F16 ... Homebuilt??? Reasonably Cheaply???

Yes, you can home build an F16...

Formula 16 Homebuild page

Absolutly you can, Plans for the Blade you can get from Phill Brander, or Taipan plans from AHPC. Plans cost around AUD$250 (but contact the above to be certain)

How you are talking about building in pieces is exactly how I've did mine because the cash flow then was a bit slow, it took longer than I had planned, working away from home etc, but I couldn't be happier with my boat and the way it performs.

I should say at this point, that mone is not an F16, but could be, if I added the kite.

A search through the forum will show lots of discussion on homebuilding, and check TonyJ's a couple of threads down or Rolfs in the homebuild forum at the bottom of the main index.

Regards

Thanks guys,

As I said I was VERY impressed ... I had only seen my friend's boats on the beach ... to see them just scooting down wind slicing through the H16 fleet leaving a cloud of spray behind was just AWESOME!!!!

My friends on the Chesapeake Bay have both Taipans and Blades. They have committed to come to the YC I'm a member at for our Rock Hall YC

Annual One-Design Regetta

on June 21st and 22nd ... I think I'll have to arrange to borrow a F16 for a ride (I wonder what my bar tab will be for these favors!!!) I can see why my friends just LOVE their new boats!!! I'll start getting $$$$'s together. I'm a fairly decent wood worker, but my friend Glenn is an EXCEPTIONAL wood worker ... maybe I can convince him to build one also!!!

Question: Do we HAVE to paint it YELLOW like Wouter's ???!!!!

Thanks for helping me get started ... I just need to convince the family I need a THIRD boat!!!

HarryMurphey
TheMightyHobie18/P19MX
(and maybe a F16 in the future)

And while you are at it, maybe you can convince Chessapeak Light Craft (a Kayak kit co.) to come up with a quick build hull kit using the Blade/Taipan plans. They have access to the best marine ply, etc. But you would need to buy the beams, tramp, mast, blocks, cordage, spinnaker gear, sails, etc. but you can order that from Vectorworks.

Think twice get some prices and do some calculations. You don’t save a lot of money by building the hulls and buying the rest. To make the effort worth wile you have to build everything, or still better buy the hulls and build the rest.

New Blade hulls are about $3,200 each, or $6,400 for a set.

I guess if I could build a mast, tramp, sails, blocks, lines, etc. it might be cheaper to buy the hulls and build the rest, but I can't.

Given that most of us cannot realistically build anything but the hulls, I think that is where you -might- save money. I chose to buy mine as time was off the essence.

Rolf, do you have any idea how your Blade will cost when completely ready-to-sail? (Not counting your precious hours obviously).

We are running full accounting on everything going into the boats and we can make this available later on..
I am not too keen to present an estimate now, or publish the numbers later on for that matter. Reason is that we know how and where to get parts really cheap and will do most ourself. This will be reflected in the price like Gato said, but not everybody can build to this price unless they have the same connections and skills!
Our estimate is based on finding Tornado masts for less than US$200.
Hulls built from strip plank, which might be cheaper than ply (will be interesting to find out!)
Homemade sails and trampolines
Homemade foils and rudder system
Buying Riley fittings instead of a more well known brand.
Buying all lines in one go, perhaps abroad, and import them at a discount.
Crossbeams probably made in carbon, as we have access to an industrial source for this project. Actually half the price of buying sections from a spar shop and having them shipped here.
None of this would be possible unless we had connections all over the globe helping us out with advice and parts!
Experience with epoxy/wood/composite.
Access to industrial accounts for fibers and epoxy.
A place to build.
Understanding families.

I dont know if I should publish our estimate.. Might do the class more harm than good. Better to wait until we know for sure I think?

Anyway, if somebody wants to build an F16, I would have began sourcing parts. We began with the masts. The hulls are the easy part to build cheap. Finding all the rest is what will break the bank. If one could buy a derelict or wrecked spi cat from an insurance company it might be a good start.

Timbo,

Very interesting that you mentioned

Chesapeake Light Craft

... it is a VERY small world ... May I suggest that we

push

really hard for some F16's to come to the Rock Hall YC's

Annual One-Design Event

... The Commadore this year is a gentleman named Mr Dyer Harris who has a son .... (wait for it) ........ he is the OWNER and PRESIDENT of CHESAPEAKE LIGHT CRAFT!!!!!

How's that for a small world!!!!

Help me out here boys!!! ... maybe we can make something happen .... RHYC would really love to award the FIRST trophy for F16's

On the Bay

... I'll check and see if Dyer's son will be in attendence.

