Monday 29 April 2013
Sunday 21 April 2013
Wednesday 17 April 2013
Considering the Laser 28 Keel Shape.
You have to say that the foils on a Laser 28 are what makes her a great boat to sail. The distinct lack of keel means that she flies off the wind and will plane given enough puff. A perceived shortness in the rudder will give you a problem of it stalling out and the boat crashes, exhilirating but not fast. One boat (Leda I think) has a Mumm 30 rudder.
The key to upwind performance is keeping her flat and getting that bit of lead to dig in. Don't do it and you've got leeway and you'll never point. As you build speed then your ability to point will increase you can then "feather" up into the wind to gain height in the gusts whilst not letting the speed drop. This is the kind of thing that makes her interesting and challenging to sail but it also means you'll need 5 or more bulky mates on a breezy day and you might be asking them to stay in the bar in the light stuff.
So...rewind to the Round the Island Race last summer. There we all are with a proper race crew and we're chasing down the RF290 "Red Fox". The RF was built from the Laser 28 moulds and is to all intents and purposes a Laser 28, apart from it doesn't have a keel stub and the keel fits into a socket. This particular boat is sailed by people who know what they're doing so no surprises that they could stay in front of the likes of us; but...they did not seem to be exhibiting the heel with the lack of people they had on the rail. This started my mind whirring.
It's an old story but the only time we made gains on them (in about 25 knots of breeze) was a close reach as they had white sail, genoa and we had an old SB3 asymmetric kite up - until we blew the kite to pieces.
As we returned from the race, we short tacked along the beautiful Dorset jurassic coast whilst Red Fox were inshore gunning the hell out of their little engine heading west. They must have bailed out because she was later alongside in the cove at Weymouth. I considered having a dive to have a look underneath, but you see I'd spent a long time on that freezing, soaking rail considering it: they'd stayed in front and we'd had a lot of spinnaker time round the back of the Island. This had to mean that there wasn't a bulb under the keel, surely the drag from one of those would have meant that we'd have walked all over them (broaches aside!)? It had to be something else, was it the Mark Mills keel? Was this the same shape as could be seen on Shasa from Jersey (now Encore)when she was sold?
When we look at the difference between that and FarrOut's standard (Bruce Farr) keel
So off to the Sailing Anarchy forums and I find a photo of the Mark Mills keel
Surely this is Shasa parked in the same place in a previous year?
Well it looked like a nice solution to the upwind = weight on the rail vs downwind = lots of smiles connundrum should you sail in a place where you've got some water depth (we do!). I asked Mark Mills, who replied pretty quickly giving me the email of the guy who had the keel changed on Red Fox. He was very helpful and told me that it had been produced by Iron Brothers foundry so they would have the designs, he also confirmed that the Shasa photo was the type of keel he put on Red Fox . I tried an email enquiry to Iron Brothers to work out how much they would charge for a new keel. They were good enough not to answer...really if we're looking at changing the keel on our lovely 26 year old boat perhaps we should be looking for a different boat! Maybe not just the Farr 30 rudder but the rest of the boat as well.
But it looks as if Red Fox does have a Mills keel unless it's been changed back. I'm kinda guessing it hasn't! If only I'd taken that swim...
The key to upwind performance is keeping her flat and getting that bit of lead to dig in. Don't do it and you've got leeway and you'll never point. As you build speed then your ability to point will increase you can then "feather" up into the wind to gain height in the gusts whilst not letting the speed drop. This is the kind of thing that makes her interesting and challenging to sail but it also means you'll need 5 or more bulky mates on a breezy day and you might be asking them to stay in the bar in the light stuff.
So...rewind to the Round the Island Race last summer. There we all are with a proper race crew and we're chasing down the RF290 "Red Fox". The RF was built from the Laser 28 moulds and is to all intents and purposes a Laser 28, apart from it doesn't have a keel stub and the keel fits into a socket. This particular boat is sailed by people who know what they're doing so no surprises that they could stay in front of the likes of us; but...they did not seem to be exhibiting the heel with the lack of people they had on the rail. This started my mind whirring.
It's an old story but the only time we made gains on them (in about 25 knots of breeze) was a close reach as they had white sail, genoa and we had an old SB3 asymmetric kite up - until we blew the kite to pieces.
As we returned from the race, we short tacked along the beautiful Dorset jurassic coast whilst Red Fox were inshore gunning the hell out of their little engine heading west. They must have bailed out because she was later alongside in the cove at Weymouth. I considered having a dive to have a look underneath, but you see I'd spent a long time on that freezing, soaking rail considering it: they'd stayed in front and we'd had a lot of spinnaker time round the back of the Island. This had to mean that there wasn't a bulb under the keel, surely the drag from one of those would have meant that we'd have walked all over them (broaches aside!)? It had to be something else, was it the Mark Mills keel? Was this the same shape as could be seen on Shasa from Jersey (now Encore)when she was sold?
