Are weight equalisaiton systems safe?

   Hi - A bit of 'Blaze history' - the early 10.4m fully battened sail was replaced about 4 years ago by a smaller 10.0 semi-soft sail developed by the class association and Sobstad. (now virtually universal) Only it's top two battens are now full width - this was done to overcome problems with the original sail which was simply horrible in F4 and above.  The boat is now transformed and helms can 'feather' the sail upwind and keep the boat moving fast.  The problem with some fully battened sails, particularly on singlehanders is that when sheeting out in a gust the battens support the chord of the sail into the airflow around the mast - this increases drag, the boat slows more and the helm has to let the boom out further etc etc (and repeat).  It was also very possible to be caught in irons if technique was less than perfect when tacking with the original sail (Sound familiar to some of you ?).  The semi-soft approach, as with 'traditional' sails, allows the helm to dump power and  keep the boat tracking as the luff of the sail can, when necessary, 'feather' as the rig is adjusted.   Getting caught in irons, a problem with many novices, was also banished.  You will notice that many of the later RS designs (and others) have also realised the limitations of fully battened (large) sails on all sorts of boats in recent years - no point in having power that is unusable ...The Blaze is now slightly slower in very light winds, but points higher and when it blows it really comes into its own. 
Equalisation - well for us it did not really work.  Lightweights hated the lead (up to 12kg) in the boat especially when it blew and the heavyweights could not use the toestrap system properly as they were forced to have the wings 'in' and could not get far enough from the straps to hike well.  The Blaze has very little 'rocker' (very flat fore and aft) at all and the impression we got is that this sort of hull form was relatively insensitive to the attempts at equalisation.  We found the big guys won heavy wind races regardless - possibly because they are generall stronger and lightweights, even with lead, got to the front in the light stuff.  In the end we abandoned the system and accept that certain people are possibly advantaged in some conditions.  But it has not influenced results to any perceptable extent.  70kg helms and 95kg crews are remarkably close in most conditions.  We think this is because the rig is highly adjustable - a benefit of being held up with untrendy wire and that this is perhaps the best way to 'even out' some of the gross differences between crew sizes and weights.  In short we have rediscovered many of the advantages of the rigs developed and that evolved in many traditional classes. We are hopelessly biased, of course, but would encourage anyone remotely interested to try one - contact the association.  Cheers - Mike Lyons

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mpl720 Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Newbie Joined: 15 Nov 04 Location: United States Online Status: Offline Posts: 23	Post Options Post Reply Quote mpl720 Report Post Quote Reply Topic: Are weight equalisaiton systems safe? Posted: 07 Dec 04 at 9:18am
	Hi - A bit of 'Blaze history' - the early 10.4m fully battened sail was replaced about 4 years ago by a smaller 10.0 semi-soft sail developed by the class association and Sobstad. (now virtually universal) Only it's top two battens are now full width - this was done to overcome problems with the original sail which was simply horrible in F4 and above. The boat is now transformed and helms can 'feather' the sail upwind and keep the boat moving fast. The problem with some fully battened sails, particularly on singlehanders is that when sheeting out in a gust the battens support the chord of the sail into the airflow around the mast - this increases drag, the boat slows more and the helm has to let the boom out further etc etc (and repeat). It was also very possible to be caught in irons if technique was less than perfect when tacking with the original sail (Sound familiar to some of you ?). The semi-soft approach, as with 'traditional' sails, allows the helm to dump power and keep the boat tracking as the luff of the sail can, when necessary, 'feather' as the rig is adjusted. Getting caught in irons, a problem with many novices, was also banished. You will notice that many of the later RS designs (and others) have also realised the limitations of fully battened (large) sails on all sorts of boats in recent years - no point in having power that is unusable ...The Blaze is now slightly slower in very light winds, but points higher and when it blows it really comes into its own. Equalisation - well for us it did not really work. Lightweights hated the lead (up to 12kg) in the boat especially when it blew and the heavyweights could not use the toestrap system properly as they were forced to have the wings 'in' and could not get far enough from the straps to hike well. The Blaze has very little 'rocker' (very flat fore and aft) at all and the impression we got is that this sort of hull form was relatively insensitive to the attempts at equalisation. We found the big guys won heavy wind races regardless - possibly because they are generall stronger and lightweights, even with lead, got to the front in the light stuff. In the end we abandoned the system and accept that certain people are possibly advantaged in some conditions. But it has not influenced results to any perceptable extent. 70kg helms and 95kg crews are remarkably close in most conditions. We think this is because the rig is highly adjustable - a benefit of being held up with untrendy wire and that this is perhaps the best way to 'even out' some of the gross differences between crew sizes and weights. In short we have rediscovered many of the advantages of the rigs developed and that evolved in many traditional classes. We are hopelessly biased, of course, but would encourage anyone remotely interested to try one - contact the association. Cheers - Mike Lyons

Rob.e Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Really should get out more Joined: 19 Oct 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 545	Post Options Post Reply Quote Rob.e Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 06 Dec 04 at 7:44pm
	I heard there where two 300's in Aus, (bizarely with aft mainsheets? tho that may be a myth). The old Blaze rig was supposed to be difficult, but the new rig sounds like it makes the boat really nice! They are at least selling well. The 300 is the fastest of all, but also more demanding, coming from a Moth designer. To my mind it has all the best features of the earlier Moths, i.e. it's "cutting edge", light, fast and rewarding, but not as extreme as the latest designs. They probably made it too difficult for the market it serves, so they haven't really sold enough. It needs a season to learn, but once mastered, is not that hard to sail, and pays you back for all the effort! By the way, the'yre all faster than the Laser, and the 300 rates just slower than the contender, but close enough to really race boat for boat- the best sailor would probably win! Edited by Rob.e

Chris 249 Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Visit Member's Homepage Really should get out more Joined: 10 May 04 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2041	Post Options Post Reply Quote Chris 249 Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 06 Dec 04 at 5:23am
	Thanks for that GM, interesting info; we never got to see any of those boats out here in Australia.

