R Speculation

Originally posted by gordon1277 One thing I have noticed is the distance between mast foot and centreboard seems to me to be unusual in that it is a long way and I wonder how this works. most boats are pretty close.

I'm pretty much a heretic when it comes to board position in that I'm not sure its as critical as is often believed, especially people on cruising boat forums. To my mind moving the board backwards and forwards simply changes the amount of sideload on the rudder as opposed to the centreboard, so ideal board position is related to size of foils and all sorts of stuff, and moving it back or forwards a few inches will have minimal impact on weather helm.

I suspect that an awful lot of it will come down to low speed handling, keeping the boat out of irons and all that. It may be that a large mast/board distance makes the boat easier to tack.

It would be interesting to see something from RS about all the things they changed during the development phase and why - something we could all learn from.

I havent sailed the show boats, but the prototype sailed fine upwind, very similar to a supernova even though its shorter. I am sure lots of things have changed since, but the 7 and 9 sails looked nice enough to me. The only area where the lack of weight may not be as positive would be using the momentum to shoot a mark that you have undercut

Edited by SimonW99 - 07 May 14 at 2:36pm

Everyone will want a trolley - everyone so far has ordered one. People are fascinated by the carrying thing, just because you can - but I've logged the health & Safety point! And of course you wouldn't want to do it in a breeze. I'd probably end up in orbit.

Give Yachting World's Matthew Sheahan a break on the trolley weight comment! In the heat of the videoing moment he probably confused himself: His RS400 trolley will weigh just over 30kg - a bit more than an Aero hull (rather than a fully rigged boat).

Very happy to run through the design evolution... when a bit more time allows.

Originally posted by MartinWadhams Everyone will want a trolley - everyone so far has ordered one. People are fascinated by the carrying thing, just because you can - but I've logged the health & Safety point! And of course you wouldn't want to do it in a breeze. I'd probably end up in orbit. Give Yachting World's Matthew Sheahan a break on the trolley weight comment! In the heat of the videoing moment he probably confused himself: His RS400 trolley will weigh just over 30kg - a bit more than an Aero hull (rather than a fully rigged boat).

Edited by kneewrecker - 07 May 14 at 7:01pm

This boat doesn't have the extra down wind sail, so it is far more likely people will want the big rig for the extra oomph when they bear away.

Mind, the Radial seems more popular than the full rig Laser by Nats attendance.