Does anybody know where I can obtain plans to build a Tornado. I have a guy in OZ that wishes to build a wooden spinnaker Tornado. (his 3rd).
Thanks

There used to be a link on the US Tornado Website. Try contacting them to see if anyone remembers.

Gougeon Brothers (West Systems Epoxy) should know, they were one of the designers of the tortured ply Tornado and built them for several years. Try contacting them through there "homebuilt" projects forum.

Check out your local T class association, then ITA if you don`t get any help there. Problem is that most plans for T will be old plans which might produce heavy boats by today`s standards. Could also check out the building plans for the Mosquito, then scale all materials up by 1.25, ie from 16ft to 20ft. so 4mm ply would become 5mm (have to use 6mm, don`t think 5mm is available.) Could build hulls to 25-30kg each, how does this compare to epoxy boats / class rules. Depends on how tight class rules are about internals on wooden boats. If interested, contact Tim Mozzie on Forum Database for more info in Auz.

Cheers
Steve

Scale up will not get you a class legal boat. Hull tolerances are quite tight on the Tornado.

Hi Simon,
I didn`t mean scale up the plans ie hull shape, I meant apply the building method, so if the mozzie plans say 4mm ply bulkheads at beams, then scale up material thickness proportionately, use 6mm. If Mozzie building regs say 20mm foam bulkheads at 200mm c/c, use 25mm foam bulkheads at 250mm c/c. you should then build hulls lighter than the old Tornado plans would allow, but have to make sure they comply with current rules. You would have to do this in conjunction with the Tornado plans so the hull shape is correct & within spec. Also need to make sure that all framing internals etc conform to class rules, as well as skin thickness & weight etc.
I merely suggested this as an option, since I`m not sure if building plans for plywood T`s are updated to be competitive with the newer production built T`s in terms of min. weight. Obviously need to stay within class rules if you`re going to all that effort of building a boat.

Cheers
Steve

I'm not quite sure about this, but I dont think the minimum weight limit of the Tornado has changed over the years. So a plywood tornado would weight about the same as a production boat.
BUT, there would be a huge difference in stiffness of the platform.

The Gougeon T's was cold moulded with western red cedar and had a hull thickness of 6 mm. They also used an internal support structure to add stiffness. I dont think the plywood T's had anything like the same stiffness.

The yearbook has some information about the hull shapes, but by far not enough to build a boat from. If you got the measurement templates, the allowable hull lines could be deducted..

I read in Seahorse, that there is a Gougeon T in sweden still sailing. Dont remember their exact words, but I think it was quite stiff compared to the Marstrøms. The hull forms has evolved a bit since the 80's, so we dont know.

But, it would be interresting if a wooden T could be competitive!

Steve,
If you can't source the plans I know of two different people that have them. I'll give you a call.

Regards,
Phill

The Tornado plans & Templates are availabe from the ITA...but I believe there are rules about homemade builds...something to the effect of only being allowed to build one boat per year as a amatuer builder. If you want to build more in order to sell them as a business, you need a builder's certificate from the ITA for the boats to be class legal.

As to construction methods, the plans only define the overall hull section shape, dimensions of fittings and their locations, the minimum weight and also stipulate the boat must support a crew of specified weight with both hulls completely flooded (safety). I don't believe the plans outline how the boat must be built to meet these requirements. This allows for innovation is design & construction techniques.

Wooden boats of cedar were extremely stiff in their day, but were somewhat heavier than the same vintage glass boats. They were competitive, with many top crews sailing them at the Worlds. Problem was that as labor & material costs rose, wood became basically an "exotic" material to build a boat out of. That plus the added maintenance issues with wood made them less popular.

I've got a friend in Sacramento that just purchased a very nice condition wooden boat ("Holden" I think) for a song. It had been stored for the past 20 years and has almost no hours on it. What a find! Hopefully he'll bring it down to the LA region this summer for a few events where we can compare it to my Marstrom performance-wise.

Mike.

