>>Wouter, I ran into this piece of information recently on 1design.net, but am surprised that there haven't been more details floating around. Do you (or anyone) know when they are going to be available and what the price will be? And in relation to the original post, how will the price compare with the FX-One and I17R? Is there any marketing going on?


I'm a little bit bound by the clearence the builder has put to several information elements and Im happy to give him all the margin he wants. What I can say is that , the intend is to have the first boat sailing this season and that is is intended to directly compete with the I-17R and cheapest F18. Of course both the FX-one and Taipan F16/Stealth F16 are (far?) more expensive due to the fact that these are all imported boats (The US dollar is still weak). Same applies to the Hobie Tiger. That is of course why a US based builder is so important to the F16 class.

We keep it mild on the marketing front for now. Nothing worse than claiming big stuff and having to face a delay in delivery so to say. Besides we're not lacking in interest and we all agreed a long time ago that we rather grow at a mild pace but continiously than flare up like a wildfire and die as quickly as well.

Here I will give you some info that was send by Matt to an interested party a few weeks back :

****

We are working with Phill to put into production a US manufactured Blade F16. We are still working out some of the details, but I can give you an update of where we are now.

Phill is in the process of transferring the design parameters to us for the hull. We are taking the templates generated from the original design, and creating a CAD model of the hull that we will fair electronically, and then have the hull plugs machined. This way we will have perfectly fair molds from the start. The transfer of the hull design and the modeling are currently being done. We are aiming to have the first composite boat on the water in the first halve of this season.

The components other than the hull, for the Blade initially will be what we can procure off the shelf. The exception to this is that we are having made centerboards and rudder blades that fit the hull shape of the Blade better than the stock components produced by AHPC. We will be eventually putting into production a rudder system designed specifically for this platform, as well as trading components and sourcing to fit with this design and produced locally.

The final pricing for this boat is still in development. A significant portion of the initial components are made
overseas, and the fluctuating exchange rate has been very problematic for us. We will be offering soon an introductory
price for people interested in purchasing one of the first run boats. Those involved in the initial run will get offered upgrades and changes as they are made at or below cost. While the final pricing for the boat has not been set, we are very conscious and looked at this very closely before we agreed to enter into this arrangement with Phill. The price of this boat has to be at or below what the other platforms in the same class are already selling for. We feel that there are 2 boats available in the US that fit very closely with what we are producing with the Blade, The I17R and the F18. The F16 boats like the Taipan, and the other European built boats all have support issues and especially now exchange rate problems in comparing pricing. We will be stocking parts at our factory for support, and will be publishing a very comparative warranty for this boat as well in the near future.

I am sorry I do not have any more definitive information, but if you are still interested, I will keep you informed as we progress with this project.

********

For anybody want more information I suggest you contact Matt McDonald of Vectorworks Marine directly at MMcDonald@VectorworksMarine.com (Please only seriously interested mails, Matt is a busy guy)



To this I can add that Phill Brander has just taken delivery of the first set of purpose build full Carbon boards/rudders/stocks for the Blade F16 and he is very happy with them after the first inspection.

Blade Europe has just ordered and payed for Glenn Ashby build sets of mainsails and Jibs and Goodall Spinnakers. (standard gear on the EU build version).

Slowly but surely we are getting there and from the looks of it this is the way to get some proper gear onto the water.

I think this info pretty much gives some answers to your questions.

And ehhh, Blade F16 is definately NOT a lake boat. That has been tested already and it is the boat you want to be on in large waves and chop. I hear the hull surfs like nobodies business and stays level on the watersurface when doing a beat against wind and waves.

Regards,

Wouter