Review of Simoun 445

Basic specs.

The Simoun 445 is a small sailing dinghy designed by the maritime architect Yves Loday in the early sixties. Several hundred boats have been produced. The Simoun 445 is built by the French yard Gouteron S.A..

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Hull

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.

Rig

Rig of Simoun 445 anno 1975.

The boat 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 genaker or a spinnaker for optimal speed.

Keel

CentreBoard

The Simoun 445 is equipped with a centreboard keel. A centreboard keel is a pivoting lifting keel, allowing to sail both coastal and inland waters.

The boat can only enter major marinas as the draft is about 2.00 - 2.10 meter (6.56 - 6.86 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.

Immersion rate

The immersion rate is defined as the weight required to sink the boat a certain level. The immersion rate for Simoun 445 is about 50 kg/cm, alternatively 282 lbs/inch.
Meaning: if you load 50 kg cargo on the boat then it will sink 1 cm. Alternatively, if you load 282 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.

L/B (Length Beam Ratio)

What is L/B (Length Beam Ratio)?

The l/b ratio for Simoun 445 is 2.51.

Compared with other similar dinghies it is more spacy than 62% of all other designs. It seems that the designer has chosen a slightly more spacy hull design.

Maintenance

Boat owner's ideas

This section is reserved boat owner's modifications, improvements, etc. Here you might find (or contribute with) inspiration for your boat.

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Finally

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References

[Ref 1]: ISO 8666 Small craft — Principal data.
[Ref 3]: ISO 12215-5 Small craft — Hull construction and scantlings.