Karl,
Well, A-cats are not that fragile; you just can't abuse them like a H16 and leave unattended on the beach with sails up. Indeed, even F16 owners need to be careful with that in unstable winds. These light boats can tip over when the gust comes from the wrong side. Unhooking the mainsaheet is almost a must. But the A-cat will stand the sailing load in rough weather quite well. And simple tricks have been found to stabilize the mast on these boats so they won't shake themselves down. I think the modern A's are more robust then many people imagine them to be.
this new carbon boat, I'm sure the current FXone will be tossed in the trash-can by HCE
That is not Hobie Europe's way of doing things. They'll keep the old version and just add the CARBONE. Hoever, it does mock the OD policy of the hobie organisations and the old and new version are certainly not expected to be of equal performance.
Next question, whats it rate?
That is hard to predict, but when I use the current Texel specs for the old tech FX-one and punch in the new mainsail area (16.0 sq. mtr up from 14.91 sq. mtr) and assume that they get the weight down to 120 kg then the Texel rating will be :
(ordered from fastest rating to slowest)
A-cat = 99.5 = 100 (no spi !)
CARB-ONE 100.4 = 100
F16 1-up = 100.7 = 101
F18 = 101.2 = 101
F16 2-up = 101.8 = 102
F17 US version = 103.1 = 103
FX-one = 105.9 = 106
EU inter 17 = 109
It should be noted that all boats given above are with spinnaker except the A-cat. And the A's really get hammered for lacking a spi and can't really sail to their rating against spi boats. A better rating for the A's is just behind the F18/F16 2-ups unless the winds are 5 knots and less and the spi's won't fill properly.
The CARBONE looks promising in the speed department but a rating difference of 0.3 to the F16 1-up and 0.8 to the F18 (2-up) is only a difference of respectively 11 secs and 29 sec per hour of bouy racing. Which is pretty negligiable in real life. Due to rounding off of the rating the CARBONE needs to beat both by at least 36 seconds per hour racing. Basically, I expect it to become a level performer to the F18 and F16 classes; which is certainly not a bad thing in my opinion.
Note however that the entlarging of the sail from 14.91 sq. mtr to 16.0 sq. mtr. is responsible for 1.6 points out of 5.5 (30%), the rest (3.9 points) comes from being assumed to be 29 kg (64 lbs) lighter. So roughly 1.34 points per 10 kg. The new Carbone no longer can satisfy the F104 class specs, not even with the old smaller mainsail.
The 30 kg of weight savings seems well founded on the data I have. 6.5 kg on the mast (based on shortened Tiger mast to F16 carbon) max 7 kg per hull in only replacing glass with carbon but keeping same construction as old boat. 1.5 kg per daggerboard (F18 daggerboards to best of F16 daggerboards) and then some 1 kg per rudder setup (stock and board); max 2.0 kg per beam. Total 29.5 kg. They can also replace the boom and spi pole with carbon but that won't save them that much about 1.0 kg while adding lots of costs. Afterall a 35x2 mm black anodised alu boom costs 25 bucks and weights 1.28 kg (used by FX-one currently). You can only save 0.4 kg on that by going to carbon, but pay at least 4 times as much. Note that Hobie has yet to make any daggerboard under 3 kg even the full carbon ones. Going down to 1.6 kg as the best F16 boards are today will be quite a challenge for them. The same for rudderboards and stocks. And that 10.5 kg carbon mast (bare) will not be build in house either.
I hope this clearifies some things or at least gives a feel for what is reasonably expected.
Wouter
