[blabert]

Came across a fireball today...been stored for the last 15 yrs...rig appears mint and boat looks to be ok...what are they like to sail...anyone have any info on these...

[Terrorvision]

Great boats- old skool. Learning on one of these, or keeping your chops up on one, helps you out in all aspects of sailing asymmetrics, big boats, sportsboats. Go for it.

[Wet Spreaders]

My dad and I used to sail one in the UK - really fun. The 1970's version of a skiff, given the materials that they had available to them back then. Check the mast - needs to be thin at the tip - Needlespar, I think it was called. I saw a really tatty one parked outside Encinal yacht club about a month ago. Brought back memories.

The boom is very low, so if you get too much heel on when reaching you will not be able to depower by letting the main out because the boom will be dragging in the water. Bear away.

Very sensitive upwnd to the centerboard - make sure that the centerboard case is not floppy and tired because that's a pain to fix.

It's not a OD - but a develpment class except for sail area and hull shape + weight. I'm pretty sure that every boat is rigged differently and the foils are different shapes. My dad built his out of plywood, but there were also some made of 100% glass and some glass hulls with plywood decks.

You can have a spinnaker launcher (tube in deck) rather than bags. The launcher is much easier to use than a bag.

Don't take it out in heavy air on your first day.

[jibeset]

Great boats to surf around on.... You will love it!

[Jackovator]

Performance is similar to a 470, though quicker downwind and slower upwind esp as breeze gets up. They carry competitive weight better than a 470 too.

[Hellothailer]

Ingmar, on Mar 30 2005, 07:46 PM, said:

Great boats- old skool. Learning on one of these, or keeping your chops up on one, helps you out in all aspects of sailing asymmetrics, big boats, sportsboats. Go for it.

I'd go along with that.

Blabert: Who built it and when?
Used to sail a Chippendale with Needlespar rig. Nice boat. Great trainer for 505's and more......... only negative.....a poxy little chute.

[Ned]

check in with phil at philsfoils, he's a 'baller and can steer you to some resources. 

Surely you've checked their website too?

fun boats with a fun group of people in the class.

[wraith]

Nice boats. Pre glass era are higher maintenance - and the crew had better be flexible and nimble. Maybe I was already getting older, but I always found the front end cramped. Large main, small kite sometimes made offwind legs more interesting than they needed to be. We never broke anything much, except a 30 knot day at the UK nationals when we sailed back with the hull only just afloat.

I've got a bizarre shot of the boat we sailed at the Europeans and Worlds qualifiers. For some reason the crew is trapezing 2 feet higher than needed - perhaps it was much wavier than the photo shows.


herehttp://www.navwiz.com/photokorn/photos/8/med_1102611889-8.jpg

[pierre]

Go for it. Great fun and very popular class worldwide. Worlds in the UK this year and over 120 entries so far.

Fireball UK website

They are a laugh and great for just blasting around in. They also have a bandit PY handicap (in some peoples opinion ;) )

[Terrorvision]

wraith, on Mar 30 2005, 11:52 PM, said:

For some reason the crew is trapezing 2 feet higher than needed.

A lot of 'ballers do seem to trapeze high- if you look at the gallery here you'll see a lot of instances. It's good to see a development class which has stayed closeish to roots, unlike the Cherub for instance which has moved so far away from the original.

Attached File(s)

•  fireballs.jpg (84.26K)
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[Chris 249]

Wet Spreaders, on Mar 31 2005, 04:24 AM, said:

My dad and I used to sail one in the UK - really fun. The 1970's version of a skiff, given the materials that they had available to them back then.

[QUOTE]

Ummm, without wanting to be too much of a pedantic pain in the arse (yep, well OK I AM being a PPITA) a "1970s version of a skiff" was actually...a skiff. A '70s skiff had shedloads more sail than a Fireball (maybe 3 times the kite in an Aus 14), much more righting moment, much more open rules.

