Mark, I dont think the T will be uncompetitive put up against the other boats that can be build within this box rule, for the first years at least. The reason the T is so fast, is the incremental refinement and olympic class development that have taken place the last 30 years. Having the best sailors in the world doing sail development and finding 'go fast' techniques makes the T hard to beat. That's why the T is the 20 footer benchmark and the boat to beat (still the benchmark, that's why I refer to it).
As Wouter says, the M20 have gained some weight, and given some other courses then straight upwind/downwind (e.g. distance races) it might be less than the optimal platform (especially with additional corrector weights to bring it up to 130kg's).
When that have been said, part of the fun (in my opinion) in a box rule, is to see what's fast and whats not. If the Tornado is blown away, so be it (but I have a hard time thinking it will be, even if other boats weight less. It's just so optimized).
The current lightweighters are carbon boats, and possibly pre-preg/autoclaved, hence the cost. My reasoning for having a minimum weight is to allow lighter boats than the current F-20 while still making allowances for homebuilding and economic construction. If you dont put a price on your own time, a homebuildt with a resirculated rig/equipment should be quite affordable (this is part of the attraction to me).
The suggested Box rule should encapsulate all the boats you mention, but some of them will need corrector weights.
Your last comment is very interesting. Who will build and race boats under such a rule? 40 foot cats, R33 etc. are big and expensive boats, both to buy and keep competitive. My vision is that this is a class for a somewhat heavy "Joe Average" who wants high performance and the room for some experimentation, to race both round buoys and on distance races.
If some decent prize money are put up, the Olympians will come, either on T's or something else they believe in (who can get a sponsor like, Volvo, so we can put on something like the "Volvo Champions Race",
http://www.volvocars-aktionen.de/vcr/home.html).Carl: Regarding sailarea. I agree with what Wouter said earlier, the solution is not neccesarily to put up more area, but to get the ratios right. The old rule that just defined sailarea is a good one IMHO, let every designer/builder decide for themself wether they want an unirig or a sloop. Need to decide on a sensible spi-area tough, even if it has been demonstrated that larger spi's are not neccesarily faster.
I dont like having correction factors or time adjusters within a box rule. First over the line should be the winner, and no whinning
