I heard the US build versions (made by vectorworks marine) from now onward come from a new mould. This mould was made after learning a few new building tricks from other catamaran builders. I heard they are using a different foam material now as well, plus some other stuff. So it looks the glass/vinylester design is getting dialed in.

With respect to the rig and hardware, I think we can call the design dialled in by now. Glenn Ashby (Ashby sails) has now made about ten sails for the Blade design now and his design is now in its 3rd iteration. Of course Glenn has made even more F16 sails (for Taipans as well) and he based his F16 design on earlier experience with the Standard Taipan mainsails. In real life sailing the Ashby sails are very much welcomed by their owners, even the Blade designer himself said that he was very pleased with the feel and performance of the Ashby mainsails. I haven't tried them myself yet, so I can only relay what others tell me. I did sail against a boat with Ashby sails and it certain didn't feel like my competition had any disadvantage. If anything I was the one with a disadvantage, I personally have a Redhead F16 mainsail and a Goodall selftacking jib. My squaretop is 600 mm wide, standard Taipan 4.9 = 400 mm, new Ashby/Goodall/Landenberg mainsails have a squaretop op about 850 mm wide. I have a mainsail of the second generation (2003)

Similar comments are expressed by owners of Landenberger and Ullmans sails, although the number of these owners is still limited. From Singapore we hear very positive noises about the newer Goodall mainsails. That is in relation to the older standard Taipan Goodall mainsails that nearly all of them were using on their Taipans. They also have a few Ashby sails overthere now but we don't really have good comparison data on that, not enough time has passed.




If you buy american and ship is across the point then you are looking at 12.800 US$ + 1500 US$ (rought estimate about shipping) = 14.300 USD = 19.450 AUD. However, in your case I would by stuff like sails, mast and Ronstan hardware locally. This both save you shipping costs (shipping the mast is expensive) and I think sails and hardware is cheaper locally in Australia. But you just have to look into that youself.

There is another option for you as an Australian. There is something going on in Australia at the moment, something I'm not at liberty to discuss in public. My advice is to contact Phill Brander yourself at phillbrander(at)bigpond.com and ask him directly about acquiring a professionally build Blade F16 in Australia and see where that leads you.

Wouter