This could work on many levels ....

Rolf,

Do you think that that

broken mast

would work as crossbars ... or should I go talk to Kevin Cook about Carbon???

I'll start

scrounging materials/parts

I'm excited guys ...

pumped"!!!

Sail Flat, Sail Fast
Harry Murphey
H18mag/P19MX

Oh, maybe we could leave the hulls a

Natural Wood

finish?

Dyer and his son built a

Natural finish

Windmill several years ago ... it is really pretty!!!

Harry

Dont rush into it. Just use your eyes and your contacts and see what you can find. There are some really good deals to be made, but you have to wait and look for them. Finding a mast and a boom is a priority, then begin looking for other fittings and foils/ruddersystem etc. But before you do anything, consider how much money you can spend on this! There will be some cash spent on this..

About crossbeams, you wrote:

I think that will do, but Phill, Wouter and others are more qualified to confirm that. Unless you can source carbon at industrial cost price, carbon will probably be more expensive. Finding 90mm diam alu tubes with 1.6mm wallthickness at a good price should be possible.

Parts is something you always can sell again, so you minimize your risk by beginning in that end if you are to do a boat on the cheap. The hulls are a relatively well known quantity.

Hi All

Fortunately for some and not so much for others, the cost of putting a boat on the water that you build yourself, is largely dependent on where you are in the world.

Buying secondhand is the beginning, for a few things or using what you may already have can ease the blow of the starting cost.

This is a few things that saved me big dollars as far as I'm concerned;

Building the hulls, the hulls are I suppose the main ingredient to the overall boat, and the bare hulls are surprisely cheap to build.

I put everything together myself, I bought new beams and a new mast section and all the fittings and put it all together at home.

A Class Trailer - Ebay $50.00

Rudders were the rod push down type that I had on my mosquito.

Centreboards - when Jim Boyer shut shop, I bought my boards from Jim half price as seconds, one is a little heavier than the other and one had some marks in it.

Mainsail - Bought second hand, only a few years old and very lightly used, it is still almost brand new.

Regards

Give Vectorworks a buzz and see if they have a line on used boats. There's bound to be one or two around.

A used boat is almost always the most economical alternative. I dont recommend anybody to build unless their main goal is the process itself, not the results.

I think I did email someone at CLC about a stitch and glue Blade hull kit, I think they said it couldn't be done because of the roundness of the bottom of the hulls. OK, so what about strip planks like a wooden canoe kit? Or perhaps they could come up with a kit for all the formers, wood, tools, epoxy, glass, etc. that you would need to build a TaiPan/Blade type hull?

I'm kind of like my father ... he enjoyed working/modifing the Family cabincruiser more then running it ... it started out as an Express cruiser and ended as a Sedancruiser w/ flying bridge

My issue is I do not have a sum of cash to purchase it (unless I win the lottery) ... but am a pretty good scrounger!!!

I happen to know where there are several bent H16 masts for crossbars?

I spoke to Tony Arrands/RacerX today about sails ... several of the

locals

have asked him if he would make some ... he doesn't have a design currently ... but for multiple sail orders he will!!!

I'm putting the word out for other suitable pieces ... we'll see what I come up with

Sail Flat, Sail Fast
HarryMurphey
H18mag/P19MX

Glenn built one of their kits a couple of years ago ...

And remember if we get Commodore Dyer on our side to

talk it up

w/ his son maybe ....

He does like Glenn and myself ... we have been volunteering for all sorts of assignments/work at RHYC ... I can understand him liking Glenn ... but I'm grumpy, stubborn, hardheaded ... and those are my good qualities!!! Truth be told I've gained alot of pull at the club by bringing my

weedwacker

and keeping the place neat looking, pruning trees, assembling the new

deck furniture

...

Harry

huh?? <img src=

alt=

/> Blade cant be done in ply? I guess that means a Tornado, Mosquito, Dodgy or Tiapan cant either...

*wanders off all dejected* <img src=

alt=

/>

On a positive note I know we could get

flat packs

made up.. With laser cut ply forms ready to stick/glue/tape.. Ikea for boat building..

I kind of like the

flat packs

idea. Even better, IMHO, would be the idea of setting up an open-source design. Have design data on a server somewhere which could be downloaded by a prospective builder -- including CAD files for the forms, etc. Folks could download, modify, build, submit ideas for improvements, etc. It seems like a natural fit for a development class whose members like to sail and try things together, and race with a spirit of camaraderie rather than cutthroat competitiveness.

