Alan, it's easy to form committees but it's not so easy to get someone to do the work involved in maintaining and modifying a boat, or a pair of boats. It is not easy to get anyone to build the rigs to the designers specification as I have found when working with sailmakers, and few of us have the patience to build rigs other than for our own cruising use. To get direct comparisons would require two identical hulls of around 20 feet long which produces berthing and maintenance problems. The Americas Cup syndicates may afford that, but- - -?

I don't think the JRA members gained anything out of sponsoring Joddy's degree course, and I'm not aware that anyone used his results or equipment to improve any rig. There was a time when one of the monthly yachting magazines (Yachting Monthly???) had a short mast they fitted to the bow of boats they tested which had a water impeller at the bottom and a wind speed/direction unit at the top which fed back to a data logger, and which produced polar curves which were published in the resultant magazine article. They may still do it as I don't read the magazines these days. Something like that might be of some use, though I was quite happy with the instruments I had on Poppy which were water speed, wind speed/ direction (relative or true), and expanded scale VNG both up wind and down. The trouble is that very few will fit such instruments to a cheap junk rigged boat. Even if a Yachting Monthly type mast unit was passed around the members to try there are still so many variations of wind strength including gusting and direction variations, sea state and bottom cleanliness to consider that you probably would not get a useful set of results, or enough information to improve the breed.

Although I had started to fit an unstayed mast into a Mirror dinghy to test the split rig idea I quickly realised that even in a standard Gunter rigged Mirror my 195cm height and 95 Kg weight would not have given fair comparisons when sailing against two teenagers in another standard boat. I then looked for the minimum boat to do the job and nearly bought a Hunter Europa (£1750 including a road trailer!) with a view to fitting a fully variable mast position and sailing against racing Squibs which have identical hulls. I consider this to be about the minimum hull size for sensible comparisons, but then I found the Squib fleets were few and far between. Eventually I settled on the Longbow and the use of the Island Race to be able to compare performance against other cruising boats and that has worked out extremely well, not only in obtaining overall race position which depends on local race knowledge of which I have little, but on sailing along side boats which have published handicaps which although not very accurate give some indication. This worked well on Poppy, and Edward is still getting useful information now.

It is hard to get consistent sailing comparisons. As Edward says, it requires a steady commitment which few of us have even at club level. In his case he has picked an ideal sized boat in an area where there is a local keen racing fleet of one designed boats, but that is where the problems start. The one design boats are actually different with different rudder/ skeg arrangements, and above the deck level the rigs of many of the keen racers are ridiculously expensive bits of kit with carbon sails and many other toys. The net result is that after a false start with inadequate information he is now racing single handed, with his home made sails against keenly raced highly tuned boats. The handicap system is designed around pointy headed rigs so the junk never gets a fair number and spinnaker boats are rated as slower than non spinnaker boats!?! (though the Island Sailing Club simple system is quite good for us non-pointy sails). Edward has had a couple of PBO articles written, but the comparison was against Whisper, one of the hottest boats around, and certainly not a cruising boat. It's interesting that the PBO technical editor rather likes sailing Amiina and is prepared to borrow her to impress(?) friends? This sort of interesting fact doesn't get published.

Arne is right is saying it is worth sailing beside Bermudan sister boats, though it is hard to guarantee that a) they are trying, and b) they have equally dirty bottoms which have a huge effect. I hope he can give us a report soon.

The problem is that few junk rigs can be compared with Bermudan sisters, particularly to windward as they really can't compete, and have got the rig a bad reputation. As far as I can see only Arne's rig and the split rig can hold their own. Ketil has shown this, along with Edward, Frank and Poppy. As far as I know junk rigged boat have only crossed the start line in the Island race on 10 occasions. Poppy competed 3 races with top third of the fleet results, despite trying to sink, and Edward has done similarly in two races with a third being windless. One other boat sailed twice, finishing in the one race completed in the bottom 10% of the fleet when the corrected handicap was applied, but did not getting past Hurst in the windless race while Edward, who had a later start had already got round the Needles. I understand one other boat tried an earlier race and gave up at Keyhaven, and a couple of years ago I followed another junk rigged boat in the race, from behind the fleet and watched it falling so far back that it was about the first to retire when Amiina (the fourth slowest boat in the race) was able to complete the course and finished with a top quarter result. In practice there are very few junk rigged boats what will enhance the junk rig's reputation on the racing circuit. So only 6 races completed out of 10, with the split rig always being top 30% of the fleet for 5 and only one other boat finishing with a below 90% result. 'Nuff said!