Interesting to see once again the differing definitions of "development class" you have in the 'States, AFAIK the Fireball class has ALWAYS called itself a one - design although tolerances are wide.

FWIW, maybe a workable definition of "OD" is something where the rules contain the whole shape; the Fireball rules include a copy of the hull lines and if you build to it you'll create a real boat that really sails.

In contrast, in a development class there's nothing that defines a floating shape....there's just a bunch of points at the limits to the box. Or that's a definition that would fit the UK, NZ, Australia, France, Germany and everywhere outside of NA.

[Matt D]

Fun little boats that are very forgiving too! Great class for students or people whom don't have a lot of money, or simply smaller crews. Also due to their extremely low freeboard, they feel like they're going faster than they are.

Their small kite does suck, but to compensate, they normally include very tight reaches to try and make the downwind ride the most fun possible, considering.

I would definitly call the class OD, with loose tolerances.

Really fun boat when the wind is extremely strong, and most other classes stay on the beach.

[JimC]

Chris 249, on Mar 31 2005, 10:08 AM, said:

FWIW, maybe a workable definition of "OD" is something where the rules contain the whole shape; the Fireball rules include a copy of the hull lines and if you build to it you'll create a real boat that really sails.

I've always figured that a one design is one where the same bloke always gets the designer's royalty - eg Peter Milne always gets the royalty if you build a Fireball, but if you build a Cherub John Spencer (or his estate) gets nothing, instead it goes to whoever designed that particular shape, Bethwaite, Farr, Murray or whoever (to mention some older designers people here will know.

I suppose you could say that a Fireball was the 70s equivalent of a skiff in the Northern hemisphere in that the equivalent sorts of people who now sail SMODs that they believe are skiffs then would have probably sailed Fireballs (or 505s), but in no other sense at all.

Actually I'd dispute that the Cherub is that far from its roots compared to the Fireball. OK, they look different, but John Spencer's Development classes were just about always for a reasonable performance boat that the ordinary bloke could design and build themselves, and that's still happening. By contrast the Fireball looks the same, but was orginally designed as a cheap boat with a strong self build element. This has long gone in favour of high spec manufacturer built boats which the sailors in the class believe home builds can't compete with. So which has gone further from its roots? They've both evolved, but in different ways.

As for gift handicaps, you hear that a lot in some places, but its never struck me that way. They're just one of those boats (small sail area, low hull length, narrow waterline beam) which are strong in some conditions so on the occasions when they do do well people notice...

[wraith]

Ingmar, on Mar 31 2005, 08:52 AM, said:

wraith, on Mar 30 2005, 11:52 PM, said:

For some reason the crew is trapezing 2 feet higher than needed.

A lot of 'ballers do seem to trapeze high- if you look at the gallery here you'll see a lot of instances. It's good to see a development class which has stayed closeish to roots, unlike the Cherub for instance which has moved so far away from the original.

I usually managed to be a bit lower - but IIRC this was a race after a gale, and we wouldhave had 8 to 10 foot seas in the bay...

[GBR7911]

They have there worlds in Teignmouth, Devon this summer an impresive entry 5 months before the event with the following entry.

87 UK
5 Shetland Fireballs
5 Australian Fireballs
10 French Fireballs
2 Czech Fireballs
9 Irish Fireballs
3 Swiss Fireballs
1 Canadian Fireball
2 American Fireball
1 Kenyan Fireball
1 Italian Fireball

The class expect the entry to top 150 should be a cracking event.


Event website http://www.fireball-worlds.com/

[jfunk]

wraith, on Mar 31 2005, 03:33 AM, said:

Ingmar, on Mar 31 2005, 08:52 AM, said:

wraith, on Mar 30 2005, 11:52 PM, said:

For some reason the crew is trapezing 2 feet higher than needed.

A lot of 'ballers do seem to trapeze high- if you look at the gallery here you'll see a lot of instances. It's good to see a development class which has stayed closeish to roots, unlike the Cherub for instance which has moved so far away from the original.

