Damian101

We had a good Sunday in the Fleetwood club house updating 3 existing boat certificates with new or additional rigs, and 2 old Sea Scamps measured and updated. Many thanks to Peter Iles, Paul Middleton and John Sharman for holding the other end of the tape measure. Whenever we do these open measuring exercises normal club members always comment on they didn't realise what was involved in measuring and all learn a lot about their pride and joy. We have a few more to measure over the next week. If you want yours measuring so you can enter the event and sail with similar boats just ask.

Here we have for sale an old Marblehead that is very pleasing to the eye, with nice gentle curves. The fin is permanently fixed in which was the norm back in the day, short fin ideal for shallow lakes or ponds. There is a rudder servo fitted but no winch. Mounting plate for an RMG Buyer collects from Huddersfield West Yorkshire or I'm willing to meet half way on the motorway network within reason. £75 On a separate listing there are two carbon rigs that would suit this boat, just a little fettling required. damian.ackroyd@gmail.com 07808 255425

A carbon hull to the Cream Cracker design by Dave Creed which is very close to the original Cracker design from the 1970's. Some scratches on the hull, but nothing serious, most would polish out. Detachable fin, rudder, winch and rudder servo. Certificate last issued Jan 2020. Rudder servo looks like a Hi-Tec waterproof standard size. Winch looks like a Tempest winch. 1 top suits of light weight skim sails on carbon mast and spares, 2nd suit on carbon mast. Top suit 2100mm high. The rigs and sails are in very good condition and to be honest I couldn't make new rigs cheaper than the advertised price!!! Buyer collects from Huddersfield West Yorkshire or I'm willing to meet half way on the motorway network within reason. Afraid postage is out of the question as the postage will be more than the yacht is worth. These boats certainly have a presence on the water when sailing, and still give enjoyment to someone who likes something different that looks yacht like and is still fast 😀 £300 damian.ackroyd@gmail.com 07808 255425

Identify the culprits, two strikes and you earn a demotion with a DSQ score.

There is a very good diagram in the original MYA Handbook - also saved on the website. This states sizes, and distances that if followed gives good legibility at distance for the IRSA international classes. Slightly small digits and rules are published for the Dragons and their smaller sails. One thing that often gets missed is the thickness of the letters, a very thin letter may pass the rules and look nice but it is very hard to see at distance, ideally keep the strokes of the letters 20mm thick. I'd stick with Helvetica, Arial or Gill Sans that all give good legibility across the varying digits. Regarding 01-10, 08-80, 18-81 etc Always place a '1' in front to stop the confusion. 101, 110,108,180, 118,181. Remember others need to identify your boat by its sail number if you are calling for water at a mark, if they can't identify you then good luck in the protest room.

Vane A “Sir Percy” coming out again this year, with a sail each month to refresh me and boat. New RA “Sir Ivor” making her debut from February. We had a slight mistaken as both are same colour - oops. Roll on 2026 nationals.

Hi Mike The view of the hull upside down reminds me of my first venture into scratch building a 36, the plan was from Marine Modeller around the year 1991.

I have an ARS in my boat, purposely tried it in everything from an IOM , Marblehead to the 6M - all perfectly. I know these are more expensive and look very similar to the red ant - BUT It has to be the most accurate winch I've ever used, no glitching, no hunting back and forth, very smooth and repeatable.

Unfortunately very true with this transmitter - at small venues I use rechargeable batteries, but at larger venues and lots of boats I use Duracells with no issues.

Talk to your local foundry. The reason I say local, is you could end up paying more for postage than the actual one off bulb.

Port chancers - this may sound strong but from personal experience of been taken out several times by the same boat on the first day of an event I have no problem of them been penalised to the hilt, it made me really think about participating in certain events over the last couple of years, thankfully getting the desire back to compete at the top level again. 1st offence - 360 turn and behind all the boats that were hindered, might be 4+. 2nd offence - DSQ (non discardable) 3rd offence - DSQ plus miss next race/heat

The other option is to have multiple windward marks, the fastest skippers go round the furthest mark. In my opinion all starting at once is preferred, then everyone gets the benefit of learning the art of starting and beating up the first beat. The slower guys pealing off earlier to start the run, do that for each lap and everyone should keep coming back together several times and making it more fun each lap and not just at the finish, eventually all finishing at the sometime.