David's suggestion of the Hunter Sonata is a good one, but who would do the work, and if the rigs weren't good enough then would they get good publicity for the rig? Moreover, being a keenly raced fleet the Sonata would be another case of a cruising junk rig sailed by an amateur fiddler competing with the hot tuned racing enthusiasts. The bilge keeled Horizon 23 (Weaverbird) would be a more sensible cruising boat choice, and one that I had considered when looking at the Europa, though the price was not right.

You've asked a good question, Alan, but there just doesn't seem to be an easy answer, even with money burning a hole in our pockets. The Yachting Monthly(?) mast might be a good idea, but how much would we actually learn from it? I doubt if it would make any material difference to the breed. There could be better use for the spare funds.

Cheers, Slieve.

PS I am a member of AYRS, though have been little involved recently.

Arne Kverneland wrote:

Edward

.......

Arne

PS: Congratulations with that race from Poole to Yarmouth! Looking forward to see the result sheet,

3 times i have posted it along with the photos, and twice it has disappeared. 

It's Annie's final paragraph that makes the most telling point, I think. The phrase "herding cats" is probably the one that comes most readily to mind, to describe a project to build and race a fleet of JR dinghies. 

However, just supposing it were to go ahead (and yes, it would be a fun thing to do) then 8ft is too small. It's harder to make one of the more complex JR variants at this size than, say, at a size to suit a 12ft or 16ft dinghy. At any size between 8ft and 16ft, crew weight and skill level make a huge difference, so we're certainly not talking about rigorous testing, we're talking about having a bit of educational fun.

For rigorous testing, I would suggest that an old racing class such as the Sonata would be the better platform. Take a cheap one (one for £2000 on ApolloDuck at the moment), put in at least three sets of mast partners and steps (well forward for low AR rigs, well aft for split- and aero- junks, somewhere between for "conventional" junk rigs), and add Alan's instrumentation. Then you have a boat that can take part in club racing, or go off on its own, logging data. But why would anyone want to do this? Only, I suggest, as a step on the learning curve towards putting together a serious, large race boat for something like the OSTAR. Why else do we need to know whether one JR is 1% "better" than another? 

I certainly don't. I want an efficient rig, but I don't measure efficiency in terms of speed to windward any more (though I used to). I measure it in terms of "miles sailed per £ or $ or €" or "miles sailed per unit of crew effort or hassle". I suspect that for many of us, an instrument that will run a cost/benefit analysis on the various forms of JR is what we need.

I think the idea of a small fleet of identical dinghies, raced during rallies, seems the most achievable project, and it would also be a fun thing to do, which always motivates people.  By sailing triangular courses, swapping skippers regularly, sailing in a variety of conditions etc, some patterns would emerge.  It could also be an ongoing conversation, conducted every summer when the junks gather, and duly written up for the JRA magazine, rather than something that tried to establish a determined outcome (There are bound to be dissenting opinions, but that will only add to the overall interest).  There could even be one dinghy rigged with a bermudian sail.  I think, however, that any information gleaned would be mostly for the benefit and enjoyment of JRA members, though an article in a magazine like PBO or Yachting Monthly might inspire others. 

Conducting more scientifically rigorous testing, with instrumentation, would be an interesting project, but would involve a lot more expense, and require a team of competent participants, which might be hard to justify financially, and even harder to administer.

Where to base the fleet of dinghies is an interesting question, both in terms of building them and where to store them between outings.  There could, of course, be more than one fleet.  NZ seems one likely place, since there is such an active community there, and maybe Pete Hill would help build them, with some volunteers.  The UK would be the other place that springs to mind.  In the end it would come down to willing hands.

Edward,
I can see your point with respect to attending a whole series of club races  -  it sounds more like work than fun.

However, there might still be race data from a few races available (last year?).

My idea is to disregard handicap and corrected times. What I am after are the elapsed times of the other Splinters in the club races. These can be averaged and then be compared with Amiina’s time. One could even find the average sailed time over several races (same track?).

The result could tell how Amiina fares against the other Splinters, in percent.

Arne

PS: Congratulations with that race from Poole to Yarmouth! Looking forward to see the result sheet,