I usually managed to be a bit lower - but IIRC this was a race after a gale, and we wouldhave had 8 to 10 foot seas in the bay...

Dude, it's a two sail reach. A good crew always trapezes higher on a two sail because most skippers can't keep up with the changes in apparent wind when sheeting main and steering. So you will often get a roll into windward.

Plus the boat is flat and the sails are trimmed in, he doesn't need to go lower.

[wraith]

jfunk, on Mar 31 2005, 01:24 PM, said:

wraith, on Mar 31 2005, 03:33 AM, said:

Ingmar, on Mar 31 2005, 08:52 AM, said:

wraith, on Mar 30 2005, 11:52 PM, said:

For some reason the crew is trapezing 2 feet higher than needed.

A lot of 'ballers do seem to trapeze high- if you look at the gallery here you'll see a lot of instances. It's good to see a development class which has stayed closeish to roots, unlike the Cherub for instance which has moved so far away from the original.

I usually managed to be a bit lower - but IIRC this was a race after a gale, and we wouldhave had 8 to 10 foot seas in the bay...

Dude, it's a two sail reach. A good crew always trapezes higher on a two sail because most skippers can't keep up with the changes in apparent wind when sheeting main and steering. So you will often get a roll into windward.

Plus the boat is flat and the sails are trimmed in, he doesn't need to go lower.

dont attack me - I am the crew in that photo!

Glad to hear I was doing ok ..

[Kevlar Edge]

Great boats we had a few around my club when i was a kid, the fleet dissapeared in the 70s. these little boats proved to be great trainers when it got windy and it was light enough for us to right.
we trapped high also it's was not umcommon for the boat to skip over a wave stick the nose up and douche the crew

[xfire]

32057, on Mar 31 2005, 08:17 PM, said:

If they're so great why aren't there more here in North America? Wish there were fleets, I'd like to try to build one and race.

So Great!

That seems the antithesis of US boats. We race J24s Lightings, Thistles, Snipes, CFJs and 420s for the most part. in the US. I wouldn't describe any of those boats os "so great".


We used to have a 400 boat US fleet of Fireballs in the 70s. There is still balling (as it is known) in Ohio, South Carolina, and a great midwinter regatta at Davis Island YC in Tampa, FL.

Fireballs are inexpensive, tuneable, planing dinghies. They weigh 175# and will plane upwind in 13 knot winds and downwind in 9 knots. Relativley easy to handle 25 knots. A real handfull in 30 knots. (what fun boat isn't) Competetitve crew weights are (were?) between 295 and 320 pounds. (We won a lot of national races at 260) (But a lot more at 300)

The one-design rules are quite permisive in running rigging, but tight in sails. The hull shape is controled at the ends and the cockpit bulkhead frames at the front and back of the cockpit with +- 4 mm at most points, with a couple extra points along the rocker.

They are easy to build for home craftsmen using the stitch and glue method, or serious craftsmen could buld them with chine stringers.

Rule allows good centerboard foil sections, but tight control on the profile. The rudder rule is wide open.

I seemed to find a bunch of disreputable deviations within the rules for the hull and deck that were subsequently outlawed.

What is the thwart number of the boat in question?

[Ned]

There are, but in North North America (Canada).

Otherwise too many people sailing leadmines and other kinds of boats, mostly "lead assisted".

[xfire]

Ned, on Mar 31 2005, 08:58 PM, said:

There are, but in North North America (Canada).

Otherwise too many people sailing leadmines and other kinds of boats, mostly "lead assisted".

Either heavy, or lead assisted. (Snipe, Lightning, Thistle)

[blabert]

boat is KC 1851 only number i could find...it was ab andoned on a piece of propety a friend has bought ...stored in a barn

[Laserslave]

i heard that they had a bad habit of snapping in half....is this correct?? but otherwise i hear there brilliant boats to sail