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tickler View Drop Down
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Joined: 03 Jun 07
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Posts: 895 		Post Options Post Options   Quote tickler Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: V Twin
    Posted: 25 May 12 at 3:21pm
Going back several pages.......the OK is one of the most horrible looking boats ever built and you need to be a limbo dancer to get under the boom.....but. Last year at Glossop SC, incredibly windy for a local trophy race. The wind funnels down the valley like an express train. Few boats even started much less complete a lap. After three persuit races the order was Javelin (sailed by husband and wife team, multi national champs and European champs). Second OK with modern rig and carbon mast third Byte C2 (the boy) fourth Byte C2. No other boats made it past the first race.
The Javelin at 17'7" is very fast upwind in those conditions. The ok coped well with the gusts and then had a knack of floating on its side with the mast horizontal to the water. The quite wide hull then shielded the sail from the wind, a little wriggle from the helm and up it came again. That OK never went over properly all day. Someone did try an 800 but that broke and came back as did a 400. The two best boats on that day were 'ancient designs', but they were the best.

I would like to meet the man who could build a light boat that could cope with that.

Come on young Fuller (be you Ms or Mr), get in your EPS and give it a good thrashing!
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tickler View Drop Down
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Posts: 895 		Post Options Post Options   Quote tickler Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 May 12 at 3:24pm
Oh, and by the way Ruscoe if you want a nice old Contenders PM me.....yellow, Rondar....
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Presuming Ed View Drop Down
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Posts: 641 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Presuming Ed Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 May 12 at 4:11pm
Originally posted by pondmonkey

Fair points- but the weight game for elite sporting products has changed since Torbole.   I guess I'm saying the 49er hull seems to have stood the test of time- relative to the pace of technology-change in other aspects of our lives.  

People have known about carbon for ages - well before the trials. IIRC from the dinghy show, Rodney P was playing with carbon and honeycomb in his FDs. Wikipedia tells us that honeycomb sandwich construction was proposed in 1915. Tecnara built Tag Heuer in 1992, just to prove that the boatshop floor isn't a labatory... Smile

Downside of carbon is the cost. 
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Posts: 3011 		Post Options Post Options   Quote RS400atC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 May 12 at 7:23pm
Originally posted by tickler

Going back several pages.......the OK is one of the most horrible looking boats ever built and you need to be a limbo dancer to get under the boom.....but. Last year at Glossop SC, incredibly windy for a local trophy race. The wind funnels down the valley like an express train. Few boats even started much less complete a lap. After three persuit races the order was Javelin (sailed by husband and wife team, multi national champs and European champs). Second OK with modern rig and carbon mast third Byte C2 (the boy) fourth Byte C2. No other boats made it past the first race.
The Javelin at 17'7" is very fast upwind in those conditions. The ok coped well with the gusts and then had a knack of floating on its side with the mast horizontal to the water. The quite wide hull then shielded the sail from the wind, a little wriggle from the helm and up it came again. That OK never went over properly all day. Someone did try an 800 but that broke and came back as did a 400. The two best boats on that day were 'ancient designs', but they were the best.

I would like to meet the man who could build a light boat that could cope with that.
...


Ultimately, that is the ugly logic that leads us to keelboats.
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tickler View Drop Down
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Posts: 895 		Post Options Post Options   Quote tickler Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 26 May 12 at 8:50pm
Hw come? A keelboat is a thing with balast on the bottom whereas a dinghy is bodyswung? Javelin is actually not that heavy but it is strong.
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 May 12 at 9:34am
 
Originally posted by G.R.F.

Bikes: I sell downhill ATB's don't know where you've been, but i ride one with hammershmidt 2 speed auto change front, and uppy downey push button seat post, 6 inch travel front and rear forks adjustment to lock em out for uphill, lights that make night day, hydro formed alloy, carbon bars, heat resistant disc rotors, powered by hydraulic brakes, it goes on.


But if weight is so important, what are you doing messing about with a dual suspension bike that is heavier than a hardtail, road bike, singlespeed, hardtail or CX bike of equivalent quality?

I'm not expert, but as I understand it and as Bike Radar puts it, "interest in road cycling in general and in hybrid bikes in particular is on the up, mountain biking’s star is on the wane, and the level of interest in folding and singlespeed machines remains static." My books on bike design indicates that the mountain bike marked started to slump within a year or two of dual suspension and discs hitting the mass market. So where is the proof that the increase in MTB technology has actually made it more popular?