I agree, in some ways wood is superior to glass (and the core doesn't dent the way it does on a Marstrom). The major problem is, it is expensive. It is more difficult to build a wooden production boat. You can't buy things premade up (for example prepreg) and subcontracting out is harder. Also wood is a commodity, some years are good and some years are not.

You could probably build a wooden Tornado that would meet or exceed the Marstrom. I have some friends in the exotic furniture buisness, the only hi tech wood buissness I know of, we came up with 3 ideas.

First, using a computer controled table cut single layers of venier and laminate them with kevlar cloth(for my core) into a mold pretty much the way Marstrom does. Price would be $28,000-30,000 minus sails based on 20/year.

Second, strip plank. Use a CNC router/cutter to cut each strip so there is an exact fit between each strip. Kevlar inside and glass outside. Price - a little cheaper

Third, wooden dowels. .5-1mm epoxy coated wooden dowels along with a dry filler are placed in a mold and then vacuumed. It is kinda like building things out of unidirectional carbon. If fact you could probably use hot melt the same way they do with carbon to hold the dowels into a sheet. I suggested something like this years ago to them to solve one of their weird problems, I have never heard of anything but a few pieces of high dollar furniture being built this way. Price - I have no idea

Something to think about

Ouch, kevlar and carbon are restricted materials within the tornado class. Sorry..

http://www.tornado.org/html/rules.asp

I dont think strip planking is a good way to build a Tornado. You will get to many horizontal glue joints that adds a lot of weight. At least that was what Farrier discovered when he started to use vertical joints between foam sheets.

I really liked the Gougeon system used as internal stiffening. Building out of plywood is easy, but I'm afraid the panel stiffness would not be very good.. Perhaps the Taipan builders can correct med ?

If plywood boats was good, why did the Gougeons use cold moulding ?

I looked into how to get the hull lines for the Tornado, and found some interresting things.
1: Measurement of the hulls are very detailed, not much room for error if home building/designing.
2: Measurement blanks costs £ 800 !!! (I know where I can source som old ones for free, but..)
3: Marstrøm, Yves Louday/Reg White are launching new models with new hull shapes. Basically they have made the hulls slimmer in front and less bouyant at the stern.

I have a set of plans for the stresses-ply tornado.

Give your friend my e-mail.

David Melcon petaluma@deepnetgaming.com

Carl,
JUst as side note.
I was fortunate enough to attenbd a lecture by Meade Geogeon
a few years back when he cam eout to Aust, I was building a 32ft cedar strip cat at the time.
He went thru a lot of the research they performed with NASA when they were designing wind turbines. They found the most superior material when it comes down to cyclic stresses as as experienced by turbine blades (and boat hulls alike)
Is wood laminate with 6% carbon.
This was after they tested all manner of materials both natural and man made.

Regards,
phill

In reply to Rolf:

I understand Kevlar is restricted. You can use it, if you can show a cost/life benefit. For example the nomex or Kevlar core used by Marstrom. I am pretty sure, I can show that on a Tornado. I am building a 14 ft cat. Cost/life was very important to me in the design. I ended up with glass outside and Kevlar inside by a wide margin.

Concerning strip plank. Take a look at Gougeon's book on wood construction. Strip plank/glass ends up about an 1 oz per sq ft less than plywood/glass for the same stiffness. The difference is the relatively heavy adhesives used in plywood.

Cold Molded vs. Plywood - Cold molding is basically building custom plywood around a mold. There are many advantages, choice of veneers, use epoxy instead of the heavy flexible adhesives needed for plywood, use extra in high stress areas, add glass, etc. The biggest advantage for cold molded is the results are very consistent. You can build one identical hull after another, very important for production.


What really killed Gougeon is Marstrom hulls are a little faster under certain conditions. I have forgotten, I think it was chop and the suspected reason was the hulls are a little fuller forward and the bows sharper. It really doesn't matter if it's true, people thought it was true.

Don't get me wrong, I love my Marstrom. If fact one of my goals for the 14 ft cat is the decks be just as solid as my Marstrom.

