It will be great for you guys in Australia ( and new zealand?) to build boards for your market, the more the merrier.
I only skimmed the thread but it seems a good place to make a few general points.
Board weight. Dont build a board under weight and then weight correct if it any way reduces strength and longevity. Build it to last, you wont regret it. A sensible weight limit is just that sensible and not worth circumventing.
Box rule. Terrible idea. Reason being it leads to weird and wonderful creations that make everything else obsolete. This ( in my view) really is not the point of RACEBOARD. In my world view the Raceboard rule should be one that encourages nice pleasant to use classic raceboards that are reasonably priced, last well and are good and relatively easy to sail in 0-25 knots.
The current raceboard rules are really inadequate, and rely entirely on nobody bothering to make raceboards...... if the class dispense with the production board rule it would be a devastatingly bad move,
in the absence of a proper measurement rule the above scenario erupts. It initally seems attractive/exciting but it soon leads to a crap class that nobody sails.I completely agree that the production board only rule should go, but only if/when an adequate measurement control system is implemented in its place. One that is loose enough to give some variation in designs for different weights and styles of sailors but tight enough to keep the boards looking and behaving like "classic" longboards.
The administrative argument against measurement is the time and the pain in the arse of actually doing the measuring. We think this could be navigated around fairly easily by anybody who makes and wants to race a board, publishing the control measurment dimensions on a dedicated website. Then enabling all competitors at events with the power to check any other competitors board dimensions against the published sizes and rules post racing. It being a stipulation that all competitors MUST make their board available for checking. Any disputes then to be referred to race management. Basically self policing.
Anyway... have a really good think of where you can go with building boards in AUS, the class you want to sail and how you want to encourage builders and competitors to participate. Now is the time to make the strategic decisions about what you are doing.. before investing in tooling and time!
We have been thinking about this a lot lately, so if anyone wants to contact either myself (Matthew Burridge,
[email protected]) or Sean Cox directly then feel free, We obviously have a vested interest, but that interest is in successful vibrant racing fleets.
Good luck and crack on!
