Most passengers in your Sunfish

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SonoraJoe

New Member
It's time I introduce my kids to the sailing I used to enjoy so much. I need a car top boat, and I've always loved the Sunfish. But I'm not sure it would handle the weight of me and the two kids. We would add up to just under 420 pounds. So I'm wondering how some of you have done with loads like that in your boats. How many kids have you had at one time, under what conditions was it manageable, and was it amenable to teaching sailing while having fun? How much weight can the Sunfish handle?
 
There are pictures of a fun race where each leg you add a passenger and IIRC there were 4 legs so 5 adult people on the fish.
Of course the more people the less "manuvering room" you have and should be restricted to light air days.
Not to mention setting up the rig for day sailing so the boom is quite a bit higher off the deck than for racing.
Trying to get even two people under a deck skimming boom during a tack or gybe can be just about impossible...LOL
 
We've had me, my wife, and our two kids on our Sunfish, in light air. Our kids are about 40 lb each, and my wife and I weigh about 320 together, so we weighed out at about 360 lb or so. The boat sat high in the water and performed well; the only issue was keeping everyone from getting tangled up in the boom/mainsheet when tacking.

Wind was very light. Sailing in a straight line in heavier air would have been no problem, but tacking would have been more complicated.
 
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