This season we did a few upgrades to the boat to improve handling and lighter air performance. The boat always rocked on strong conditions (over 18 knots), but we suffered a bit on the light airs. Boat still moves well but its hard to race to its rating when in displacement mode as we are normally bunched with boats with larger waterlines.
We also had been suffering from a bit of helm. The boat will always want to turn to starboard if the tiller was let loose. It took a while to realize what was wrong, but after some close inspection it was obvious that the rudder was off the vertical axis of the boat. I'm not sure it affected performance much, but going 18knots with the kite up, the last thing I wanted was for the boat to want to round down. I could have just repaired it by realigning the rudder post, but since the saws-all will be coming out I decided to upgrade the steering system on the boat, with a new rudder, beefier rudder post and bearings and a new composite tiller. I already had the original designer of the boat, John Swarbrick, working on a design and production of a new bowsprit for the boat, so I added the new steering system to the order. The rudder is a little deeper than the original and tracks quite nicely compared to the original one.
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| Original tiller |
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| New tiller and rudder assembly |
The second improvement was a new bowsprit, It is 3' long and we got an A2 and A5 to fit the new dimensions. We got everything installed just before the end of the season and it is looking very promising. We'll know more after a full season in 2011. The bowsprit is pretty nice looking, and makes the boat look a bit meaner than it already looked.
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| Side view of bowsprit |
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| Bow view of bowsprit |
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