One for all you armchair Naval Architects out there .... as the constructors of our boats are now getting the craft very light I was wondering what the actual effect would be of racing a boat at 70kg hull weight (which is very possible) or lighter. Has anyone (at the fast side of the fleet) taken out their correctors and raced their ballasted brethren?

Theory suggests that the lighter boat would win out, crew skill and equipment not withstanding, but I am wondering by how much? What would be the impact on hull design (having a Frank Bethwaite moment and the "dynamically humpless hulls" springs to mind)?

Any opening offers?

PS I am not for one moment suggesting that we drop the weight from 98kg, I am just wondering what the effect would be!!!!!

Remembering that 28 kilos represents about a 10% drop in the total sailing weight, (if you consider the hull, rig and two wetsuited bodies totalling perhaps 280 kilos, reducing to 250) then such a drop in weight looks less dramatic.  However it may be enough to lighten loads and so less crew weight would be required. Sails may become flatter and therefore less need for a complex raking/flattening rig - skiff-style gust response masts perhaps (It starts to sound like a Bethwaite Tasar or 59er!!). The boat would sit higher in the water, reducing wetted surface area, becoming more tippy.  It may pitchpole more easily so a T-foil rudder could be introduced to counter it, althought unlike a 14 a Merlin doesn't plane upwind so I don't think a variable fin T-foil would work so well. I don't think the hull shape would change dramatically because the Merlin has reached an optimum with the Tales and its variants.

Interesting thoughts but not one to take forward I think. The class is doing nicely as it is.

I bet you wouldnt notice a blind bit of difference until you hauled the boat up the shingle.

Go on someone - take out all your lead on the sly, and see if anyone actually realises whats happened by your results....

I think that to a large extent it's all in the mind.

I remember being very upset when a new wooden boat was 15lbs overweight. It niggled me endlessly until my wife Helen and I started winning races. We finished 3rd in the Championship, our best ever result and had no trouble hauling her over the Whitstable shingle. If she'd been down to weight we'd have done no better.

Maybe an all up weight is an idea the ultra heavy helms and crews could take out correctors suddenly "pud" would be good!

Robert 
I think that you are a brave man coming out and revealing that, after finishing 3rd in a Championship, you dragged your wife over the shingles at Whitstable just to remove her excess baggage because she wasn't down to weight!! I presume that this is the equivalent of Arthur Scargill hauling his wife over the coals for not supporting the miners' strike!!?

Does anyone else have a sense of deja vue about this?

however the mental picture of Mr Harris dragging his young wife across the shingle whilst berating her about her pie consumption is perhaps worth having the thread on the forum again.

I'd better get round to sticking the lead back in Heaven Sent at some point - there was only about 4kg of it but really at my level of sailing it makes no difference at all.

I have actuallly done this with Time Zulu.  Made no difference to my performance!  When I told my peers at Midland they had not even noticed!

So, might make a difference at the front of the fleet, but then they might check!

Perhaps that's why she's my wife no longer!

Funny, I was losing a bit of self confidence, as I had noticed both Steve and Andrew  being closer than usual or sometime ahead (especially if Steve's son is Helming), as I normally benchmark my self against the people around me.

Now I know it is alright to sail without lead, I'll take out the 21 kilos in Snakey 'B' to maintain the status quo at the tail end of the fleet. (maybe not). But at least your confessions have made me a bit happier for christmas.

So the MR Class does do irony! Though not cheating.

However Alan you will have some serious work to do to get your 20+ kilos out of Snakey B whereas the correctors just fell off the centrecase into the bilges with Heaven Sent and the reason I haven't put them back is as much to do with my reluctance to drill holes in the boat for bolts (which is what it needs) as anything else

Happy Christmas everyone

Andrew

Incidentally having just re-read the start of this thread the answer on hull shapes is that Merlins are already quite close to the "humpless hull" as there is a very gradual transition from displacement to planing.  The only thing that will radically alter hull shapes is a change that drastically reduces the time spent in displacement mode and hence the importance to boat-speed over a course.  Int14's are optimised for reasonably early lift and predominantly low drag when planing at high speed, ours is a different compromise

I believe that Will Rainey's latest boat is modified to try and reduce the 'hump', based on photographs of the previous boat sailing.  I think it's fair to say the results have been equivocal to date.  I also stand to be corrected!