GM Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Posting king Joined: 19 Mar 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 122	Post Options Post Reply Quote GM Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 05 Dec 04 at 6:21pm
	I think there were a couple of problems with the eps. The first was that laser marketed it as a boat to sail in Audi sponsored UK and Euro series - which some people did. However, when Laser bumped the class from the Audi stuff there wasn't a particularly strong class association to organise anything else. There also didn't seem to be any clubs with a fleet of any size to promote it as a club race boat. Second problem, the Vortex - Laser weren't selling too many boats anyway and they seem to have been wary of trying to sell two boats to the same potential purchasers. So the new Vortex stayed and the "old" eps got dumped. There was also a story that they were making a loss on every eps they sold but might just be a story. I've not sailed a 300 and I've only briefly sailed a Blaze (with the old rig, not the new X one). I think the 300 is a much more difficult boat to keep upright than the other two due to its narrow hull shape. The Blaze was a handful in strong winds because the old rig was a bit of a disaster. (The original boats weren't as fast as Topper expected so they stuck a longer boom on and added 1.4 sq m to the sail, mainly onto the leech.) The new rig seems to have transformed the boat - it isn't any faster (and it might be a little slower in very light stuff), but the helms don't have to fight the boat upwind anymore. I think the eps is still a better boat, comfortable to hike because of the wing shape (not just a bit of tube like a Blaze) and the buoyancy in the wings does tend to slow the capsize process down enough to give you a chance to sort things out (sometimes!). I don't think the eps is as quick as the handicap of 1013 suggests. Laser had actually suggested 1030 I think. The guy I bought my boat from was allegedly to blame. My club always puts in lots of RYA returns and the previous owner did a lot of winning - he also sailed the boat with the wings right out despite being a heavyweight (I can't really critisise him cos thats what I used to do too!). So there were suggestions that his results made up a significant part of the total returns the RYA received! Edited to say it weighed about 65 kg, big rig 9.3 sq m. By comparison, Blaze is around 80kg (I think), X rig sail is 10 sq m. Edited by GM

Chris 249 Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Visit Member's Homepage Really should get out more Joined: 10 May 04 Online Status: Offline Posts: 2041	Post Options Post Reply Quote Chris 249 Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 05 Dec 04 at 11:19am
	GM, what happened with the EPS? How did it compare to the 300 and Blaze (or Laser and Contender etc) in sailing performance and feel? What did one weigh?

GM Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Posting king Joined: 19 Mar 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 122	Post Options Post Reply Quote GM Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 03 Dec 04 at 7:20pm
	Speaking as an eps owner (although the poor thing doesn't get sailed much these days) the weight equalisation thing seemed to work reasonably well when the boats were being raced one design. Once Laser removed the class from the Audi sponsored tour hardly anyone raced one design anymore. The owners decided that there wasn't much point in sailing a fast boat and deliberately slowing it down by making people bring the wings in so ditched the rule. Don't think I ever sailed mine with the wings in the "correct" place. The Blazes did something similar - although they did in it two stages I think. Doesn't seem to have made a lot of difference to the results amongst the Blazes at my club - no real correlation between weight and results.

redback Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Visit Member's Homepage Really should get out more Joined: 16 Mar 04 Location: Tunbridge Wells Online Status: Offline Posts: 1502	Post Options Post Reply Quote redback Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 03 Dec 04 at 12:01am
	I have to admit that the Laser 4000 is not an easy boat to right - although the equalisation system has very little to do with it. I think we have to accept that some of these high performance boats are not for everybody.

Rob.e Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Really should get out more Joined: 19 Oct 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 545	Post Options Post Reply Quote Rob.e Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 02 Dec 04 at 8:45pm
	I've noticed that successful weight equalisation systems seem to be mainly restricted to trapezing boats and rely on a mix of greater leverage and weight adjustment. It's interesting that there doesn't seem to be a system thats worked for sitting out dinghies, or at least in singlehanders, (my interest!) I'm thinking of the EPS (now deceased), the Blaze (they dropped their system I believe) and the RS300 (the smaller rig is not popular, despite being much easier to sail) Any thoughts on why this is?

MikeBz Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Really should get out more Joined: 21 Apr 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 536	Post Options Post Reply Quote MikeBz Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 02 Dec 04 at 11:47am
	If the weight was put at the top of the mast then you might have a point. But with it placed inside the hull the effect will be very small. In terms of 'putting sailors at risk' you can find many un-equalised dinghies which are heavier therefore harder to right than plenty of the equalised dinghies, but nobody seems to be getting worried about those boats being 'unsafe' - you have to choose a boat (including the configuration you'll sail it in) that is suitable for you. Mike Edited by MikeBz

Jon Emmett Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Visit Member's Homepage Really should get out more Joined: 15 Mar 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 988	Post Options Post Reply Quote Jon Emmett Report Post Quote Reply Posted: 02 Dec 04 at 8:19am
	When I sailed an RS700 I was always on maximum lead and I never came close to having a problem. The lead was all placed very close to the top of the centreboard. The only issue was getting over the racks, which where very wide (when I put in my intermediates on I found I could not get through the gap!)
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