To all,

I want all to read this. And yes, you will have to make the effort to read more than two 3-word phrases. Anybody who isn;t willing to put in that effort has no valuable opinion in my book. And yes includes some science as well, anybody not understanding that can better leave the issue to the people that do understand it. My appologies, I don't feel like chasing ghosts all the time.

First the reply to Kirt.



It was HOT in 2002, but back then the mainstream sailors hadn't taken notice of it. Even the Moth class was having foils at that time.




It is only an issue when the gains made by this setup presents an unacceptable jump in performance. And over a large wind spectrum range at that.

Remember the outward canting hype of a few years back ? No new design, except A-cats, have that now. Why ? Because the gains were too small to be measured while the drawbacks were noticeable. In the F18 class the Tiger design remained uncanted and won many races. And that was the end of it.

Remember planing hulls with hydroplane step ? We had the same scare back then as well. Now both boats have been discontinued and the F18 version was unable to make an impression in the F18 cirquit. It was fast in strong winds but not so fast in other conditions; this meant it was a bad regatta boat as one can't command the weather. This is also what let Rohan Veal to loose the Australian Moth nationals in 2005 when two weeks later he won the World Championship. The Aus nationals had 1 (just 1 !) race with light winds and Rohan couldn't foil his way to a high place. He did have to content with all that drag adding gear though and a non-foiling moth, that booked only 2nds and 1 st, won the event.

My point, we must see this in perspective.





After years of moving in the same circles as a certain designer I have yet to see him provide dependable information. The data provide this time is embarrashingly faulty.

It is correct that any board put under an angle to the vertical will produce a force component that will lift the hulls a bit BUT this is not yet the same as providing a "clear advantage".

Afterall if I were to sail my conventional boat at a great heeling angle, thus angling my conventional boards off the vertical, than I don't go faster than the same boat at a smaller heeling angle. The phenomenon at work is more complex and it is no wonder solution to all our problems. In this respect I demand that person giving their opinion about the matter first educate themselfs on what is truly going on. Basing opinions on gutt feelings or the panic in the A-cat class is simply useless. My aunt is scared to death of mice, but that doesn't mean that these little furry animals are a great thread to her. Her fear is irrational and no rational soluntion can solve this situation.




Another group that saw their members panicking. It is a miracle that they didn't ban the outward canting thing or he planing hulls thing; or wave-piercer hulls for that matter. Or another great example by the F18 class, banning fully battened jibs or requiring that daggerboards must weight 3 kg's at least. But then again somebody may put lead in the daggers so they limited the max daggerboard weight to 6 kg as well. The F18 class has allowed herself to be ruled by the whims and fancies of scared members this is why designers don't particulary like the F18 class anymore. It is too much hassle and too many unnecessay or foundationless rule changes.

I think the F18's provide a bad example here. Mostly because they are now trying to undo a set of unnecessary rules; examples : fully battened jibs , carbon in rudders and daggers.

I think we only want to see rule changes or additions that have a proven necessity or that that actually limit something that is really undesireable. We should not pollute our rules only to have to clean it up at a later time. We all have more important things to do with our free time.




That is an easy one to answer. PART of the F16 group feels scared. They can't realy explain or proof why but they feel scared anyway and they want to be assured. But not by any scientic "stuff" that takes more than 2 or 3 punch lines. I don't think anybody can assure them under these limits. Except maybe themselfs.





And as far as I reverse engineer from the DVD these boards are canted inward relative to the hulls between 5 and 7 degrees. This means with the 3 degree outward canting of the hulls that the TRUE inward canting is 2 to 3 degrees. This means that this provides less than 4 kg of lift at the very bets conditions. Go to the weight watchers and achieve more gain.

Of course AHPC will offer it. It is a fashion statment. If Glenn says that he sails with a bucket dragged behind his A-cat than scores of A-cat sailors want to have that too and builders will sell them with the boats on request. What ever happened to the outward canting benefits ? But even more striking, canting the rig 3 degrees to windward has the same effect as canting the board inward. And some ORMA boats do that as well. Luckily we have a precendent in this case. Canting rigs were tried in A-cat class and were abandonned. They didn't produce the results that was hoped they would.



Of course, but I really want to stress that we must have this discussion on the basis of a scientic model and scientifically produced predictions. Otherwises the whole discussion is baseless and as a result also useless.

We must take great care to understand the F16 rules fully, we are not the A-cat class, and we must not allow ourselfs to be swept of our feet with every hype that happens to come along. Also we must realize that the F16 class rules allow the F16 organisation to intervene and force a certain solution whenever a unacceptable jump in performance is encountered. Such authority is written explicetly in the F16 class rules. We must trust ourself to use it when the time comes and not try to ban everything that MAY lead to us using this authority later. Chances are that by far most hypes/developments will die before any action is needed on the class rules level.

So, I allow you guys to humour me from time to time, but with this topic I don't want to see more "can you explain it in 5 words, please"

Unless you guys will accept "Trust me, it's under control"

With kind regards,

Wouter

Kirt