505 Innovations at 95 Worlds

Technical Innovations Noted at the '95 Worlds

Updated/corrected August 16, 1996

Carbonara

Rondar recently built an all carbon fiber boat for the Swedish team of Kalle Nilsson/Johan Arvedsson. The boat has no gelcoat and no paint, so the carbon fiber layup is there for anyone to see. It was apparently fantastically light, and was brought up to weight by building in material in the center.

The boat is apparently fragile, and was holed at the worlds. A starting line bump was enough to fracture the skin in an earlier event.

The boat was apparently an effort to substantially reduce the moment of intertia. Paul Young of Rondar suggested to me that in general, the moment of inertia of the hulls are well within that of the rigs. Since Carbonara used a Proctor D, albeit black andodized making it look hi-tech, the overall moment of intertia sounds like it is not greatly less than that of a standard boat.

Carbonara was rumored cost two thousand pounds (a little over $3000) extra for all the carbon fiber.

Johan provided me with some detail on the boat.

She was built in March 1995 by Rondar Raceboats Ltd.

Carbonara is constructed of 254 g/sq. m. carbon biaxial all over. Inner skins of cockpit floor and under crew area of side tanks is reinforced with 280 g/sq.m. Kevlar woven roving. Front thwart, centerboard case and transom are made from 354 sq.m. E glass.

Recorded weights:

Hull + Deck bonded 43.0 Kg Secondary bonding 6.0 Kg (Mast support, bulkheads, toestrap etc.) Centerboard capping 12.0 Kg (includes 3 Kg lead) Aft centerboard support 1.0 Kg Paint inside + non slip 4.0 Kg Paint deck 2.0 Kg Fittings inc. compass 40.0 Kg ("heavy" fittings in CB area) and rig CB and rudder (heavy CB = 7 Kg) Glassed in lead 17.5 Kg`

Weight correctors 2.0 Kg

Total amount of lead 22.5 Kg (+ appr. 4.5 Kg in excess weight from over dimensioned fittings etc.)

Only the wet area of the hull is gelcoated, the rest of the hull and deck only has a thin transparent barrier coat to reduce weight.

Johan's note includes a list of further alterations from the standard Rondar., including a mast gate extending further aft, different CB trunk supports, adjustable forestay, a jib sheet system which allows the crew to move the lead out, without altering jib sheet tension, forward spinnaker tweakers, and the Rondar spinnaker sheeting tracks moved from aft to the center of the boat, making them easier to adjust.

Johan writes...

"The Carbonara idea is basically the the result of a discussion between me and Krister Bergstrom on a 12 hour flight back to Europe from the '94 Worlds in Durban. I asked Krister - How would you order a boat today if you could order it any way you liked? We were still discussing 12 hours later. The rest has been another long discussion between myself and Rondar (Paul Young) who has had great patience with me (and Kalle) and made a great job. The idea is simply to reduce the weight in the ends of the hull to reduce the moment of inertia (it could be really effective in combination with a carbon rig and Technora sails, these we will use from now on - saving another 1.5Kg on sail weight).

Unfortunately it seems like we built the crew area a little bit too thin - with "bumps" in the skin created by the returning spinnaker pole (spiro). This has now been solved by adding one extra layer of Kevlar on top of the carbon in the crew area of the side tanks - adding approximately 2.0 Kg of weight (that we can take out of the glassed lead). We have also reinforced the bow with some extra Carbon after the accident during the '95 Worlds... Heat has never been a problem since the carbon surface rapidly cools off from both the wind, shadow and water....Carbonara feels different to all other boats (including both the standard and Bergstrom's Rondar). Kalle also had some problems to get used to it and describes the difference to the Lindsay as Carbonara is sailing "on top" of the water and "over the waves" instead of through them as the Lindsay. We have noticed - we believe - that Carbonara does not go as close (high) to the wind as the Lindsay (even if we went higher than most of our competitors in the worlds - except maybe for some of you Americans), but she compensates that with higher speed. Carbonara is a totally different boat downwind - definitely faster on reaches and all downwind angles - and sails as "on a railtrack" compared to the Lindsay which has a more "sideways" feeling. Kalle mentioned that when you move the tiller on the Lindsay it feels like the bow "answers" and moves - in Carbonara its totally opposite and the feeling is that the aft moves. We still haven't found the optimum speed in light conditions - which we don't really know the reason for. I can't really say if it's us, the boat, the tuning or sails - I hope I will find out soon! But we were very happy with our 4th and 6th placings in the British and Worlds - better than we expected after such a short time learning this totally new concept - and almost equalling Kalle's best ever results (he was 5th twice - in less competetive fleets) after 25 years in the 505. I hope that proves we are on the right t(r)ack... (we'll see in Townsville...)...(To anyone interested Carbonara will be for sale after the '96 Worlds in Townsville. A good package deal - appr. USD 13,000 export price (no VAT) - includingf.x. 3 Rebell (racing) wardrobes + Pinnell & Bax Spin, extra foils, trolley and trailer etc."

