Class rules
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URL: http://www.laser28.org/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=626
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Topic: Class rules
Posted By: frfletch
Subject: Class rules
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 3:58am
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We don't sail one design here on the west coast, so we have migrated from the class rules a bit. I think consideration should be made to update the rules to allow the Laser to catch up with the times and become a better boat.
1. Just about nobody puts new lifelines on sailboats now days using stainless steel. The higher grades of dyneema are better in every way and weight 1/7 as much as 1 x 19. 2. Similarly no one uses 1x19 for back stays on fractional rigs. 4mm dyneema is plenty and is also 1/7 the weight. Today there is an increasing trend in using dyneema, specifically Dynex Dux, to replace 1x19 in the standing rigging. Of course this will provide a substantial improvement in boat performance, so once one boat goes, everyone would have to, but I suspect that in 5 years from now, Dynex and others who may developer other ultra-hi performing synthetics, will have the majority of the standing rigging in high performance boats. Our little Lasers are quite tender with not a generous amount of weight or surface area to our keels. Why not get rid of some of the weight in the ends and up high so that these things can move a bit better? Dyneema is cheaper than stainless and simple things like back stays and life lines can be spliced by the owner with special equipment. Comments? |
Replies:
Posted By: Bill Layton
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 8:13am
| Frank are you saying buying a Dyneema backstay is cheaper than buying a a standard 1x19 - 3/16" dia with swaged on ends? Can you verify this for me. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 9:04am
| 3/16 wire is $1.69/ft at Defender. 5/32 AmSteel (Dyneema) is $0.70/ft. 12 strand is so easy to splice that even I can do it. |
Posted By: Bill Layton
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 9:23am
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Thanks Dan, I thought at one point the dyneema needed a cover on it? Do we just leave the dyneema exposed with regular splices on the end? Is it really that simple.
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Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 11:03am
| Yes, it is really that simple. However, on mine, I cut some 6" sleeves of jacket material and slipped it over the dyneema to line up with the stanchions and then whipped the ends into place. The original Laser stanchions are quite fair so unsure if it was necessary, but it is simple to do, so why not. Also, if one goes the extra mile and uses Dynex, it is very abrasive resistant. They are using it, uncovered, to wrap and drag logs out of the forest in that industry where it has replaces chain and steel wire. I still used the little jackets though. |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 11:22am
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By-the-way, same with making a new backstay. If you can do a brummel splice, you can make a back stay. Also about price: There are many grades of dyneema, but all stronger than steel. There is SK 75, SK 78, and SK 90, then such things as Dynex Dux. You can also order dyneema winch line from China via Ebay, etc, where you can buy 5mm for the life lines, or back stay, etc, for about $.50/ft. I also purchased some yacht braid for them in 8mm (5/16') with a dyneema core and polyester jacket. I purchased six rolls of 50m each. The advertised price was $128/roll, but since I bought 6 rolls he discounted it to something like $100. This material is beautiful, but not suitable for tapering, because the core is not UV protected as are the cores from New England ropes, Samson, etc. They are nice lines though.
Regarding Dynex, I think the class might be able to negotiate a deal on a their 5mm from Colligo Marine. The owner's name is John. His company is the one making the most effort in promoting Dynex into the recreational marine community. They offered to rig my entire boat in Dynex, including standing rigging, as a promotional thing. The local handicappers said that they would start out with a 3 point hit. As it happens, my boat is under the microscope by the rating people as it is, so I decided to not do it. As long as my boat is pretty much a conforming Laser, they can't very too much from the base rating. However we have here what we refer to as an X-boat, (something to which there is no reference or has been highly customized) and once you are an X -boat the rating people can assign any number they want to it. I don't want to trip into that. The company in China I deal with is called YZ Ropes. Find them on Ebay. |
Posted By: Bill Layton
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 7:26pm
| After some reading I've learned that the lifespan of Dynex is 5 years. That'a about the same lifespan as PVC coated lifelines.... but my backstay is 28 years old... |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 8:51pm
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The reason that Dynex can only be advertised as good for 5 years in the sun is because it hasn't existed longer than that for practical testing. The expect it to go much further. Also, you have no idea if your plastic coated life lines are good or not because where they start rusting is beneath the plastic. That's why most authorities don't allow them anymore. When I purchased Voila, the one thing on the survey report was the suggestion that I get rid of the plastic coated life lines. We trucked her from Portland to Blaine, and then sailed her from Blaine to Squamish, BC. Within an hour one of the life lines failed. I did a lash job and made a temporary fix. An hour later, a separate life line failed.
