Oz IC, trapezing from the sliding seat!

This is the KA1- 'Beyond the Fringe'. He's not actually trapezing from the sliding seat. He has removed the seat, and added wings and a trapeze. The other interesting development is the concave foredeck. O yes, it's also an AC rather than an IC. That means it has a 23sqm assymetric spinnaker.He has also increased the working sail area to 11.7sqm.

More info click http://www.intcanoe.org/ausic/aus1.html

And for those who really do have nothing to do, can read all the results and opinions here: http://www.intcanoe.org/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=35


Edited by Strawberry

Phil has done a very nice job on AUS1 'Beyond the Fringe', specifically building it up for sailing on Lake Cootharaba in Queensland. He raced with us at the Nationals with his larger rig and kite over Easter. Off of a Yardstick of 85 (to the IC's 94), he came in second overall on yardstick to Seth in AUS14.

Interesting to see that in the 20+ knot conditions the IC's easily accounted from him around the buoys at McCrae last weekend but in the lighter conditions he was untouchable once he got the kite up. The boat would definitely benefit from a Carbon stick, and possibly moving the wings back (so he can keep the nose up in the waves). One of the major hinderances in the waves was the bow going under and the kite (in sock) getting heavy and driving the nose in further.

A testament to the efficiency of the sliding plank is how wide the wings have to be for trapping off of to get equivelant righting leverage.

www.internationalcanoe.yachting.org.au

There is indeed a school of thought in the IC class (as opppsed to the kite equipped canoes) which is looking at another approach to more speed. That is to return the boat to its pre 1970s box rule and to reduce the minimum weight significantly, but not to increase the sail area or righting moment. Full hydrofoils would be a road to far at the present state of the art I think: those who've sailed both foil Moths and modern Canoes seem to be of the opinion that you need to do more jumping about the trampoline on a Moth than is really practical on a sliding seat.

There's more about lightweight Canoes elsehere on this forum, suffice to say that one prototype has been built and sailed (by Steve Clark, owner of Cogito, the C Class that current holds the Little Americas Cup) and another is on the way (being built by Andy Paterson - inventor of the Narrow Moth and the first person to sail a Moth on hydrofoils) I think its fair to say that these two are probably adequately receptive to new ideas!

Large rags are pretty much off the agenda, the general feeling being that to get the perfprmance with small rags has just so much more style and class (and besides, big sails are just sooo 1990s!)

Edited by JimC

Originally posted by getafix and slightly deeper rudder b) lighter but bigger rig (higher aspect sails as before not neccessarily a big bump in overall area) and c) lighter hull weight

Rudder size isn't limited anyway, and nor is mainail aspect ratio. There is a limitation on mast height but I don't believe if forces an over squat sail. Certainly If I were putting a new sail on my current IC then it would have a slightly shorter boom and more area up top for a higher aspect ratio. My new ex Cherub stick is pretty light!

The conventional Canoe rudder is small, but seems to work OK with sufficient practise, but a bigger rudder aand smaller daggerboartd would be in line with trends in some other classes.

So your suggestions would seem to bne already included in the current proposals...

seems they took a boat (the IC) a good club sailor could attainably get good on within years of weekend or every-other-weekend sailing and made it into a boat (IAC) which only those with a great deal of time to go sailing could perfect to the point of getting round a course in a blow or in a regatta against similar boats

... but I'm on the outside looking in so I'm sure some IAC sailors will object!