Karver Pink KB6 © International SailForce

The pink-coloured KB6 is a light-weight block weighing just 21 grams. It has a safe working load of 220kg and is suitable for a line diameter of 6mm. The block is composed of rollers and ball bearings to ensure friction is kept to a minimum and is ideal for applications where a line under high load must turn on a long radius such as sheets and halyards.

Karver’s new K-BTi blocks achieve low friction under load, low weight, smaller size, but with maximum safety.
The K-BTi blocks are 60 to 70 per cent lighter than any other existing blocks on the market. The blocks have been reduced in size to suit the new high-tech ropes now available. Weight and size has been minimised while maintaining a very low friction coefficient. These new blocks, with their central lashing, provide the same safety features as the standard K-blocks in case of over-loading.

As titanium is not allowed in all boat classes, Karver has produced the KB range in both titanium and stainless steel.
The only difference in the two K-BTi blocks offered in this range is their weight. The KBTi2 and KBs2 both have a safe working load of 2.5 tonnes, a sheave diameter of 36mm making them suitable for a line diameter of 12mm. However, the KBTi2 weights 85g, while the KBs2 weights 112g.

The new K-B block includes a textile attachment. It is ‘olive’ shaped and assembled with a special composite part to hold the lashing. The block is made of aluminium and composed of bearings and balls. Its weight is 103g for the block, composite part and textile shackle. The safe working load is 1.2 tonnes and the breaking load is 2.4 tonnes.

Antal

The SailForce team are experts in customising Antal products for their clients. With Italian flair and design Antal manufactures high performance mast track and batten car systems, genoa cars, travellers, winches, rope ring drives, halyard blocks and high-load snatch blocks.

Three key new products in the Antal range are the Turning Tulip Sheave, the Removable Gate for Full Batten Track and the W90.3 three-speed Maxi Winch.

Antal’s non-turning Tulip Sheaves are fixed sheaves which do not turn in the direction of manoeuvres as they accept quite different lead angles. The tulip sheave is designed with a bit of flair and angle to it so that a person can pull a rope from an upward direction or pull from a downwind direction and the rope won’t fall off the sheave.

The choice of a Tulip sheave, instead of a revolving block, comes from the need to reduce bulk and weight. Antal refined their Tulip sheaves after working with the French oceanic multi-hulls where this type of sheave was used for entry and exit of halyards on the rotating masts. Antal then developed the idea of making the sheave more efficient with an axial bearing in composite fibre and large round bearings (self-captive) in Torlon for side loads. The Tulip sheave is in oxidized and Teflon coated aluminium and can handle very high loads.

The Turning Tulip Sheave is the next step in the development of Tulip sheaves. It is deck mounted and has extra bearings to reduce friction. The flare in the tulip sheave allows it to be used at a more vertical plane, rather than horizontal like the non-turning sheave. The ‘tulip’ gives more freedom to the users , being able to be used at nearly all angles and is still capable of taking high loads.

The Removable Gate for full batten track is designed specifically for mainsail heads that have square tops with diagonal battens. As these mainsails are hard to put on and off the cars on a normal slider system, Antal has put a gate in the mast system so the gate can put, for example, a metre up the track. Then the mastman doesn’t have to pull the diagonal batten all the way down to the bottom of the mast. It can be pulled down to the gate then he pulls the cord on the gate and that piece will actually slide out so that the crew can remove the headboard and head batten without having to pull the sail away from the cars.

Antal offers a wide range of winches for cruising and racing boats; 28 types in all. There are 14 standard and 14 self-tailing models. They are available in chrome-plated bronze, hard black anodized aluminium and natural bronze. The winches have been tested in the marine environment and do not require a lot of maintenance.

The W90.3 is the latest powerful winch to be offered in Antal’s winch range. It has most of the features of the other winches in this range including the self-tailing spring-loading feature which adjusts automatically to the thinnest ropes, and if overloading occurs, the winch releases the line to avoid excess force on the self-tailing arm. The difference is in the winch’s power.

The W90.3 has three powered and three manual speed options. It comes in three versions of the W90.0 – the ELH electric horizontal drive, the ELV electric vertical drive and the HD hydraulic vertical drive. All have a drum diameter is 300mm, a base diameter is 430mm and a safe working load of 8000kg.

Another of Antal’s new products is the HS Mast Slider System. This system is for boats will full batten mainsails which experience high loads and compression loading on the mainsail luff.

The HS system uses aluminium sliders containing composite fibre inserts which run on the aluminium track mounted on the mast. This HS composite fibre is a new material from Antal made from special resins strengthened with fibre and self-lubricating. The company says it is durable over long periods of use and offers extremely low friction coefficients.

Sparcraft

Sparcraft is a world leader in mast manufacturing specialising in the design, engineering and manufacture of high-quality masts, booms and rigging systems. SailForce provides replacement parts and technical links for Sparcraft products.

The company recently launched a range of removable bowsprits for boat from 25 feet up to 47 feet. The company says these bowsprits can be quickly cleared from the foredeck and will be ideal for use with gennaker, code zero and spinnakers.

Sparcraft’s new tuff luff headstay system, Tuff Luff Aero, is a major evolution by the company in developing slotted headstay systems. This light-weight system provides a unique aerodynamic shape giving a