then you have to anneal to the correct hardness. How many companies are prepared to guarantee the correct hardness of the ally? 1 or 2 worldwide perhaps

If there are only 1 or 2 of them that can then I know both of them. I think most extruders can anneal to the right grades. Aluminium is pretty soft without any heat treatment after extrusion. Any serious application of aluminium requires T5 or T6 annealing.

I know 6005-T5 was succesfully handled by a Chinese extruder (albeit with a minimum of 2 mm wallthickness)

http://www.azom.com/Details.asp?ArticleID=2807

Wouter

Go back to the Chinese company and ask for straight true 1.5mm T6 extrusions.. See what they say..

For those jobs we have a certain US based extruder (he does the superwing masts; 1.6 mm walls)

Besides T6 doesn't exist for 6005 aluminium; its equivalent for that grade is the T5.

Wouter

That is all well and good.. BUT AHCP has the rights to their work and designs (as it should be).. So they and only they have a say in how the superwing is produced..

They have, but at the start of the class we (as the F16 class) made an agreement with AHPC that other builders could use the superwing mast for their own F16 products. Given a few guidelines and provisions but no limitations !

I still have that in writing in my archive.

This is one of the best deals we have made in the F16 class. In turn, it is also very advantageous to AHPC. Basically, the superwing mast is now the standard mast for all F16's using alu there, thus making all boats highly similar in that important area. It also means that Goodall can supply quality sails for all alu masted F16's (the vast majority) while using the experience gained with the Vipers.

A win-win situation if there ever was one.

Wouter

you miss the point.. AHCP makes the decision to make new superwing molds not the F16 class or individuals... So if the mold is wearing they and they alone choose to make a new one.. Or they may decided to keep using the old.. Making an F16 ally mast mold and using their section and or extruder would be a breach of faith..

Well, contact with Greg is good and I'm sure that he will not have any objection to getting lighter masts from a new die himself.

I see no reason why the F16 builders can not come together over this and share the burden as well as the benefits.

The costs for a new die are really not that high especially when shared over the 4 builders that currently use the superwing (AHPC, Falcon Marine, Formula Catamarans and Catamaran Parts ; respectively Viper F16, Falcon F16, Blade F16 and Raptor F16).

500 bob a party will go a long way, I'm sure.


If anything we should give this a try, don't you think ? (assuming a worn out die is the cause)

Wouter

sure you can try.. Well Greg can ask if he so wishes.

The point may be then the mold will then be all 4 builders not Greg's/AHPC alone. I'm not going to work out that contractual arrangement!!

Very interesting and amusing thread.... Better than any soapy on the TV...

As I understand it, Macca has a marketing degree, has been working in the sailing industry for a number of years, and yet most of you think his opinions are considered crap and attack him personally!! I do not know Macca personally, but surely the F16 association cannot be SO precious that they attack people who may be giving them some wise advice.

And by the way.... It is A H P C..... not APHC or AHCP or any other mixture of letters.

A = Australian
H = High
P = Performance
C = Catamarans

after 18 hours awake my crapo typing slips more and more and more typos slip in..

As for advice.. I have well meaning advice from qualified experienced people that was completely wrong. The reasons behind the current rules do not seem to be understood

We wouldn't be interested in a lighter die, we already have a dozen light masts at the factory. Old a cat sections. A tiny bit smaller but about 3kg lighter.

We are happy to clear these to anyone, anywhere in the world.

Macca has a marketing degree???

And no-one else of a different opinion has ?

Wouter

At least you are getting near the point. Most of us consider his advice UNwise.

I am a weekend sailor, albeit, not a very good one. I bought my Blade because it was the LIGHTEST , fastest, spinnaker boat I could buy and by class rule, could race it single handed. I do not wish to lug more weight through the sand or even tow it behind my car.

The vast majority of us want to keep the boats as light as possible. Macca is in the minority, his arguments are not persuasive but he persists in beating this dead horse in the faint hope it will come back to life. From where I stand, he has demonstrated far greater skills at sailing than marketing.

Macca has a big degree of frustration with this group!

But I think I have worked it out: The F16 class isn't about sailing at all... Its about creating a mystical world where all sorts of different boats that comply in some way to a very broad rule can start a race on the one start line and then the results can be attributed to a variety of different factors but none of which are allowed to be that the boats are not equal.

You live in a world where carbon masts and alloy masts can compete on equal terms, where boats 25kg apart are equal and one where single handed and double handed boats perform the same. Where the production costs to build a boat to fully utilise the freedoms offered in the rule would extend well above that of an A Class.

In short you are dreaming! Whilst you do this, the rest of us will get out there and go sailing (its a sport, on the water and we all compete on equal terms, try it some day!)

The results are attributable to a single factor, skill! My lighter weight Blade does not allow me to beat Robbie Daniel on his "heavy" Viper.

There does seem to be an advantage to sailing 1-up in around 6-8 knots; that advantage seems to disappear when the wind is up to 10 knots. Other than that, the F16 box rule, as it stands today, provides very close competition for a variety of boats.

The rule does what it was intended to do. F16 is not smod!

In short you are dreaming! Whilst you do this, the rest of us will get out there and go sailing (its a sport, on the water and we all compete on equal terms, try it some day!)

What "equal terms" are you talking about Macca? Are you now going to get a real job in marketing, and sit in some cubicle for 5 days a week, then hook up YOUR boat, the one you paid $16,000+ for, then take it to the water to race against the rest of us weekend clubber hacks? Are you going to become one of us?

OR, are you going to spend several days racing someone else's boats, (VX40's, etc.) then have a brand new F16 or F18 or...? ride delivered to the regatta, jump on that brand new boat, with the latest equipment and sails, and race against us weekend clubber hacks, kick all of our butts, and claim the class needs to raise the minimum wt. because
-THAT's- what made you so much faster?

It's the sailor that wins the races. The small difference in total wt. really has very little to do with it, hell my wt. varies by about the same amount as all these boats depending on how much pizza and beer I had last night, and when I took my last dump!

BTW, I recommend you take the dump -before- you put on the drysuit...

I hate when . . .nevermind.

And the A-class, F18 class and other formula based sport classes in sailing like the Promo's and Class-5's landyachts are different in this respect ?

I mean, I can still enter a F18 worlds with a 1997 Nacra inter18 fitted with dacron sails or a pinhead Hobie Tiger and I don't see you argue that those boats are perfectly equal in performance to the say the C2, wildcat or infusion.

The fact that these boats comply to the class rules (F18 in this case) doesn't mean that they are guaranteed to be equal to all other makes, both old and new. That is not the way formula rule work.

The formula class rules only provide a cap (upper boundary) to the best performance that can be had and indeed experience and succes in both the F18 class, A-cat class and now the F16 class proof that this is beyond any doubt a realistic concept. The F18 class may needs more rules then the F16 class to achieve that, whereas the A-cat class gets by with less rules then the F16 class. Both are currently more expensive with regard to new boats then the F16 class. Having said that, all three setups have been proven to work well and do indeed provide lots of sailing enjoyment to large groups of sailors.

Against these facts the opinions of a single sailor (with or without a marketing degree) are judged to be irrelevant.

You can preach that the sky is falling till you are blue in the face, but you won't be believed until your predictions are supported by facts (not by repeated claims).

I'm sorry Macca, that is just the way it is.

Wouter