Ed maxwell of Weymouth England took delivery of his new 2006 spec stealth f16 yesterday.

It is the first boat out of a brand bew mould and has a few new features over the 2005 boat, these are:

New lighter smaller carbon t-foil rudders and stocks
High aspect ratio 'square'top mainsail.
Sharper bow tip
Improved beam trays
Flat transom


Since the quality of the boat has been raised on other threads I feel it is appropriate to address this issue on the forum.

It has been indicated that 'The stealth is a a good entry level F16 and that its price is reflected in the quality of fittings and finish.'

I can assure you all that there is no skimping on materials or fittings on this boat.

The Stealth has

Hulls that are built in epoxy because it is the best resin system

Sails by Andy Landenberger, these are expensive, but we believe they are the best.

The mast is carbon because we believe it is better than aluminium.

The foils, stocks tiller gear and spinnaker pole are all carbon because we believe it is the best.

In all the above areas we could make significant savings but we don't believe that would be the right way to build a race boat.

There are some photos of the latest boat below

Hello John,

The link to the pictures are not working:


Perhaps you should consider moving your website to a more professional hosting provider. If you want/need help setting it up let me know.

Data-transfer limit reached..

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another

There must be an easier way than this

...

Ed Maxwell - you are one lucky sailor...

Again , I love my Taipan , but Ed's boat makes my boat look absolutely antiquated !

Wouter say's they're fast as well having sailed his (mod) snake along side the Stealth...

Well done John! Best of luck Ed !

That is just sooooo nice looking John. Well done with the new rudders too! I was very impressed with the prototype you showed me, the finished product looks terrific.

I like the new main too. Intuitively, it looks as though it should be fast!

I have to say that I never really understood where people were going with the 'Stealth is a cheap, basic entry-level F16' approach. The boat WORKS, everything on it is right for the job it has to do - in other words a proper stripped-down racer. No frills, no bells, no whistles. Which is EXACTLY as it should be. The standard of finish is every bit as good as any other builder and you should be very proud of your product John.

Now, if I can just persuade Anne that we really don't need to send Matthew to Universty this year......

John,

Are those Rudder fittings lighter / stronger / more secure. What was the reasoning for the change ?

one word:

sexay!

John,
For some people perception is everything.

Their perception is that the more expensive the boat, the better it must be.

The perception is that the lower the Portsmouth rating, the faster it must be.

The perception is that if a boat class has a minimum crew weight, you can't be competitive if you are much over that.

It is all about marketing strategies, I guess. And your strategy is deplorable, because you are trying to sell a high-quality product for less money than its competitors.

Thank you, and I hope your boat beats the socks off all the other F16's. Of course, you probably can't afford to hire hot-shots to do that. (That is another way to create a perception that one boat is better than another.)

But in my personal opinion, one-design is the only way to race. (And not single-manufacturer one-design.) Formula is a hybrid concept that is worse than one-design racing and better than handicap racing.

The questions are: Will formula racing eventually tilt the scale toward more people going back to one-design or going to handicap racing? Or will formula racing become predominant?

And will all these options dilute sailboat racing even more and make it continally more expensive for the average person to get involved?

What would give first if the rudders hit something immovable at speed. The rudder box or transom?

I have hit something with the t-foils...

While sailing the Stealth, I hooked a crab pot line with the rudder. Neither the transom nor the rudder box "gave." Instead, the rudder pin popped out of the lower fitting and bent. The "repair" consisted of simply replacing the pin, so it was really no big deal. Perhaps John P. can speak to whether this was a cleverly designed phenomenon.

Hitting the daggerboards on something immovable is a bigger concern, since they're longer, trunked in hull and, being in front of the rudders, will hit the object first!

I actually can think of a lot of occasions where the cassette up/down configuration would be quite handy. Farrier has a nifty combined mechanism on some of his trimarans--the blade slides up and down and the rudder box also kick up. (Too bad that system won't work for T-foils.)

First may I thank you all for your positive responses.

Eric, as you say striking ground with the rudder at high speeds it is not as important as people seem to think, as the rudder is shallower than the daggerboard and is always following it so unless you are reversing at high speed the daggerboard will hit first however the pin should bend and pop out as you say, but also the bolts attaching it to the transom are brass so they should break first as well. We have had a couple of high speed groundings with daggerboards up under spinnaker no damage was effected to the hulls.

Scooby, the reason for the change was to save weight and reduce drag from the larger rudder.

Gotta say if I was in the market for any of the new F16 designs I`d pick this one.
Seeing the boats in the video confirmed my initial thoughts, those raised beam landings and slightly curved up hull shape with transoms tapering off to what looks like impossibly small transoms, but in fact are wider at the bottom than the top, reminds me of the C-class hull shape and beam landings.
Looks like an altogether good all-round package, I`m struggling to understand the concept of "good introductory boat to F16" mindset - T-foil rudders, carbon mast, great sails, innovative design ideas and all the right specs for full F16, is it that the price is too good to be taken seriously ??

One day when I`m big I`ll get me one of those !!

Steve

Steve,

You're spot on! I too don't understand why the Stealth isn't being considered by some as a genuine, full-blown competitive F16. It has all the right credentials as you've already seen. What we need is regular meetings of perhaps Euro F16s with different designs represented so that each design can be impartially evaluated rather than the theoretical and aesthetics approach currently in vogue.

Hey John are you sure you don't want to up the 06 Stealth price to just above the Blade ( you know, the highest price must equal the best boat). Keep the 05 boat as the " entry level " and you have all the bases covered.

How does teh Stealth f16 compare to The Blade F16?
Price, workmanship, performance?