In my view, there is no case that can be made for steel compared to Dyneema for life lines and standing rigging other than for, perhaps, the forestay. I can't figure out how to accommodate the 72 diameters of bury in the 6.24 mm channel in the Carbo Foil. |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 8:54pm
| Just noted you were referring to the backstay, which is 1 x 19 and surely will last a long time. It also weighs a tonne and goes all the way to the mast head........dump it. Let's free these little boats up a little and let them chase the big guys. |
Posted By: Bill Layton
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 10:03pm
| I have the fresh water perspective and have never seen a coated lifeline fail and we have lots of boats here. But with the RRS mandating lifelines we will follow that and drop our own rule. The membership will need to decide if they want to allow dyneema for the B-stay. It certainly isn't a cost issue and it's been around for over 10 years. Sounds interesting. Thanks for your input |
Posted By: Winner
Date Posted: 02 May 2013 at 11:53pm
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I think Frank makes a convincing argument, especially when it comes to
reducing the weight that's high above the COG to help reduce heel. I'd
be curious to know though how much weight that is in total (let's say
combined weight of mast, stays, shrouds and sails) and how much of that weight is
contributed by the forestay and backstay, as a percentage of the total
weight. My sense is that the two stays are probably not a huge
contributer and even by reducing that weight by 85%, the overall difference won't be huge. But that's just my quick response without putting actual numbers to it. My boat is freshwater and all my lifelines and backstay are in great shape so until I start racing more competitively I'll stick to what I have. ------------- Chris Eclipse #240 Thunder Bay, ON |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 03 May 2013 at 12:31am
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In sailing, no single item breaks a boat loose and sends her on the plane other than say 50hp on the back. A boat's speed is the culmination of many fractions.
Weight aloft is a terrible thing for our Lasers. Recently I demonstrated to our crew in a practice the necessity of hiking hard. In the given breeze we were making 6 knots even with all hands on the rail and feet out. I then had the main trimmer turn around with his feet insider and the boat speed dropped to 5.74. That's about 500m per hour.......non recoverable. It seems like a little thing to have one's feet inside, but it is not. If you could put, say 3 or 4 pounds on the end of a pole of say 26' long and held it out and waved it around.....you couldn't. Now accelerate that weight as when going over chop and hitting a wave, and the inertia of the mass is huge. Worse, hang it all out to leeward on the end of a long stick. Much worse than one crew with his feet inboard. Boats far bigger and more stable than ours, are meticulous at reducing weight aloft. Voila lives on the hardstand together with a fleet of Farr 30's. None have steel back stays or cascades, all their antennas are on the push pit, many halyards start at 6mm and taper from there. After all, we are all trying to go 6 mph just a little faster than the next guy. Fractions make the difference if you are a racing sailor. |
Posted By: Seawolf
Date Posted: 03 May 2013 at 2:35pm
| Well this is timely, I just sent my rig off to a rigger to be inspected and the backstay bridle to be replaced due to a little "meathook". So if I am advised that I need to replace my rigging, then I am coming back here for another hard look at this. If I understood this thread, you are advocating replacing the 1x19 with Dynex for all standing rigging except the forestay, and that is due to the carbofoil being design to fit on a 1x19 SS. I guess one thing that got me hesitating on this idea, even though there is the initial cost savings on the standing rigging, there is the idea of losing the mast which would be a substantial cost. However, I will definitely do the replacement for the lifelines in Dynex. |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 03 May 2013 at 3:38pm
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Life lines and for certain the back stay. Then dump all the stainless steel wire in the cascade system and replace it with any of the Dyneema's. You don't need Dynex for that. Just some Amsteel or anything in the 1/8 - 3/16 range will do for the cascade. You will be very happy with it all.
