Review of International FJ

Basic specs.

The International FJ also known as Flying Junior or Flying Jr. is a small sailing dinghy designed by the Dutch maritime architect Uus van Essen together with Conrad Gulcher also from Netherlands in the early fifties. Several thousand boats have been built.

It was officially renamed the International FJ in 1980.

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Hull

The hull is made of plywood.
Some boats have a hull made of Fibreglass.

Keel

DaggerBoard aka Sword

The International FJ is built with a daggerboard keel. A daggerboard is a lifting keel that can be lowered and raised vertically, allowing the boat to enter shallow waters.

The boat can sail close to the beach as the draft is just 0.18 - 0.28 meter (0.59 - 0.89 ft) dependent of 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.

EU classification

International FJ holds a CE certification:

The boat is by European Union certified as Class C. INSHORE:

Designed for voyages in coastal waters, large bays, estuaries, lakes and rivers where conditions up to, and including, wind force 6 (Beaufort scale) and significant wave heights up to, and including, 2 m may be experienced.

Immersion rate

The immersion rate is defined as the weight required to sink the boat a certain level. The immersion rate for International FJ is about 39 kg/cm, alternatively 223 lbs/inch.
Meaning: if you load 39 kg cargo on the boat then it will sink 1 cm. Alternatively, if you load 223 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 International FJ is 2.52.

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.

Do you have changes/improvements you would like to share? Upload a photo and describe what you have done.

Finally

We are always looking for new photos. If you can contribute with photos for International FJ it would be a great help.

If you have any comments to the review, improvement suggestions, or the like, feel free to contact us. Criticism helps us to improve.

References

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