I was watching an interview of the chief umpire for the Sail GP and he mentioned that the most important rule that they enforce both on and off the water is "No Damage". He showed examples of boats colliding where the give way boat was penalised, but also in some circumstances the right of way boat was also penalised for not taking due care and attention around their boat. Near misses were also penalised. From my experience of sailing at many venues around the country very few can actual set a long enough first beat to separate the fleet by the first mark at a readable sail number distance. The big events such as Ranking and Nationals have fleets of 20 to 24 boats, this is essential for those skippers wishing to get experience of what a big Europeans or Worlds will be like, but it brings it's own challenges and we as skippers have to change our approach to sailing in 20 boat fleets compared with 10 at club level when approaching on port very likely will work as you're only navigating around 2 or 3 boats at a time and not 10+. I also think skippers should be taking far more care in the smaller classes to avoid contact and avoid situations where contact is highly likely.

I was filling in the excel voting form earlier and came across the Hollow in the bow profile within 10mm of the LWL. Why are there no accompanying diagrams showing the bridging points and how these will be used given different shapes of "chins". Without these diagrams we are unable to see the true potential this rule change may have. If a waterline is bridged and it moves the LWL point 30mm forward, where are the girth measurements points now taken from? A - From the original LWL point B - From the new bridged point where ever that may be If from the new point, in the formula you'll be loosing numbers on the extended waterline, but gaining on the reduced girth measurements. Where are the freeboards now taken from? This could make measuring a 6m in the dry measure a lot harder than it currently is, and mean a lot of other rule numbers will have to change to reflect this change if carried through.

No Reason for a 2nd, 3rd, 4th, or 5th mast, it is opening up a massive opportunity to having different mast standards for different conditions and gaining an advantage. 5% tolerances may not sound a lot but in reality that could make a totally different mast for different conditions. I'd need 5 masts at a cost of approx £300 per mast, gooseneck and boom: Light weight main Working main Flat main (reduced roach) 2nd working 3rd working One of the main reasons I sail the 6m and A classes is the simplified rig requirements of single mast, gooseneck and boom, allows me to compete at the top level without costing a fortune, otherwise it's another class I'll be priced out of if I want to be competitive.

A piece of 4mm stainless appropriately bent to go up and over the well sides would do the same job - but it wouldn’t give me the extra 190 squ mm of sail area. So why did I have to cut my Potter goosenecks down again? Let’s have some consistency. So it’s not a free for all or he that shouts loudest gets their own way.

Instead of just firing off a email, our suppliers are great at giving advise from their many years of sailing. Give PJ a ring, explain what you are doing and they’ll advise appropriately.

Gosport didn't forward them on and passed to me at December. They are with me ready to hand out at Pracc 3 &4 Blue Lagoons, which is the first race since Christmas.

Templates - All depends on the class. As the discussion has centred around the IOM class, I find it easier to use sticks that have tape wrapped around them to show the min and max dimensions, so much easier than using a tape measure or metre rule and you don’t have to keep referring back to figures in the class rules.