Bergstrom's Aft Rig

Four time world champion Krister Bergstrom was back, very narrowly missing his fifth worlds title. He currently sails a very customized Rondar. The key differences were:

Lowering the mast step such that the rig sets up well aft of other rigs when he rakes to a normal sailing setting.
Moving the back of the mast gate aft to allow the mast to be raked
Moving the CB bolt aft to compensate for the aft rig
Moving the jib tack forward into the launcher as much as possible
He has not used a main halyard for years, slightly reducing the weight of the rig.

Krister is threatening to return to the race course with his famous pink Parker of years ago.

Bergstrom's Feelings About Weight

Krister sanded half of the gelcoat off the foredeck and forward hull. The boat was rigged with very light fittings, and very light line.

Deck Stepped Mast

I noticed one boat with a deck stepped mast.

Aft spinnaker sheet lead block on Track

Many of the Rondars are rigged with the aft most spinnaker sheet lead block mounted on a track on top of the seat tanks, near the stern. Rather than moving the stopper knot on the sheets as conditions change, you simply move the block to compensate.

Forward Jib Tack Positions

Bergstrom's and many of the other Rondars had the forestay and jib tack mounted on an aluminium tube going across the bow. This tube steals a little space from the launcher, but results in the jib being tacked further forward. I believe this rig is necessary to get the adjustable forestay option. The winners, Robinson/Masterman used a Rondar with this system.

Jib Sheeting Systems

A wide variety of jib sheeting systems were in use. In general, just about everyone except some of the US boats has a means for moving the lead in and out. Many boats had minimal fore and aft or up and down adjustment.

Sails

Bergstrom used a Kevlar mainsail. Howard Hamlin claims the main is all seam shape and no luff curve, but I did not take a close look at it.

Most of the Aussie 505 Team had Vectran (black fiber) sails. They are a clear film with the vectran reinforcement. They resemble 3DL, but are built of panels, with the vectran criss-crossing the film, rather than laid onto the film to match the load lines, as with 3DL. Most of the Aussie 505 Team were using these on Goldspar masts. Their rigs do not seem to be optimized for the light and marginal trapezing conditions that were common during the worlds. The top Aussie boat was 16th.

The Rondar Hulls

Though they have been around for three years, this was my first look at the new Rondar 505s. They use an epoxy layup, with a PVC foam core. Rondar has built at least two all carbon fiber boats, the Nilsson/Arvedsson boat, and one other that was gelcoated or painted.

I spoke at length with Paul Young about the construction and the hull shape. My recollections of that discussion (and a couple of others) are:

Built to minimum sizes (boat is small everywhere)
Played with baseline (rocker)
Paul Young measured lots of hulls before building plug
Swedes with carbon Rondar notice difference between it and their Lindsay
Rondar is considering a balsa cored, vinylester resin boat to reduce cost (this was partly in response to my pointing out that a Rondar was not noticeably less money than a Waterat in North America). The balsa vinylester boat would not need to be vacuum bagged.

Rondar hopes to do SailExpo with a new 505, 470, 420, Contender, and bring some used 505s over in the container.

The Rondar looks like a Waterat or Kyrwood generally (interior). Lots of interior varients have made, such as wider CB trunk caps, and moving the back of the gate aft. Some other details that were interesting to me were:

Layup shroud tubes with tank, not added later
Thicker area in rail where shrouds attach to rail - built into tooling, hull skin is parallel to deck for easy through bolting. The area is long enough to allow for shrouds on cars and tracks.
Paul Young was 4th (crewing) in a "bog standard" Rondar that had just been completed before the Worlds.

According to Val May, the Waterat hull is unique, and differs from the others, while the other hulls have much in common.

Robinson/Masterman

The winners had a forward tack launcher boat according to Paul Young (I did not look at the boat myself). From reading regatta reports in 505 Great Britain, they are very fast upwind. Bill Masterman is very tall, while Robinson is quite light.

North American Boats

Overall the North American boats had good speed. There were always US boats well up there in every race. Tyler Moore/Ryan Cox and Nick Trotman/Mike Mills combined good speed with sailing smart, and were 5th and 9th respectively. They were sailing the two oldest boats in the Worlds fleet. Moore/Cox raced a forward tack Waterat with North sails, while Trotman/Mills used their 1982 forward tack Lindsay with some Ullman sails.

The initial conclusions are that the North American boats are fast enough, but need more big fleet experience to sail smarter.

Ebbe Rosen and Olle Wenrup of Sweden - who appeared to sail quite smart - were 3rd in a launcher Waterat.

Next stop, Townsville!