Fun Boat
It’s a Family Fun Boat
The 'Rainbow' is a 3.6 metre (12 foot) sailboat. The design is extremely flexible. While excellent for training at a club or sailing school, it can easily be configured for high performance racing or used as a simple family fun boat. Weighing less than 40kg it can travel on a roof rack for holidays at the beach or camping trips to secluded waters. It's fun to build and fun to sail, especially if you have built it yourself. See the gallery page for pictures of Rainbows being built and enjoyed by amateur builders.
It’s a Real Boat
The Rainbow is not a knock-it-up-in-a-weekend and throwaway boat. It's a real boat, light for ease of transport but strong and enduring. The boat is easy and forgiving to sail but, in the hands of an experienced crew, it offers remarkable performance in suitable conditions.
Build it yourself
Construction is from timber and plywood. You make up the key components like the centreboard box, then assemble them on a building frame. Full sized patterns make marking out simple. There is no difficult bending or compound curves.
Gain new skills
From its earliest days, he Rainbow was designed for novice builders as well as the experienced. The updated building process is optimised to be as fool proof as possible - the step by step construction system is self checking as work progresses. This helps grow the builder's confidence.
After enjoying building your Rainbow your new skills may invite you take on larger projects, a bigger boat (how about a live aboard yacht for a Pacific cruise!) or at least do those jobs around the home with new confidence.
One third the cost
Cost varies depending on how much you make yourself and what you buy in kits. Typically the cost is about one third the cost of a similar sized ready to sail boat. One third the cost and often three times the boat!
OK for Adults or Kids
Your new boat can be sailed by children or adults. For teaching, there is room for three on board - no need for shouting from the beach! The Rainbow is very responsive and manoeuvrable and easy to learn to sail in. The rig is simple and easy to control. In short, it’s lots of fun!