Now, onto the current topic: I built the business case for the Nacra F16 and made it very clear in that document that there was a considerable advantage in building the boat to the class weight or very close to it. This was based on the fact that the current benchmark boat (Viper) has left the door wide open for a better solution to the F16 rule to enter and dominate the class.
Based on the component weights from current partslist it was possible to get the boat down to weight, as Hans says it is totally feasible to build down to this weight, it just takes more time and energy (increased production cost) to do it compared to the current boats offered by Nacra.
Whoa up, for years Macca stirred the pot over on the F16 forum and wound everyone up pretty well about the weight issue arguing forever and a day how the F16 class had it wrong and all boats need to be over weight, now having " retired" from Nacra he seems suddenly to be a convertee in that all boats need to be minimum weight, its amazing how the dollar in ones wage slip seems to cloud ones mind, mmmmm. If you suck up to the dollar then I guess it will eventually bite you in the a***
I guess the builders already making boats to weight will have the same warranty as Nacra who have also made a few suspect boats along the way, you only have to read some of the F18 forums to realise that.
The weight issue is no different than the Viper, its simply more economical in production cost terms,to use existing F18 parts.If enough are built maybe the rules will be changed to suit simply by the voting rights of owners, but under the class constitution they will have to wait for the 5 year review before they can apply.
The Viper doesn't seem to have suffered along the way and ended up with about the right handicap ( it wins some open events but not all ). If someone was such a weight weenie then it wouldn't be much of a problem to retro fit carbon beams, carbon mast and a set of A class rudders to bring the Nacra boats down to class weight. Would it make a better boat, only marginally I would think.
