Review of Kelt 5.50
Basic specs.
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The hull is made of fibreglass. Generally, a hull made of fibreglass requires only a minimum of maintenance during the sailing season. And outside the sailing season, just bottom cleaning and perhaps anti-fouling painting once a year - a few hours of work, that's all.
The Kelt 5.50 is equipped with a fractional rig. A fractional rig has smaller headsails which make tacking easier, which is an advantage for cruisers and racers, of course. The downside is that having the wind from behind often requires a gennaker or a spinnaker for optimal speed.
The Kelt 5.50 has been built with different keel alternatives.
Unknown keel type
The boat can enter even shallow marinas as the draft is just about 0.98 - 1.08 meter (3.22 - 3.52 ft) dependent on the load. See immersion rate below.
Unknown keel type
The boat can sail close to the beach as the draft is just 0.30 - 0.40 meter (0.98 - 1.28 ft) dependent of the load. See immersion rate below.
Fin keel
The Kelt 5.50 is equipped with a fin keel. The fin keel is the most common keel and provides splendid manoeuvrability. The downside is that it has less directional stability than a long keel.
Kelt 5.50 can enter even shallow marinas as the draft is just about 0.75 - 0.85 meter (2.46 - 2.76 ft) dependent on the load. See immersion rate below.
Sailing characteristics
This section covers widely used rules of thumb to describe the sailing characteristics. Please note that even though the calculations are correct, the interpretation of the results might not be valid for extreme boats.
The immersion rate is defined as the weight required to sink the boat a certain level.
The immersion rate for Kelt 5.50 is about 84 kg/cm, alternatively 474 lbs/inch.
Meaning: if you load 84 kg cargo on the boat then it will sink 1 cm.
Alternatively, if you load 474 lbs cargo on the boat it will sink 1 inch.
Sailing statistics
This section is statistical comparison with similar boats of the same category. The basis of the following statistical computations is our unique database with more than 26,000 different boat types and 350,000 data points.
What is L/B (Length Beam Ratio)?
The l/b ratio for Kelt 5.50 is 2.33.
Maintenance
If you need to renew parts of your running rig and is not quite sure of the dimensions, you may find the estimates computed below useful.
| Usage | Length | Diameter | ||
| Jib sheet | 5.4 m | (17.8 feet) | 8 mm | (5/16 inch) |
| Genoa sheet | 5.4 m | (17.8 feet) | 8 mm | (5/16 inch) |
| Mainsheet | 13.6 m | (44.5 feet) | 8 mm | (5/16 inch) |
| Spinnaker sheet | 11.9 m | (39.2 feet) | 8 mm | (5/16 inch) |
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