Boat Weight              72-74 kg

Hull Length               4.4 m

Beam Length             1.7 m

No. of Crew               2

Number of Trapeze  Single

Opt Crew Weight     120 – 140 kg

Hull Material              GRP

Year Designed         1997

Spinnaker Area        16.83 m2

Sail Area (Upwind)  13.19 m2

Designer                    Julian Bethwaite

29er Class Association website: https://www.29er.org/

The Boat

The 29er was designed by Australian skiff legend Julian Bethwaite, with a team of internationally recognized dinghy sailors.

Although the design was originally targeted to youth sailors as a feeder class to the Olympic 49er, the 29er is a “super class” on its own merits. The optimal combined crew weight is considered to be 120 – 145kg’s but is by no means limited to that span.

29ers are built to exceedingly strict one design standards, and under strict control of World Sailing. This assures that sailing ability is the key performance criterium.

The boats are rugged, well equipped and fully competitive straight out of the box. Failures are rare, sails are durable, and the expense of running the boat is modest.

The Hull 

Constructed from hi-tech fibreglass-reinforced polyester in a foam sandwich layout, the hull is ultra-lightweight with a self-draining cockpit.

The Rig 

The mast is in three parts – an aluminium bottom and middle section, with a polyester-fiberglass composite tip that gives the ultimate in gust response and acceleration.

The Sails

The 29er sails include a fully battened mainsail and self-tacking jib. Both mainsail and jib are made from a mylar transparent laminate. Add on an asymmetric spinnaker and you’ll discover the 29er is pure dynamite downwind.

Other design features include a mainsail cuff to increase sail efficiency, a ram vang, safety foot/grab rails and an enclosed transom.

The Foils

Foils are made in CNC cut aluminium tooling.

Mackay built 29ers

Mackay built 29er hulls, foils and spars now available in New Zealand again.

With the Oceanic fleet sizes growing and new fleets in Asia and other Pacific rim countries, we recommenced production in 2020 using a full set of the latest moulds all made from CNC cut plugs.

Attention to detail is everything on our 29ers.