Design and Construction
The Rocket’s hull is a vacuum-infused vinylester fiberglass composite using a thermoplastic honeycomb core laminate, described by the builder as an intensely rugged yet extra-lightweight cored structure anchor. The hull itself weighs 90 pounds in the prototype record and is quoted elsewhere at a 100-pound complete hull figure, roughly 20 percent lighter than conventional builds of this type and well under the original Phantom’s dry weight of upwards of 130 pounds anchor. The shape is a V-bottom, and the widest sections of that V sit directly where the crew sits, a layout the builder credits for the boat feeling palpably more stable than comparable boats on the market. The deck and cockpit are finished with EVA foam padding along the cockpit, gunwales, and daggerboard trunk, and later 2026-model Rockets added full deck foam coverage, inspection ports, and rub rail.
Rig and Handling
The lateen (crab-claw) rig is deliberately primitive: one mast, two lightweight spars linked with Spectra strops, and a single halyard. The sail, boom, and gaffe lay down on the deck ready to be raised, and stepping the rig is a matter of pulling the halyard 10 feet and cleating it. With 81 square feet of sail on a 169-inch overall hull, the boat is built to move—in good breeze it will plane upwind, downwind, and on reaches, a rare trait in a boat this small and light.
Accommodations
There are no cabins or berths here; the Rocket is a day dinghy. Its defining interior space is an expansive full-length cockpit stretching all the way to the stern, with 75 inches (6 feet 3 inches) of floor length and a padded, soft non-slip marine deck foam bottom. That open layout replaces the Phantom’s enclosed cockpit and turns the entire topside into usable crew space.
Equipment and Sailaway Package
Each Rocket ships as a complete sailaway package with a fully outfitted hull, assembled mast and spars, sail, all lines and ropes, daggerboard, and rudder. An optional “Interceptor” upgrade adds rudder elevators, offered by the builder as a performance option rather than standard equipment.
The Verdict
The Fulcrum Rocket is a disciplined exercise in subtraction: it takes proven small-dinghy tooling, strips weight through cored composite construction, and opens the deck into a single airy cockpit. It sails with the effortless simplicity of a lateen rig yet planes in all directions when pressed. The trade-off is that it is unapologetically minimal—no creature comforts, no auxiliary, no enclosed space—and the buyer is buying a pure day-sailing platform.
Pros
- Cored composite hull at 90–100 lb, ~20% lighter than conventional builds
- Full-length open cockpit with padded non-slip foam
- Lateen/crab-claw rig rigged with one halyard pull
- Planes upwind, downwind, and on reaches
- Complete sailaway package from the builder
Cons
- Minimalist by design—no enclosed accommodation
- Interceptor rudder-elevator upgrade is optional, not standard
