"mmc" wrote in message
ng.com...
Agreed. Shallow water is the reason for my preference of a swing keel.
I'm
just off the Indian River Lagoon, where (as I'm sure you know), except for
a few spots in our area, sailing is pretty much restricted to the ICW
channel for boats with more than 4' draft. These open areas are mostly
deep enough but I've done my share of sandbar hopping on a friends 27
Hunter with 4'2" draft. There's the ocean too, but we're about 5 boat
hours from the inlet which doesn't allow for "just hop on the boat"
outings.
For shallow water I think that a centreboard is best if you want a boat that
can go well to windward when there is sufficient depth and yet go into
shallow water with the keel up.
I don't understand your preference for swing keel in shallow water, unless
we are not talking about the same thing. To me, a swing keel is what the
deep ocean racers have, with a heavy bulb at the bottom that can be swung to
one side to provide better stiffness on a long tack. In restricted shallow
water that would be useless since when you tack there would be insufficient
water to swing the keel down and hoist it up the other side.