JFC!
Bell dealers in Upstate NY don't count because the hulls haven't been made in a while. Colden and Hemlock are direct to the public builders. NorthStar sells through Oak Orchard Lake George Kayak and Raquette River. Swift is available through Bay Creek, Raquette River, Adk Lakes and Trails, Adk Pole and Paddle, both Mountain Man outlets and a Kingston dealer. Wenonah sells through more dealers, Including Oak Orchard, Blue Mountain Outs., Raquette River, Mac's Canoes, Adk Lakes and Trails and both Mountain Man facilities.
DY does his boats in series. The first in his small, performance, tandem series was the Sawyer 190 Cruiser. Then came the Curtis NorthStar and Swift Algonquin; all with symmetrical rocker, the first and third flared hulls, the NStar tumblehomed. The Bell NorthStar added shouldered tumblehome and differential rocker, the last in the line Swift Kee 16 has those features with stepped bow rocker. It would take a pretty sensitive paddler to discern performance differences between the latter two if blindfolded and not allowed to touch seat or rails. On the other hand, it's ignorant and/or insulting for someone to claim the greatest designer of our era stopped learning decades ago.
DY has done several series of solo hulls, delta shaped sit & switchers, solo trippers and sport solos. Only the latter two categories are mistakenly described above. DY's hulls have migrated away from arched towards elliptical bottoms over time, but they always feature soft chines to improve seakindlyness and all share that "feel"
DY's Solo trippers started with the '78 Curtis Solo Tripper, the Sawyer '79 Autumn Mist and StarLight, followed by Curtis' 82 Vagabond and '87 Nomad, now Coldens, the first two with shouldered tumblehome. Then came the '91 Swift Loon and Heron and the Loon Works Mistral, followed by the '94 Bell Merlin II, the '06 Placid RapidFire and the '12 Swift Keewaydin 15 and '14 Kee 14 and the '14 NorthStar NorthWind Solo. In between the Merlin II and RFire, Hemlock extended the stem layout on Vagabond and Nomad and splashed them, creating, kinda, the Kestrel and Peregrine. All these boats have length to weight ratios near 7 for forward efficiency and tracking. Differential rocker improving both starting with Nomad, stepped rocker being added to the two Swifts and NorthWind. Of note, Vagabond, Loon, Kestral, RapidFire and Kee 14 are a little shorter and narrower for greater efficiency with smaller paddlers and run ~27.5" wide. The others are 28.5-30" wide and longer, the concept being to target both shoulders of the bell shaped curve of human sizing. While our blindfolded paddler could easily tell the narrower from the wider, acceleration, top end and turning are pretty similar, differential rocker being discernible to the sensitive. The bubble sided Sawyers and Swifts probably not noticable from the shouldered Bell, Colden, Curtis, Helmock and Placid because no blindfolded paddler will be heeling to the rail.
DY's Sport solos all descend from the '78 Curtis LadyBug and '82 DragonFly. Compared to the solo trippers, they are wider, shorter and have greater, symmetrical, rocker with w/L ratios near 6, excepting the combined class race DragonFly. Shorter hulls with lower L/W ratio improves maneuverability as some cost in forward speed and tracking. Symmetrical rocker requires mastry of th forward stroke to track well but also improves maneuverability, particularly as the hull is heeled and the stern slidded through turns. There was a downsized SoapBox stripper version of the LB in the early 80; two made, one in the posession of a beautiful lady near Rochester, the other gone forever with Emily Brown. The Bell FlashFire and WildFire combined shouldered tumblehome with elliptical bottoms, both now infused by Colden.
Yes, these two series share cross sectional shaping and chine softness of chines, but length, L/W ratio, and rocker, how much and differences bow and stern yields hulls with radically different performance characteristics.
DY has recently included differential rocker in his sport boats to improve tracking for entry/intermediate level paddlers. This started with the Bell YellowStone Solo, Placid's SpitFire, and the '15 NorthStar Phoenix. The WeNoNah Argosy fits in this category.
How to discern between this tome and opposing constructs above? It's an instance of the fingerpost. I brought DY to Bell Canoe, speced, i.e. worked with him on length, width, rocker, shear and tumblehome on the FlashFire WildFire, StarFire, NorthStar, Merlin II and YellowStone Solo and both Placid projects mentioned above. There were others. I also worked with him on specs for the Swift Kee 16, 15, 14.