When we look at the difference between that and FarrOut's standard (Bruce Farr) keel
So off to the Sailing Anarchy forums and I find a photo of the Mark Mills keel
Surely this is Shasa parked in the same place in a previous year?Well it looked like a nice solution to the upwind = weight on the rail vs downwind = lots of smiles connundrum should you sail in a place where you've got some water depth (we do!). I asked Mark Mills, who replied pretty quickly giving me the email of the guy who had the keel changed on Red Fox. He was very helpful and told me that it had been produced by Iron Brothers foundry so they would have the designs, he also confirmed that the Shasa photo was the type of keel he put on Red Fox . I tried an email enquiry to Iron Brothers to work out how much they would charge for a new keel. They were good enough not to answer...really if we're looking at changing the keel on our lovely 26 year old boat perhaps we should be looking for a different boat! Maybe not just the Farr 30 rudder but the rest of the boat as well.
But it looks as if Red Fox does have a Mills keel unless it's been changed back. I'm kinda guessing it hasn't! If only I'd taken that swim...
Monday 15 April 2013
Spring Series race 1
Great to get back out on the water. Last sunday had to be spent putting the rig up so we lost our chance of getting a shakedown sail. So we went out to the startline very rusty with an unproved boat. Not only this but we had Jack and Adam unavailable for the race so were lucky to have Jon and Celia to step into the breach.
Celia was the best choice for driver so that Stephen could do the bow and Nick on mainsheet. Quite a good solution to our crew positioning problem but it did mean that Stephen and I had a foredeck / pit domestic argument - just like the old days; ho ho "shut up at the back!".
A new boat for us to play with, Mark & Rima Bugler's new Saskia VII is a J97 - the ex-"Jika-Jika" so nothing to live upto there then. Wildfire the 36.7 was out, The Commodore's Arcsine, Arcona 370 and us made up the IRC and "Fast" class. Swenn and Loo-lah were the only ones out in the slow class.
A mid line start for us, in front of and out of the way of the bigger boats. Our speed was good up the first beat as well even though we were all very rusty. A great course for us was a triangle with two 110-120 deg apparent legs which we ayso'd with nice gybes at the corner.
The problem came as we arrived at the windward mark for the second time and there was a big bang from the rig. We took the foot off the pedal and dropped the headsail, the leeward shrouds looked slack but nothing was too untoward. On checking after the race we'd lost a bit of rig tension so can only summise that the mast foot had been hanging up on the extrusion. As there was no real problem we carried on with the race but we'd lost maybe four or five minutes.
We went down the deep run under the symmetric kite and nearly caught up with Arcsine at the bottom. The wind had started to puff up a bit and 3 handed was probably a bit much for them.
We got a 3rd under IRC and a third under NHC. It was won by Wildfire IRC and Saskia VII NHC.
Roll on next week. But first of all I'm going to have to re-tune the rig, and it was all nicely taped up as well!
Too busy for photos in the pit so here's a nice one of a little issue in the yard....
Celia was the best choice for driver so that Stephen could do the bow and Nick on mainsheet. Quite a good solution to our crew positioning problem but it did mean that Stephen and I had a foredeck / pit domestic argument - just like the old days; ho ho "shut up at the back!".
A new boat for us to play with, Mark & Rima Bugler's new Saskia VII is a J97 - the ex-"Jika-Jika" so nothing to live upto there then. Wildfire the 36.7 was out, The Commodore's Arcsine, Arcona 370 and us made up the IRC and "Fast" class. Swenn and Loo-lah were the only ones out in the slow class.
A mid line start for us, in front of and out of the way of the bigger boats. Our speed was good up the first beat as well even though we were all very rusty. A great course for us was a triangle with two 110-120 deg apparent legs which we ayso'd with nice gybes at the corner.
The problem came as we arrived at the windward mark for the second time and there was a big bang from the rig. We took the foot off the pedal and dropped the headsail, the leeward shrouds looked slack but nothing was too untoward. On checking after the race we'd lost a bit of rig tension so can only summise that the mast foot had been hanging up on the extrusion. As there was no real problem we carried on with the race but we'd lost maybe four or five minutes.
We went down the deep run under the symmetric kite and nearly caught up with Arcsine at the bottom. The wind had started to puff up a bit and 3 handed was probably a bit much for them.
We got a 3rd under IRC and a third under NHC. It was won by Wildfire IRC and Saskia VII NHC.
Roll on next week. But first of all I'm going to have to re-tune the rig, and it was all nicely taped up as well!
Too busy for photos in the pit so here's a nice one of a little issue in the yard....
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