Sorry, but a piece of comparatively heavy sporting equipment of declining popularity doesn't seem to be an example to hold up when you are saying that boats must lose weight.

And is there any evidence that MTBs are actually advancing faster than boats? Bikes have auto suspension, boats have flex-tip masts. Bikes can adjust their forks, boats have single-string rake, ball bearing travellers and gnavs. Bikes are hydroformed alloy and carbon, boats are foam sandwich and carbon. The ultimate performance dinghy (Moth) has increased its speed vastly more the last decade, and the downhilling speed record has been static through that time while road speeds have actually declined, to the great relief of those who see it as evidence of success in the doping fight. So there's not much evidence that bikes lead boats in development or that greater speed equals greater interest. 

BTW re Austin 7s; yes, people no longer drive them around much, but on the other hand the '50s vintage Lotus/Caterham 7 still claims to be the world's most popular racing car. Nor does any popular motor racing class seem to be without the minimum weight rules you are so much against. So it's not just the sailing world but also the motor racing and bicycle racing worlds who are all marching out of step, and only you who is right.....

I completely agree that dinghies need to be more accessible, but you can't make them more accessible by demanding that they become lighter (which means extra expense or reduced durability or a change in attitudes, like not crashing them onto shingle beaches) AND cheaper AND AND easier to sail AND more complex. 

One thing that no one in the "destroy all the old classes" camp has ever demonstrated is exactly how this would work. For example, if the Solo started to decline tomorrow, the existing owners would suffer a considerable loss in their resale. Exactly how are they going to then afford to buy the new craft that those who claim superior intellect and wisdom tell them that they need? And don't forget, despite various subsidies the classes that take the ultra-light path you are advocating are failures in the mass market. 

There are physical issues in design that complaining will not erase. Surely the hybrid windsurfers like the Mistral Prodigy you were involved in demonstrated that! For all the hype, they failed dismally at competing with longer boards because the laws of physics do not change, no matter how many Prodigys or VTwins are launched.

What you seem to be doing is complaining without worrying about reality for normal sailors, just like people complained about longboard windsurfers back in the '80s - and look how much that hurt windsurfing. The basic idea that sport equipment needs increased performance and reduced weight is simply not borne out, as looking at comparable sports demonstrates. Dinghy sailing is progressing quickly, compared to many other sports (although IMHO there's far too much emphasis on increased performance and not enough on increased accessibility) but the fact is that the fastest boats do not attract many sailors, whether noobs or vets.
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Andymac View Drop Down
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Posts: 852 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Andymac Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 May 12 at 9:48am
I didn't know you had written books on bike design Chris, what with you declaring that you are 'no expert'. Wink
 
Whatever next; GRF writes a book on dinghy design.
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 May 12 at 9:49am
Originally posted by Presuming Ed

Originally posted by pondmonkey

Fair points- but the weight game for elite sporting products has changed since Torbole.   I guess I'm saying the 49er hull seems to have stood the test of time- relative to the pace of technology-change in other aspects of our lives.  

People have known about carbon for ages - well before the trials. IIRC from the dinghy show, Rodney P was playing with carbon and honeycomb in his FDs. Wikipedia tells us that honeycomb sandwich construction was proposed in 1915. Tecnara built Tag Heuer in 1992, just to prove that the boatshop floor isn't a labatory... Smile

Downside of carbon is the cost. 

I'm not having a go at you, but as far as I know in many equipment sports the "weight game" restrictions have stayed pretty much the same. Do you know of many in which the weights have dropped much?

BTW the earliest carbon boat I can find evidence was a Parker Contender, from '68 IIRC. There was a fairly detailed article about it at the time.
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Chris 249 View Drop Down
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Posts: 2041 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Chris 249 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 May 12 at 9:54am
Tongue
Originally posted by Andymac

I didn't know you had written books on bike design Chris, what with you declaring that you are 'no expert'.
 
Whatever next; GRF writes a book on dinghy design.

Whoops...I should have said "books I own about bike design Embarrassed Wink Closest I've come to designing a bike is hacking a flatbar into a cyclocross bike. It survived its first race yesterday only to come close to expiring spectacularly this afternoon, leaving me with a derailleur jammed in the spokes and my heart jammed in my mouth! I should stick to things where my failures just put me in the drink.
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tickler View Drop Down
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Posts: 895 		Post Options Post Options   Quote tickler Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 27 May 12 at 11:41am
Whoops....dont admit to owning a 'book'........you'll get drummed off!
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