Refering to SA's front page story, "Dawning of a new Era?"

If beach cats really are coming of age, maybe the F16 class should reach out to monohull classes? The A class has joined the 505s a few times and that seems to have worked well. Now that the As have moved their winter racing to the Keys, I'll be trying to contact the 505s and see if they have a spot for me and asking if they're interested in coming down here.

IF there really is a trend to move from monohulls to cats, we would better serve our own interests by sailing with monohulls rather than other catamarans. It would stop the bickering about which cats can sail with whom and it would give us an opportunity to showcase our product. This is a pretty big shift in policy, I know, but it is worth considering.

This is NOT something I will be taking up with the board. I want this kicked around publicly. I'm always looking for new places to sail, the 505s have a thing at Ft. Desoto, I've never sailed there, so if they'll have me, I'll see about attending. I encourage the rest of you to do the same: find some dingies or leaners that are cat curious and share a little water time with them. It doesn't have to be a big regatta, a small weekend thingey would serve as well.

It's not usual. WRSC beachcats race with the 5o5s all the time, including bigger events. Very good racers and fast. Same course, they start afterwards. We had teams go to the 5o5 mid-Winters at Ft DeSoto State Park last February. I believe they invited A-Cats to join them. As you can expect, there are club members that "swing" both ways including F16 teams.

We also "club" race with Chesapeake 20s same course and Albacores & Flying Scotts with a shorter "A" mark on the same course.

The distance race weekend before next year's nationals gain a lot of attention for the beach cats. Nothing like starting last in a fleet of 150+ monohulls and big multihulls only to be contending for line honors after 33 miles. Some monos get nearly an hour and half head start with 5 min rolling starts for the rest of the fleets. Beach cats park on the beach right in front of the party tent. It's all fun.

We just missed a nice event up in Long Island Sound, American Yacht Club Heineken High Performance Dinghy Open, that featured Fireballs, Viper 640s, 5o5s, RS K6, 49ers, Flying Dutchman, and Moths. Ohhh, there were F-18s also.

It's not as big a shift in policy as you may think.

I for you one, feel we should expand it.

I agree with Pete. What seems to be working up here in the panhandle is getting yacht clubs to include a multihull class when they host a regatta. The best example is Fort Walton Yacht Club and the Meigs regatta. I think Bob Curry, who is a member, did the leg work to get multihulls invited a few years ago. It is a great regatta with flying scotts, finns, lasers, ect. The turn out is big and it is great that the other sailors get to see modern multihulls. Also, yacht clubs tend to have the facilities, equipment and people to host a really good regatta. It is not very hard for them to set up one more course for a multihull class.

"Trident F16" Pictures? How many hours total to build? Lots of folks, including myself,would like to see a whole thread!

Would you do it again?

Here are a few pictures.

One more.

Pete,
The amount of hours is almost inconceivable. I am very, very happy with the way it turned out but I would not recommend building a boat to anyone. I started in early February and finished on Sunday. It is absolutely the hardest I have ever worked in my life.

friggin awesome. nice work. can I take it for a spin next time I'm in Navarre?

I thought about building the Tiki for almost 10 years. Finally, I bought the plans, put together a materials list and was going to order materials the next day when I found one for sale. It was almost exactly the same amount as the materials + it had an almost new outboard.

That is the closest I ever came to building a boat.

It must be very satisfying and it looks like you did a great job!

Sweet!

I did not even build a whole boat, just the hulls. Everything else, beams, tramp, rudders, boards and rig comes from Matt and Falcon Marine.

well, what were you going to do? extrude the beams and mast yourself?

Are either of you going to travel this year? Where?

not traveling anywhere with my boat (which I am beginning to feel very guilty about not using more). Going to PNS in nov for area D qual (just hit me, can I do this?) on a friend's N20. Hoping for some "gulf time" around then since we are making a serious attempt to do the Tybee. also tradewinds on the N20 as well.
Very hard to travel these days and I'll probably have to get the wifey another horse for her to let me do the tybee.

here is a pic of my homemade cover- complete with bow covers that can be used for trailering. guess if I don't use the thing it ought to be protected.

well, maybe not. I have completely forgotten about how to post an image. someone pm me on how, please???
ok... figured it out, but it isnt the way I sort of remember... so someone pm me.

The boat build and work kept me close to home this season. I plan on traveling more, at least around Florida, next year. The two long distance trips I am looking at are Tradewinds and Nationals.

The boat is done, Nichole is probably still in Jacksonville working (glad she can support your boat habit), so pack up the RR and come on up to Cat Capers. I will not even make a comment about the sail. Time to test the RR on the course.
And besides you can see your family around here also. The cats will be fine with the cat sitter. I can not think of any more responses to reasons you might not come up here.
So what do you think?

Congrats Chris.

The trident looks great.

That is funny. I do recognize the daggerboards in the boat, they are from Catamaranparts. They seems to be not that bad at all though.

Very nice boat with the Tool nose on it. Good work.

Regards,
Hans Klok

Web http://www.catamaranparts.nl
Blog http://catamaranparts.blogspot.com

Thanks everyone for the congratulations. I designed the hull for mostly uni sailing. The design points are based on a comparison with my VWM Blade.

- Less overall beam. Max beam is 304 mm, which makes it about 25 mm less than my VWM blade and quite a bit less than the Falcon or Viper. My idea was that uni crew weights did not need all that beam and that the hull could be finer, with less resistance.

- Relatively , more beam/volume forward and a little less in the stern to help downwind nose diving.

- A little more freeboard. Mostly in the bow to provide some reserve volume and some at rear beam.

- The top of the bow is not pinched in as on the blade to provide reserve volume and help with nose dive recovery.

- Round decks vs flat to help with nose diving/recovery.

- Front beam/rig moved back a little to help with nose diving / recovery.

- Funky bow to maximize water line and I though it looked cool and it was different than other F16s.

I don't think I did anything radical except for the reduced beam. Maximum beam is noticeably narrower than the Blade, a lot narrower than the Falcon and drastically narrower than the Viper. This may have been a mistake but it seems to sail nicely.

Hans,
Everything except the hulls, front beam and tramp is right off the Blade. I did not know that the Blade daggerboards came from Catamaranparts. Does Catamaranparts also provide the rudders?

The first couple of boats where supplied with the Catamaranparts daggerboards ( all Alter Cup Blades ) also a few boats where using the rudders but then Matt start to build them by himself. The rudders in the photo are from Matt, he is using a different system.

Best regards,
Hans Klok

web http://www.catamaranparts.nl
Blog http://catamaranparts.blogspot.com