Rather than theorising build a boat and see where you come out. If you need a hand send me your geometry and I'll generate some cutfiles for you.
I'm not theorising, remember I was the first one to produce a fully detailed listing of components and weights.
http://www.xs4all.nl/~whijink/F12/http://www.xs4all.nl/~whijink/F12/F12_weight_and_cost_push_setup.xlsI found that things do tend to add up. Granted, I did include some margins here and there because amateurs and builders of series will typically not be extremely focussed on working very cleanly (light) but rather tend to be lazy or pressed for time (labour costs)
And my arguement revolves completely around the expected need to attract commercial builders to the F12 class and concept in order to succeed in our goal for the F12 to become THE youth/teenage trainer for larger cats and a viable alternative to youth/teenager dinghies.
Still, I would be happy to go for a very low ready to sail weight if it can be proven that such a setup is economically viable in a commercial sense. Gato's build DS's is indeed a good example of a robust boat (glassed over 4 mm ply), but building in ply is not really commercially viable at this time, mostly because high quality ply is getting more and more rare. Bending straight foam/glass panels or rotomolding are alot more viable economically in the long run. But foam/glass plates need relatively high density foam to avoid easy denting.
What I'm trying to do here it is underscore the long term effects the choice for a minimal ready to sail weight can have. We need to look at several different building methods and strike a good balance between all of these.
But indeed, if you all decide to go for a low number then I will submit myself to that. For my own frame I need all the weight savings in the boat I can get !
Wouter
