Are we ready for reproductions yet?

General chat about boats
sam mason
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Re: Are we ready for reproductions yet?

Post by sam mason »

This one very nearly got "Modernised" on bonfire night. Even the thwart wasn't worth saving!!
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trebor
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Re: Are we ready for reproductions yet?

Post by trebor »

Their have been a few boats at my club modernised that way.
Spring clean up will no doubt find a few more in this category, lovely Cherub dumped outside just before Christmas, got a bit of history, started life in New Zealand, this will probably finish up on fire.
Robert
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chris
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Re: Are we ready for reproductions yet?

Post by chris »

I don't think the piece of wood that was kept from the original merlin was nearly as interesting as a thwart. Some say it was a deck beam, others it was the hog (which is easily reshaped)
davidh
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Re: Are we ready for reproductions yet?

Post by davidh »

Again, as one who is on the 'inside' of this (as in...I was an attendee at the 'meeting of minds) then there is far less of an issue with a one design such as the Albacore. In a case like this, you could, if you so wish, rebuild a boat from the hog up and it stays the same boat. That is a well established and understood practice that applies across boats big and small. So there is nothing stopping you, should you so wish, of creating a new boat from the ashes of the old - yet it would still be the 'old' boat (even if it terms of construction it was state of the art).

One good example of this can be found in the Firefly Class - one of the 24 Olympic Fireflys has been rebuilt as a Mark IV boat and came close to winning the celebration nationals at Torquay in 2008..... but is still the same boat, same 3 digit sail number. There are others but that is a good case that illustrates the point.

This was never the problem.

What is at the heart of this rests firmly in the development/restricted development classes, when a rebuild from the hog up is carried out, but instead of design A re-emerging from the remains of the old boat, you have design B - in effect, a new boat that bears little resemblance to the old. In theory, this in itself is not an issue, as long as it is accepted that this is a new boat, not an old one.

But in good old fashioned Question of Sport speak, what happened next? The boat didn't only win, it thumped the opposition. That thumped applied equally on the race course and in the concours department. Had that been the end of it we'd all be happy and singing its praises. Instead, the boat was then allowed to carry off the top prize for boats 30 years old and older - which this boat is demonstrably not.

Neil is right to suggest that the PY system is there to deal with issues like this. I'd respectfully advise that the PY system, even the cvrda one, is just not robust enough to deal with such a determined onslaught onto the rules. Trying to address this issue quickly descends into the personalities involved and their acceptance (or otherwise) within the class association. It is sad, very sad that what should be a great example of how older boats can be recovered has become such a can of worms.

Worse.... it's worked one in one class, there is now a very real danger that this will raise its head elsewhere. Just offering the defence that "if someone wants to win that badly then lets leave them to it" doesn't mask the wider damage that is being done.

D
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JimC
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Re: Are we ready for reproductions yet?

Post by JimC »

trebor wrote:Their have been a few boats at my club modernised that way.
Spring clean up will no doubt find a few more in this category, lovely Cherub dumped outside just before Christmas, got a bit of history, started life in New Zealand, this will probably finish up on fire.
Which Cherub is that?
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trebor
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Re: Are we ready for reproductions yet?

Post by trebor »

"Egbert the nasty"
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