Flat Stanley

This wasn't really meant to be a my boat is faster than yours thread, I was just keen to hear a bit more about then boat, given I wasn't even born for most of its heyday!

When I had it at Weston it was looking a bit sorry for itself, but structually its still strong and everything worked on it. A lot of it was to do with the crummy cover and worse trailer!

I'm not sure about the faster than a 49er claims, it was dog slow in anything less than a force 4 but infinitely more pleasurable to sail than the L4000 in any more than that which is kind of the point!  

Edited by rs405

Well..... the one time I went to weston in the Laser 4000 we were going
downwind flat wiring (not often done on the 4000 but there was
reasonable breeze) and were comfortably pacing one of the 12fters down
there. They were twin wiring, slight heel so clearly powered up and we
were going the same speed at the same angle.
The 4000 gets massacred by a 49er in speed obviously, so I don't see any
way that a 12fter or cherub is going to get anywhere near 49er pace
downwind.

I've raced the against the 14s at hayling in my 800 and they were losing
out slightly upwind and only slightly pulling out downwind..... The 49er
trounces an 800 in straight line speed.

I've heard lots of boats claiming they can either achieve similar speeds or
even keep pace with a 49er downwind..... I've never ever seen it and I've
never seen anything to lead me to believe any of it is true.

And lets face it, it's not even worth aiming for 49er pace until you can
challenge an Albacore!

Olly, never said It would beat a 49er (but I did beat a 12 foot skiff). Just said they had trouble keeping up when we popped the kite. 49ers tend to peak at around 18 knots most days, like Stanley does. But he'll break 20 pretty easily in the right conditions (mental!). For "flat out speed", 49ers arn't great.  Like I said, to a rookies untrained eye...

It's 2010. It's no suprise that 'your' yachts are built using the latest and greatest. Stanley is a 31 year old dinghy built in Kevlar/foam/epoxy sandwich.  Not to sure what your trying to say?

As for the 4Ks. Hull weight without fitting, wings or the extra lead you have to put in is 80kg. 'nuff said.

I'd recomend some imodium for that bad case of verble diarrhoea.

I think that what gives Stanley its endearing quality, was indeed the fact that it looked like a shed (even when it was only a couple of years old), and yet won most events in its day.

I once remember in the late 80s at Datchet, there were a couple of teenagers walking along the beach looking at the cherub fleet. They saw this old shed with dents and patches on the hull and varnish lifting of the deck and started laughing at it.  They made some derogatory comment about it, then we told them that they were looking at the boat that won the Bloody Mary just a couple of months earlier. They stopped taking the p*ss out of it and quietly moved on.

That was the "Stanley effect".

ross i saw it at weston and was a pile of crap,
there is no chance what so ever that you beat a 49er, not even ronin can, there arnt many boats that can beat them on flat out speed,
as for exotic materials we design crusing boats and have kevlar and carbon in our hulls that is layed on a computer analysis basis, with specific load paths and "supposedly exotic " building techniques
and as for beating 4ks i have seen it get shat on in any breeze by them

anywasy my words are said, lets have a burning ceremony