If you decide to go with more Dynex for standing rigging, I would not worry about the rig falling down. The steel shrouds that are standard on the Laser have a tensile strength of 4,400 psi. The 5mm Dynex Dux that would replace them is rated at 11,000 psi and weighs 1/7th as much as the steel. Then you can also take the heavy rusting bolt cutters off the boat, and just keep your rigging knife sharp. The use of Dynex is rigging is not a cheaper step down. It is an improving step up both in safety and boat performance. |
Posted By: Guests
Date Posted: 03 May 2013 at 4:24pm
| I wouldn't be so quick to start recommending dux for standing rigging. It's one thing for the backstay that we are adjusting constantly. From what I understand, dux has a lot of creep and would require constant adjusting, beyond what you could accomplish with regular turnbuckles -- they do not have enough range. I think there is a ways to go before it becomes a viable option. |
Posted By: Winner
Date Posted: 03 May 2013 at 9:23pm
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A few years ago on the boat I crew on, we bought a new jib halyard as the old one had terrible meat hooks in the 1x19 stainless (yes, we were actually using stainless 1x19 for a halyard). We upgraded to dyneema. Seemed like a great idea until the first time we hoisted the genoa with the new halyard, five minutes into the Wednesday race the line broke. Turns out a sheave at the top of the mast where the line entered the mast had some sharp edges, most likely from the abuse of the meat hook (chicken or egg I'm not sure but I digress). My point is, Dyneema is super strong and super thin, but you'd better keep it away from sharp objects. Hoisting your genoa back up with the other halyard is one thing. Losing your backstay is something else. Yes, I know the L28 will survive a blown backstay, but I'm just saying is all... ------------- Chris Eclipse #240 Thunder Bay, ON |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 04 May 2013 at 12:19am
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When I bought my boat in 2008 it had a spectra (dyneema) back stay that had been on it for years. It also had spectra tapered halyards that went back to 2005, still good. I have since changed the back stay and down sized it to 4mm and shortened it, and all halyards are dyneema and tapered. No problems with anything. If you have burrs on your sheave boxes, they were caused by the wear from the rubbing of the previous stainless wire halyards that wear on the sides. My boxes are fine and there is zero wear on my halyards. Our halyards are 1/4" before tapering, so we are only 1/8" dyneema on the core.......no failures nor wear on the halyards at all.
Regarding standing rigging, they do use standard turnbuckles for take-up, though multiple lashings are an alternative, mostly used on cruisers and multi hulls. Boats like ours use turnbuckles. Dux creeps very little as it is already pre-stretched. There is initial movement, but it is the mechanical take-up of the splices and settling into the terminating thimbles. Once that is taken up, there is no creep in the line. I am not trying to sell the stuff, it is not my business. However the notion that dyneema is risky in the use of back stays and halyards is totally without foundation, unless the yacht is not properly set up. We have no visible wear on our dyneema other than some light fraying on our tapered spinnaker sheets that rub through the beak of the pole end, but the same tapered lines still go on for years in that use. |
Posted By: Bill Layton
Date Posted: 04 May 2013 at 8:12am
| Frank, What toggle do you use for the b-stay at the masthead crane? Or do you attach to only one side? and do you use a thimbal on the bottom end? |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 04 May 2013 at 8:56am
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My backstay has a thimble on both ends. At the top I use a double toggle. The top of the toggle is captured by the standard thru-pin. When I put mine together I had to use things that I had or could make, so at the bottom of the toggle it straddles the thimble(all centered), but I machined a little barrel/sleeve that the pin goes through to fix the space between the toggle so that I could use a 1/4" round head machine screw as the fixing pin secured by a nylon capped lock nut. The sleeve allows the nut to be tightened holding the toggle tight to the sleeve, but the thimble moves freely between the toggles because the space is fixed by the sleeve. The thimble rests on the sleeve.
