boat weight one design
- Thread starter jokerx9
- Start date
Marty Gingras
Mid-range Anarchist
It depends on how heavy the boat is.
Rum Runner
Rum Runner
It depends on what type of boat it is. Is it 80 pounds heavy for a 1,000 pound boat or for a 250 pound boat?
slap
Super Anarchist
Might be cheaper and easier to sell it and buy one that is the proper weight.
50-80lb on an e-scow will make a difference. (its >5% of the weight of the boat)
Light crew will not help (most of the time), you mainly want that crew weight hiking not parasitic in the boat.
If you can't take the weight out of the boat then use if while you learn and look for a lighter boat.
Steam Flyer
Sophisticated Yet Humble
Converted to what?
Most smallish one-designs (and despite being 28 ft long, it has no keel, no cabin, and races closed courses on sheltered waters) have well known tables of weights of all the components. It's a good idea if you want to race, to unrig and then fully commission the boat; and if it's known to be overweight then you can weigh the major components and see where excess poundage resides.
Hitchhiker
Hoopy Frood
If it is converted is it still one-design?
Steam Flyer
Sophisticated Yet Humble
Hmmm... yes, I'd certainly agree that working on skills and tuning will pay bigger dividends than trying to reduce weight by 4~5%. But it doesn't hurt, and if that weight is all in the bow or stern, it hurts quite a bit more than just excess random poundage.
I hear people say this all the time. Not sure that is the right way to look at it.
If you are 80lbs over weight in a competitive one design you are going to be a tick slower. And on the first beat, that might be the difference between crossing someone or getting bounced the wrong way on the course. Now you cant get to that good shift. You can quickly find your self off the front row of the fleet, now you are in gas and the world just keeps getting more challenging. Or maybe on the run you cant hold that overlap at the bottom mar and now round outside in gas. So while your 80 lbs may have been a small fraction of a knot in speed, what it harms in terms of tactical options can be far greater.
LakeBoy
Random Internet Guy
I think "converted" is from symmetric to asymmetric kite.
Sail4beer
Usual suspect
That’s the equivalent weight of a couple of 5 gallon buckets of paint. That’s not a small amount on a one design Escow. I can’t imagine a repair job or assym launch port using that much material. Was the scale accurate and the boat completely empty and dry inside?
Doug Halsey
Member
- 348
- 106
There's an old saying: "Nothing makes your tactics look better than a fast boat."
Great Red Shark
Super Anarchist
80 lbs in a 1D35? No biggie
80 lbs in a Hobie16 ? No chance
80 lbs in a Hobie16 ? No chance
- Thread starter
- #17
I thought the boat was dry, but there is alot of places for water to hide in an e scow. Going to re-weigh it again. I agree the conversion should not had that much weight.
My shark 24 at 2300 lbs was 35 lbs overweight. A top Canadian female sailor crewing for me said get that weight out! But I also raced the Bluenose 24 class out east. They had not found a weight correlation to championships with boats up to 15% heavy still winning. I think missed wind shifts likely are the #1 reason racers win or lose.
Christian
Super Anarchist
For your opti, 80 lbs is quite a bit more weight to ship around....................for the 100 footer - not so much
Did you remember to unstrap the boat from the trailer? All kidding aside, 50 - 80 pounds is significant.
First make sure that the boat is COMPLETELY dry. I've seen a few boats that accumulated a bunch of water in the kingplank as the result of people not removing the plugs while the boat is being stored. 80 pounds is enough that you've got MANY gallons of water somewhere. Do you hear sloshing noises when the boat is on the crane?
Next, how much lead is in the boat? If you've got 30 - 40 pounds of lead, that's easy enough to remove (then get the weight recertified).
If the boat doesn't have any lead in it and is STILL 80 pounds over the 965 pounds spec, time to start digging. That's a lot of weight for a boat to gain. The conversion doesn't add anywhere close to that. The bowsprit is about 2 pounds, and the bulkhead and housing are each much less than 10.
Next thing that can get heavy: Styrofoam floatation. Rip all of it out and replace it with something that isn't rotting and waterlogged. Melges has those goofy cube containers they recommend. Some boats use airbags, and others use new foam that isn't full of water and rodent crap.
You can check the cored panels with a moisture meter, but I'd be surprised if that were to blame on a boat that's been cared for. The coring is foam, and there aren't a whole ton of ways for water to get in. Perhaps if it was left uncovered in a field for two years the deck might be wet, but even that would surprise me a bit.
If you have a good way to check (easiest way I know of is to compare with a known-good boat), where that weight is matters as much (or more) than how much it is. 75 pounds centered around the mast step or boards doesn't matter nearly as much as 75 pounds right in the bow or stern.
As a side note, what's the age? Is this a recent boat that was converted (say, newer than 1995), or are we talking about something much older?
First make sure that the boat is COMPLETELY dry. I've seen a few boats that accumulated a bunch of water in the kingplank as the result of people not removing the plugs while the boat is being stored. 80 pounds is enough that you've got MANY gallons of water somewhere. Do you hear sloshing noises when the boat is on the crane?
Next, how much lead is in the boat? If you've got 30 - 40 pounds of lead, that's easy enough to remove (then get the weight recertified).
If the boat doesn't have any lead in it and is STILL 80 pounds over the 965 pounds spec, time to start digging. That's a lot of weight for a boat to gain. The conversion doesn't add anywhere close to that. The bowsprit is about 2 pounds, and the bulkhead and housing are each much less than 10.
Next thing that can get heavy: Styrofoam floatation. Rip all of it out and replace it with something that isn't rotting and waterlogged. Melges has those goofy cube containers they recommend. Some boats use airbags, and others use new foam that isn't full of water and rodent crap.
You can check the cored panels with a moisture meter, but I'd be surprised if that were to blame on a boat that's been cared for. The coring is foam, and there aren't a whole ton of ways for water to get in. Perhaps if it was left uncovered in a field for two years the deck might be wet, but even that would surprise me a bit.
If you have a good way to check (easiest way I know of is to compare with a known-good boat), where that weight is matters as much (or more) than how much it is. 75 pounds centered around the mast step or boards doesn't matter nearly as much as 75 pounds right in the bow or stern.
As a side note, what's the age? Is this a recent boat that was converted (say, newer than 1995), or are we talking about something much older?
