t like the fact they are a restricted development class. I am a one design sailor at heart .
Bill5
Right now
onepointfivethumbs
Anarchist
There's one in Canindagua, NY, USA and one in Queensland AUS, a couple in Italy, Germany, Belgium, and France, but the critical mass is in the UK.
If I was ever to get a little boat just to screw around on it would've probably been the DZ at the old price point (EUR4450) but apparently Luca & Roman figured out that publicity would help sales and have since increased the price to EUR 6200 minus VAT and shipping, which means that buying one and trying to resell it on a continent with zero racing presence would almost certainly be a losing proposition. I also thought the WS report was unnecessarily unfair to the DZ considering that it was the only boat that was presented as a measurement-controlled class and Mackay has stated flat out that they had no intention of building M14's yet the M14 was ranked higher for distribution.
I saw the Melges demo and talked to a few people about it but it seems like such a small incremental update to the Laser that it almost doesn't seem worth the effort,(It even re-uses some Laser parts like the bow eye, gooseneck and vang tang). some of the juniors I coached were less than impressed with some of the layout decisions most notably the hiking strap.
The M14 site seems to be "selling an experience", I guess because there's some brand loyalty to the family in Wisconsin that makes them think they can charge 20% more for their boats and people tend to buy into more than one of their fleets. Five years out and there are 70 people listed in their "World League" ranking, while there are what, 200 Aeros in the US? I'd think the USA "Native" fleet would at least be close in numbers.
Daniel Holman
Anarchist
- 568
- 134
I've heard that there is a gaggle of Zeros growing in Germany (for that is the collective noun for D zeros) but I am not sure how big or widespread this gaggle is.
Cheers
Dan
Cheers
Dan
