Victory at 505 Nationals for New Seldén Products
by Ben McGrane 25 Jul 2008 12:51 BST
25 July 2008
Victory at 505 Nationals
At the recent 505 UK National Championships hosted by Lymington Town Sailing Club, the P&B team of Ian Pinnell and Carl Gibbon sailed to a victory with the first carbon boom to be produced by Seldén for use in the 505. The pairing scored two 1st and two 2nd positions to sail to a comfortable victory in the forty-boat fleet.
Like all Seldén carbon products, the 505 carbon boom specification is tailored exactly to the requirements of the loads produced by the boat. Localised reinforcement and patching make the boom is as light as possible while having the strength where it is required.
Ian and Carl were also using the new ALTO section mast, this new product enters into the Seldén aluminium dinghy mast range between the existing Cumulus and Epsilon. With an increase of 4-5% stiffness over the Cumulus, the ALTO is proving a great addition, quickly becoming popular with lighter teams in the 505 class and achieving excellent results at major regattas in the 470 and Fireball this season.
Seldén produce many carbon and aluminium dinghy spars across a wide range of classes. If you would like more information on existing products or would like to discuss developments within your class then please contact Ben McGrane on 01329 504021 or
Seldén Carbon Production
The winding is CNC controlled on a machine engineered to high engineering tolerances and with software developed by experts with decades of experience of winding in the US. Winding angles and positional tolerance are within ±0.5° and ±1mm and there is no scope for error from a laminator as with hand lay-up. This repeatability of winding is combined with the tolerance of resin content and chemistry. Once the program has been written and saved to disk, you can be sure that every product wound from that programme is consistent. In large batch production we have measured bending stiffness and weight tolerance within a maximum of 4% and typically within 2%.
Unlike hand lay-up, the fibres are laid down under tension. This means that when subjected to bending, compression and tensile loads, the fibres are straight and able to work immediately. Fibres are continuous from the bottom to the top, and all around the tube. There are no overlaps or joins within the laminate transferring loads