The way I read the Tornado rules, the building materials are glass, foam, wood and glue. Carbon/kevlar is allowed where mentioned specifically in the rules. Am I missing something in the rules, due to not speaking english natively ?
I think you will have to make a change in the class rules to be allowed to use carbon in the hulls, and that is a long process. The class ballot has allowed an testing period with carbon masts for 2004 (not in cometitions), but we will not vote wether ut allow carbon masts until 2005. Changes takes a lot of time..


Good point about heavy glues in plywood and cold moulding!

I have heard, and read about new hull shapes coming from both Reg White and Marstrom. Apparently the new rig can benefit from a slightly differen hull shape. Reg White has buildt some boats with finer bows and not as much fullness in the back. Marstrom has something called the B1 under development..

I also like my Marstrom very much, but wooden boats are also really beautiful. Gougeon are testing the durability and stiffness of wood/glass vs foam/glass now. Epoxyworks magazine has an article about this as applied in a skiff in the current issue. I'm looking forward to the next Epoxyworks magazine, where I hope they have som conclusions.
If wood/glass can compete both in stiffness/strength, or perhaps even surpass glass/foam, it would make for some interresting changes with regards to home building.

It's a shame Tornado plans are hard to come by tough!

Good luck with your 14 footer!

Rolf: I'm in the process of buying an all carbon/kevlar tornado, and have been told by more than one person that it is NOT class legal.

Kevlar or Carbon are definatly not permitted in a Tornado hull. Only in Rudder stocks, tiller extension and cross bar, plus spinnaker pole and snuffer. You can also use it in blocks / pullies.

This boat would be somebodies home built project and if you intend to race in Tornado regattas or as a Tornado at a regatta, you could not in this. Re-sale would not be very good with this boat also as there is no market for illegal Ts.

My advice would be leave this boat alone unless it is going VERY cheap, such as for rig price only.

I have zero interest in sailing in tornado class regattas. I'm not nearly good enough to compete with them, and really, I could care less about competing at that level.

I soley interested in going fast (which this boat definitely can do) and doing some distance races with my girlfriend.

I really can't stand class racing, probably deriving from a personality flaw where I like to be unique. I couldn't stand driving a car that everyone else drives, can stand doing what everyone else does. So don't worry, I wont be rolling up in your tornado regattas with my snazzy carbon kevlar boat.

In Reply To Rolf

Concerning Kevlar. Look at Tornado Class rule 7f

"7.f Kevlar, or any similar fibre, shall not be used in the Tornado Catamaran except for running rigging.
Core materials require prior approval of the ISAF. Those containing Kevlar or other high
modulus fibres may be permitted but in addition to their structural properties the primary criteria
in deciding whether a particular core material is acceptable will be its cost and durability."

Any Kevlar I would use on a wood veneer boat would be as a core.

There is an old trick, called starved cloth core. There is an update where you use a knitted material that looks like lace with big hexagonal holes. Use just enough epoxy to mostly saturate the yarn but leave the holes free of epoxy. Use this as a core.

For various reasons this does not work well with true composite construction. However, it works quite well in veneer construction.

I hope this clears things up.

In response to MauganH-17's post about the composit T boat, is the rating the same? How much lighter is this composite boat?

If you like going fast and being unique, why stop with composite materials? How about radical boat designs (20' beam, carbon rig, foils instead of sails, etc.)?

Am I also to presume that with this "illegal boat" you won't be in "official" distance races (Atlantic 1000, Tybee 500, etc.? That would be a disservice to your sense of adventure and competition!

And, just for kicks and giggles, what kind of car DO you drive?

waterbug:

20' beam? Why when 10' would be suited fine.

I never figured out why they didn't allow T's on the t500. Again, don't mind, not like I could compete with those people anyways. If you people think its silly, thats fine, you're not the ones buying the thing.
The guy I'm buying it from says that the local club he sails it in lets him use a the basic tornado rating. I wouldn't really care what its rated considering I sail for the thrill of it and not for a pickle dish at the end of the day.