505 Love - From the home page

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D Kirkpatrick

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That article is either painfully clueless or Lavrov-esquely disinformative. Your choice. 

Stu McNay and Caleb Paine won the 2022 Midwinters and got 2nd in NAs in a 2007 boat. Mike Martin and Adam Lowry's boat is probably about 10 years old at this point. 

Of the top 10 boats at 2022 North Americans, the newest boat was Howie and Jeff in 9160, and it's at least 5 years old. Howie buys new boats because he wants more boats in different places to make going to regattas easier, and he's invested in growing the fleet. The rest of the boats in the top 10 were all between 10 and 20 years old. The boats with the newest sail #s (9238 and 9169) were both loaned boats where the sail # wasn't the boat's number. My boat sailed as 9238, its real # is 8951 and it's a 2008. 3 of the top 10 at NAs (89, 9238, and 9169) were LOANED by owners to other sailors. 2 boat loaners (Mike Zani and me) also sailed. The owner of 9169, which is really 8714 or something like that, couldn't make the event. Both boat loaners were beaten in the regatta by the people they loaned their boats to - what other class has that dynamic?  

There is a turn key KISS Rondar on the 505 classifieds right now that is about the cost of ONE new Laser - $7500. Craig Thompson is making new Ovington hulls available and there are plenty of boats out that could change hands for well less than the cost of 2 Lasers and go win the Worlds. 

Most classes would kill to have the health that the 505 Class has in North America and worldwide right now. The NAs fleet was big, deep, and fun as hell. 

 
D

D Kirkpatrick

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Foredeck Shuffle said:
Agree.  But it has always stumped me why the class will not move to a carbon mast.  Then there is the sprit that Ethan Bixby put on and proved to work very well.  It is a significant change and perhaps lowers the bar of entry for the boat too much, but surely someone can come up with a canting sprit to ensure the boat stays complicated?
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The primary driver as I understand it for not moving to a carbon mast is expense. Not necessarily the expense of buying 1 mast, but the expense of developing the best one and then ensuring that it's repeatable. The person who is among the most able to stomach that cost remains strongly opposed to carbon mast introduction because he doesn't like the idea that he goes out commissions X number of masts at $$$, has the time on the water and the sail budget to get everything up to speed quickly, and has an unfair advantage until others get up to speed. Alloy masts are relatively easy to source, relatively reasonably priced, have a large tuning and sail infrastructure developed around them, and aren't holding anyone or anything back. There's no big impetus to change and there are relatively big downsides to it. 

Something like 13 rigs broke at the 1982 Worlds in Cork, IRL, where this year's worlds will be. Many/most of those were carbon. It was shortly after that that carbon rigs were banned. Obviously carbon from 1982 bears slim resemblance to carbon today, but there are good reasons for keeping that element as is. 

 
A

another 505 sailor

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What Dave said.

But I would support the class studying a 2 piece single supplier carbon mast, I think there are potential cost and logistical benefits to be found. 

 
Carbon

Carbon

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pqbon said:
A tin rig is unlikely to save much money unless you are talking about the old rigs being re-used.

Many classes are going carbon just because they can't find/afford the aluminium they need.
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The 505 class still uses aluminum.  The only change would be the boom and that really isn't much of a savings given the current cost of aluminum.

 
M

merchant

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Aly is and always will be cheaper than carbon. Find a carbon rig for US$2k fitted!- really aly is not going out of production. 

 
JimC

JimC

Not actually an anarchist.
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Irrational 14 said:
Carbon rigs are more expensive than ever (14 rigs are just about $7k w/o rigging). The higher the Modulus, the higher the $$$. Probably not a good time right now.
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That's 'cos standard carbon was getting so affordable that we needed to switch to the more expensive (and admittedly slightly better) stuff to keep our expenditure up...

 
fastyacht

fastyacht

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Pitched based ultra high modulus? Or just medium modulus?

So you make a specification that requires the standard modulus stuff.

 
dburchfiel

dburchfiel

Member
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Raleigh, NC
Mambo Kings said:
Agreed. 

The crazy money used to buy Rondar hulls, ship them to Germany to get rigged and then bring them to the USA to race.

For the cognoscenti, customizing the set up and the rigging are part of the fun.......the technical challenge of a boat that can be tweaked to get the last 1.0% but at the same time be simple and intuitive so that the team can keep their head out of the boat.

Also true. The inside joke among Rondar's non-505 customers is that he makes money building Fireflies, Vipers, Sonars etc, so that he can lose money doing what he really loves, which is building 505s. :)
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The German fit out is probably the most expensive and complicated way to go.  At the NA's last month several top boats had rigging much simpler than the Holger/Jess boats.  Not that they weren't complex.

New Ovington Bare hulls are $14,250 from Thompson Boatworks. https://www.thompsonboat.works/new505.html

 
A

another505er

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Devoforedeckus said:
Dr. Robert Sutton postulated back in 1973 the cost of a 505 would always be the same as a mid-price Chevy. So far, I think his theory is holding up.
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Wow flash back!  

A good comparison to price of another should have toy or answer to all things automotive, the Miata,  currently siting at $27-32k in  1990 approx $14k.

 
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