Count me in Derek. Bacon Butty at 8 o'clock Ice cream at 2 o'clock Cake at 4 o'clock Wine at 7 o'clock

As the mad one that measured all the boats and sails at the 95 Globals with the help of Mark and Paul - around a quarter of competitors had at least one or more sails fail measurement. 74 competitors, 4 rigs per competitor, 296 rigs, or 592 sails - that was a lot of check measuring! Some manufacturers are very close to the maximums allowed in varying class rules, so much so that you can quite easily believe in a bit of stretch over time will render them out of class. Something like a marblehead can take up to 4 hours just to measure the sails/rigs if the sails are made very close to the maximums, again you're measuring the whole rig and not just the sails. Having the sails pre-stamped as official wouldn't make any difference as it's the whole rig that needs measuring for the Marblehead class. Same for several other classes. From experience when measuring a skippers new set of sails, the biggest fault I find is not in the sails themselves, but in how they have not been put on the mast and booms correctly for their measurement bands. Also at this stage as a measurer you take a quick glance over the whole boat and point anything out that has been changed or replaced incorrectly over time. There's more to measuring than just using a tape measure on the sails.

All top coats require a good primer underneath. If you are painting untreated carbon fins (new or old). Best to brush a primer on, this will fill any of the little pin hole voids in the carbon. If you try spraying, the primer will not go into the pin hole voids but instead create little circular craters around the pin holes, you could end up with more craters than flat surfaces. It doesn't matter how much you keep spraying the craters just get bigger and don't fill. Best to paint the primer on with a brush, this forces the paint into the pin holes. Rub down with 600 wet and dry, plenty of water. Ensure there is an even coating of primer after flattening, if you've gone through to the carbon, place more primer on. No need to use anything finer than 600 grit, your not trying to get a gloss finish like you do with the top coat, you need something for the paint to grip to. Allow to dry, then spray if this is your chosen method. For one-off fins, I'd use standard aerosol cans from Halfords, cheap and easily available, stick to the solid colour, not metallics. On a dry day, build up in 4 thin coats. Allow 15 minutes between coats. Allow to dry for 24 hours. Rub out any imperfections, (but there shouldn't be any if your primer was good and even), with 1200 grit and a lot of water, very gently. If you haven't gone through the paint to the primer, use 2000 wet and dry again with plenty of water. If you have gone through spray another 2 coats. Wait 24 hours. Buff up with a good compound cream using a clean cloth. Halfords do a Farela cream that gets finer the more you rub. I purposely stuck to items that anyone can purchase from the highstreet, that will give you an excellent result. Remember it's all in the preparation and priming. Hope this helps.

Calling all A class skippers to get their entries into Gosport club by Friday 14th July (Vane Nationals) and Friday 15th September (Radio Nationals). This will enable Gosport club to arrange numbers for all the social events they have planned and for me to arrange the production of the Centenary shirt that all skipper and mates will receive upon registration to both the Vane and Radio Nationals. The MYA has very kindly given the monies to cover all skippers and mates for these two Centenary Nationals. For those passionate A class skippers that would like a Centenary Shirt but cannot attend either National they can purchased a shirt direct from myself for the cost of £15. (£12 per shirt and £3 P&P). Importantly stating their size. Damian.ackroyd 'at' gmail.com Robert Hobbs is producing an Addendum to his excellent "1001 International A Class Yachts" and is focused around the "A Class Family". It is in the same landscape format with an anthology of new reviews and facts concerning designers, skippers and their families and the yachts. Original Book 162 pages £30 Addendum 38 pages £13.50 P&P £3.80

Having refurbished quite a few IOM's I'd be careful of trying to remove deck eyes, most are well set in with epoxy around the nut and washer under the deck, and more likely fastened to tension bars to the keel box inside the hull. A few that I have tried to remove shear off if fastened this way. I prefer to cover them with a piece of flexible PFTE tubing or similar, this will cover the eye head and the washer on the deck while painting. Pulleys usually come out easily, but you'll likely have to clean up or replace the bolts and nuts. But be prepared to replace the whole pulley if the boat has not been serviced or given any TLC for a long time.

Hi David Yes you have to display the hull number on the outside of the hull, and most people use vinyl letters. BUT as per the varying IRSA class rules (IOM, RM, A Class etc) the hull number must also be bonded, painted or etched to the inside of the hull. Vinyl letters on the outside are often removed during refurbishment and without the bonded in number the hull will soon looses it's identity. If there is no number on the inside then it's fair to say the hull has not been registered.