At the bottom the thimble attaches to the first block of the cascade system via a D shackle, I think much like the original. I think most of my cascade hardware may be original with the metal Shafer at the top and a mix of stuff from my box, mostly small block Harken. The top of the cascade running the first 2:1 is maybe 3/16 dyneema, then it is mostly 1/8 th, all single braid until I get to the 4:1 control lines which are double braid standard junk line that is soft to the hand and about 7 or 8 mm. I will photograph the cascade today and send it to you for posting. Much of my 1/8th isn't pretty because it is just odd pieces of dyneema I had laying around to make up the cascade. |
Posted By: Winner
Date Posted: 04 May 2013 at 10:11am
Oh yeah for sure the sheave damage was caused by the previous 1x19 wire. I guess all I'm saying is that if you're considering switching, inspect everything carefully to make sure you have no sharp edges :-) ------------- Chris Eclipse #240 Thunder Bay, ON |
frfletch wrote:Posted By: Seawolf
Date Posted: 06 May 2013 at 3:00pm
| Another question, Since I have my standing rig at the rigger for inspection, and I know I will have to replace the Cascade and will look at what you suggested. But also wanted to ask and consider the rigging option "PBO" anyone have experience with this? |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 07 May 2013 at 2:10pm
| We are considering PBO, or similar, for the for stay because it does not have the additional thickness of the bury to stuff down the carbo foil. For normal standing rigging, however, the Dynex Dux will be cheaper that PBO. I am going to speak to Colligo Marine today and see if I can get some kind of deal on the Dynex for members of the Laser Association. If there is going to be a change if class rules, They are in a position to help both Laser owners, and themselves in this area. Stay tuned! |
Posted By: Jon167
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 10:41am
both Pandora & Chaos at Pultneyville Yacht Club here on the south shore of lake Ontario have dumped the wire cascade's in the backstay & vang, I went to synthetic lifelines as well and Chaos is not far behind, I will most likely be going to synthetic backstay this season. It's just a far superior product & IMHO safer. these would be the only deviations from OD rules but it would be enough to DSQ at a sanctioned OD event  I agree that it's time to consider taking a look at this section of the rules. ------------- Jon Pandora Hull#167 Lake Ontario SBYC Past President LYRA |
Posted By: Jon167
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 10:44am
PBO is super expensive  ------------- Jon Pandora Hull#167 Lake Ontario SBYC Past President LYRA |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 11:40am
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Yes, PBO is expensive, that is why we consider a "PBO-type" solution. That means a small braid or filament wound continuously around the end-piece thimbles and then bound in a jacket, or shrink wrapped on the ends where it enters the carbo foil so that the cargo foil does not wear on the line. I have two or three riggers prepared to make up such a line for me. Colligo Marine has also offered to build a forestay for my Laser should I choose to go with Dynex Dux for standing rigger. For sure there is a way. This morning I was fingering a roll of Spectra fishing braid and thinking of how to adapt that to the forestay solution. No very difficult.
Of course the easiest way by far is to get rid of the carbo foil and go back to hanks. Then one could just go with Dynex Dux all the way. We were thinking about this the other day when my friend asked me the question: "How many races did I do in 2012?" Followed by: "How many live head sail changes did you make?" It is a good question. I think I have had the Carbo foil on the boat since July 2008, and I am guessing that we have made perhaps only 3 headsail changes during a leg in that period. The foil weighs a considerable amount. Recently a brand new Beaker 37 has come to our club. This is $450,000 of state-of-the -art in one package. They use hanks. |
Posted By: Jon167
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 12:16pm
my tuffluff is only good on one track now so no sailchanges for me, we are sailing PHRF-LO & have opted out of using any headsail larger than the 106% lapper, we get a 6sec bonus  & IMHO we don't loose any upwind speed and our pointing angle is improved......I have a feeling hanks are in my future.......I'm not sure I am at a point where I would go to a synthetic headstay....... ------------- Jon Pandora Hull#167 Lake Ontario SBYC Past President LYRA |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 12:58pm
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I love this stuff! Thanks for playing. We also have dumped our code 5 genoa but still use a code 4 that trims inside the spreaders. We find this faster than the code 5 in all conditions ands we get a 3 point save.