Of course, it would have to be done in a

clean room

environment: nobody involved should have worked with Blade plans, for example. The rights of the commercial designers should certainly be respected. This would be an entirely separate entity if it were to happen.

Or has someone already proposed this and it sank?

Sure CLC could do a ply kit, but they would need a designer to work with them. There would also have to be a market for them. Shipping worldwide is kind of expensive so I dont know.

Perhaps if someone did a good hard chine design which was easy and fast to build. But as I said earlier, the cost is buried in other parts than the hulls.

Stewart, he didn't say it can't be done in plywood, he said it couldn't be done using the

stitch and glue

method they use for their kayak kits. Obviously boats can be built of wood.

I was thinking about a quick build kit where all the peices are computer cut, all the epoxy and glass is pre measured, with newbie type instructions, etc.

By building the hulls yourself and buying the rest you can save about 20% of the total cost of new F 16 cat. If you are a good builder and lucky you can build two decent hulls. To get a high performance platform you have to go for at least a carbon mast, and even with that you will have hard to get it down to min. weight.
As for the parts you buy, there is no way to get your money back, this is a development class, and what is good today will be old tomorrow.

I disagree with you on one point Gato. Gear you scrounge together like rig, blocks, cleats etc. can always be sold later on. If you find something used, you will probably not loose money on it either if you find out you are not into building a boat after all. Selling a pair of unfinished hulls is a different matter.

This statement is only true if you happen to be one of those people who feel they can only compete if they have the newest of the new.

There have been no changes since I have been around that really could have been considered monumental. A very slow evolution at best. The tiger is old school hull shape without a wing mast, but still wins, Marstom A is the same. The 4.9 is still very competitive, and I have heard the Mozzie is still even up often a good bet to win races around the course.

The formula classes are interesting because it allows more people to play. For those who want to buy and go, and for those techno junkies that want to tinker. If obsolesence was ever really a problem, other than in a few peoples minds, The F18 and A classes would never have been able to grow to where they are today. These are both expressly race classes and second hand boats would hold no value.

Matt

The open-source design idea was floated a few years ago and there was enthusiasm, but that was it.

I would like to add, I have a timber Taipan that has been widened to fit F16 rule this boat is more than competitive against any of the existing F16's.When I put the boat together
I found places such as Ebay a great source for fittings at less than half retail price.As for costings here in AUS we can build a pair of 4mm timber hulls for around $1700.00 materials only. Plans can be purchased for around $220 AUS from Phil Brander (Blade) or AHPC (Taipan)(just google.I don't agree with the guys that say that you can't save money building from home my boat ready to go with trailer cost $9500.00 AUS thats about $8000.00 less that a production new one. In saying this there is around 250 hours of building time required for both hulls.

Thats exactly right, Danny.

The savings I would say more like 40-50%. But again this as I said earlier, I can see, would differ, depending on your country (i.e. availability of parts and building materials)

I also disagree with statements like 'build for the experience, not the end result' I can't for the life of me figure the thought behind saying something the like that.

I built for the experience and the end result, and as far as I'm concerned, job done.

Regards

Matt, the reason is that if you just want a cheap boat to go sailing/racing in, the odds are very large that you will give up before you complete the project.
My little girl likes ice cream, but she would never have the patience to make the ice cream herself. It is pretty much the same thing <img src=

alt=

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Earlier in my life I entertained ideas of building a kit airplane. After years of research and much reading, talking, etc. to people who have done it, I found out you must really, really, really love spending time alone in your workshop, and have a job, wife and family that will allow for that.

One expert said in an article about building a

homebuilt

airplane,

There are people who build for pure enjoyment of building, and there are people who fly for the pure enjoyment of flying, rarely are they the same person.

I realized I was one of the type that love to fly, but lack the love of building. The small airplane classifieds are full of half finished kits for the same reason. If you don't love to build, you will get frustrated, board and eventually either throw the thing together sloppily just to get it done, or sell it half done.

Kind of like race cars, etc. there are mechanics who love to work on the cars, but rarely drive them, and there are drivers who only drive the cars, never turning a wrench. I think the same applies to building boats.

You really have to want to live in the woodshop and just enjoy building stuff, preferably without the distractions of family demands, and be happy. I don't have the time and too many family demands, and as I decided back with the airplane kit, I will never be a builder.

But I think some of the builders might not want to their baby too hard either. A race car driver will run it into another car or the wall, trying to pass for the win, and not worry too much about repairing it, whereas a mechanic might drive a bit more cautiously, knowing he will spend hours in the shop fixing it.

Drive it like you stole it

is a popular NASCAR term for good reason. <img src=

alt=

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