We sail another Laser in Squamish where we only use the Lapper. Squamish is a predominantly windy area, so it pays off to keep the 6 points. How do you fair in ends under 8 knots with the lapper compared to your competition using 155's, etc. At what point do you feel the pain with lessor sail. Do you sail in smooth water, or do you have some chop and wave action? In smooth condition, we always enjoyed the 3 degree pointing advantage of the lapper. The lapper is far faster to tack as well. We still speculate that the better solution would be a code 6 main coupled with a lapper, because the 3 point addition can be put to good use both upwind and down, and because the Laser is generally is quite neutral at the helm and could benefit from bringing some of the COE aft. It would be an expensive experiment if it did not work. I know that the top One Design Laser sailors will weigh-in at this point with their experience of having sailed against other Lasers who have tried that, and that those changes did not help them against the standard "well-sailed" Laser. I can believe that. These boats have great potential, but getting that potential is not "slam-dunk" easy. So a well set-up Laser against an expertly sailed Laser would loose 9 out of 10 times. I would like to see what would happen if a modified sail plan Laser were sailed by the crew of Colibri, Convictus, or one of the other well oiled Laser crews. As to synthetic standing rigging, we have always used it for the backstay. I would love to try it on the remainder of the standing rigging (Dynex Dux). Our local rater says that they will start off by charging me three phrf points, so we would have to carry a 16 second/hr penalty around the course both upwind and down. I think when we figure out how to organize the forestay, or I get comfortable with the notion of taking our foil off and changing all our headsail luff tapes to hanks (ouch), then we will probably go for it. Meanwhile, we are taking the vhf off the rig and putting it on the push-pit, replacing the #16 AWG triplex with 3 single-pled encased with this sort of finger-trap netted tubing that we got for $.39/ft. We are also breaking with Class compliance in that we have had a new spinnaker made to the max of code 9 with luff length of something like 33.2'. It looks a bit droopy flying from the current spinnaker hoist. I have machined a new minimalistic sheave box to take the 1/8" halyard core that it will have to accommodate and will place it on the mast about where the current steaming light goes. We also dumped the spinnaker up haul to save weight and clutter aloft, and use the alternate jib halyard instead. Less if best. Fun! fun! fun! |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 1:02pm
| Sorry about the typos! |
Posted By: Jon167
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 2:00pm
I am kind of a purist minimalist so I like your Ideas, the OD spin is so big to begin with I can't imagine going bigger.....our conditions vary greatly, Ontario can dish out some serious weather so we see it all. I really feel Farr hit it out of the park with this design, I feel the boat was about 15-20yrs ahead of it's time....he knew what he was doing and I really am convinced that except in ultra light air sheeting a lapper inside the spreaders is faster than a 155%. I was fortunate enough to be working in a loft last year and I built a new main can't wait to see how much better she will go this year.....another nice feature of having a lapper as the largest upwind headsail is cost  ------------- Jon Pandora Hull#167 Lake Ontario SBYC Past President LYRA |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 11 May 2013 at 2:24pm
| It is correct that it is a great design. On the other hand, 25+ years have passed. What will you be doing with the new main. Anything particularly interesting. We just switched back to slugs to allow the sail to drop a litt further back away from the mast giving us a little bit of unrated sail area. |
Posted By: Jon167
Date Posted: 12 May 2013 at 8:48am
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nothing particularly interesting, it was just time. I went from slugs to a boltrope ------------- Jon Pandora Hull#167 Lake Ontario SBYC Past President LYRA |
Posted By: Bill Layton
Date Posted: 12 May 2013 at 8:59am
| Just as a design note when a main is designed for slugs/slides, it comes with a slightly shorter luff length because as the sail is moved aft it will usually hook on the backstay. An older main with a shrunk bolt rope can sometimes get away from this. But not on a new sail. Also the camber is moved further fwd to keep it in the same location is would be for a sail with a boltrope. The shape is relative to the spar. |
Posted By: frfletch
Date Posted: 12 May 2013 at 10:57am
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My sail was originally made for slides by Quantum. However I did not like the way it set to the mast, so I switched to a rope luff. It was ok, but I felt the sail was too flat unless I removed all pre bend which would either compromise forestay tension, or require disproportionate tension in the lowers. At this time Quantum went bust so switched to North for help where we added more luff curve to conform better to the mast set up now more similar to yours. Now we modified the sail once more going back to slides and changed to a full batten on the 2nd from the top. At that batten we are using a special slide that has four little wheels on It that bear against the back of the mast to take the pressure of that batten. You will be able to guess that the sail looks better upwind than on a run because that full batten reverses the camber at that point as the shroud hits it.
You are also correct that the overlap between the roach and backstay is an issue, particularly at the 2nd batten. To compensate for that, we wrapped a large patch of what I think Jason refers to as Cuban Cloth. This is a very tough spectra fiber band aid that is coated with Teflon and is very slick. Combined with a 4mm slick Dynex Dux backstay it works ok. But just. Anymore mainsail than that will dictate the need for a whip up top n The sail looks great and we do get a little better feel at the helm. Jason Rhodes provides input on my sails. He worked with Greg in Totonto years ago, then ran a Quantum loft in the states somewhere on the West Coast, then worked here for North and has a relationship with the North loft today. So he has been a large factor in things we have been doing recently and helped us gain about an average of 3-4 minutes per hour on the coarse. Voila is a constant work-in-progress. |