Rules changes

Hi, here some facts to complete:
the voting power during the last WC, were not held by few european countries but: 10 national association representing 871 members (74% of members), 94 votes (70% of vote)

One french member (or Ned or Ger, or Ita and so on) is as important as one sailor from another country in the WC. Not more, but also not less.

The point to improve is the participation by Skype or whatever for far away representative to expose their positions.

After complete exchange most of the decision are unanimous.

Franck the frog.

Franck,

The following nations were present at the WC meeting:-
FRA
NED
HUN
GER
GBR
IRL
BEL
(all EU nations)

Agenda comments (not actual proxy votes) were submitted by
ITA
SWE
ESP

There were no agenda comments or proxy votes recorded for any non European national class association.

The class constitution states very clearly:-

4.4 At the meetings of the World Council, decisions shall be reached by those present by approval of over 50% majority, but members unable to attend shall pass proxy votes to the President of the IF18CA. Each National Chairman shall have votes as laid down in 9.6 of this Constitution, the President shall have the casting vote in the event that their in not a majority.

The word

shall

is defined by ISAF as a mandatory compliance. So without all National class associations submitting Proxy votes any decision at the WC meeting was unconstitutional.

Hi Macca,
If I read well , imagine that Estonia (very little country in north Europe, 10 F18 and one measurer) do not pass any proxy votes, the WC can't have any move ?
Guess what ? It doesn't work like that. The verb

shall

sure is mandatory but for the members of the WC if they don't attend the meeting.

...but members unable to attend shall pass proxy votes to the President of the IF18CA...

Sorry for my poor globish
Franck

Franck,
It works like this: as the constitution is written all national member countries have to submit proxy votes for the meeting to be valid.

Doesn't matter if those countries have 1 member or 100, they must submit the proxy for the meeting or no decisions can be made.

If the constitution said that proxy votes

may

be submitted then it would be optional and the recent WC meeting decisions would be perfectly legal under the constitution.

That is how we ensure that all member countries are aware of the issues and they have time to decide on the issues at hand and submit their proxy votes accordingly.

That is why its important to ensure that the information circulating to WC members and their national membership is accurate and balanced in its presentation.

Macca,

You can have another way to understand the text. I respect that. Accept we're not agree. Then apply:

11.1 Any dispute in relation to National F18 Associations, eligibility to race, the interpretation of this Constitution and By-Laws of similar matters, other than any dispute as to the interpretation of the ISAF Racing Rules of Sailing or any protest in the jurisdiction of the Race Committee, may be referred to, together with all relevant facts, in writing to the World Council whose decision shall be final and binding.

How paint on the hull can kill F18 ?

According to builder (we've some in France) only the material; gel coat cost 35€ for a F18, high tech paint,
is more than 10 times more expensive : 400€.

Also the construction process is better adapted to the use of gel coat. (direct in the mould) leading to simpler manufacturing and with lower cost. .

Painting needs to prepare the surface (as a car with mastic) and heavy equipment to finish.
You can use gel coat with painting pistol just diluted to repair as well as paint.

More important to me is that we all know that chemical industry has no limit.
If we accept paint on the hull the certitude is that tomorrow morning appears « magic paint » and also « magic price ».
And then last but not least how make difference between paints? Destructive test?

Franck,

There is no interpretation needed for the term

shall

ISAF has already defined it for us and it is a mandatory item. The WC must follow the terms set out in the constitution and as such the decisions taken last month are no valid.

Regarding 11.1, The Australian association has submitted a motion to the WC to set aside the rulings from the recent WC meeting and re-hold the meeting within the bounds of the constitution.

Franck,

A little knowledge is very dangerous....

I note on your own news website that you have the following news on the Cirrus F18:-

Le Cirrus R est un F18 conforme aux évolutions récentes de la jauge. Les coques ont une finition gel coat. Pour l’anecdote le rapport entre le coût de la matière gel coat et une peinture high-tech est de 1 à 10. Les contraintes de fabrication avec la peinture sont aussi plus importantes que le gel coat: mastiquage et cabine de peinture comme une carrosserie de voiture.

Translated:-

The Cirrus is an R F18 in line with recent developments in the class. The shells have a gel coat finish. For the record the relationship between the cost of the raw gel coat and a high-tech paint is 1 to 10. Manufacturing constraints with the painting are more than the gel coat: glazers paint booth and a car body.

Yet Mischa's brand new boat is painted.... So you should be very careful what you write.

As for your claims about costs to produce in paint they are equally misguided:-

It is possible to spray newer style paints directly into moulds in the same way as gelcoat, and then the finishing time to produce a hull is actually reduced compared to gelcoat hand finishing which is very labour intensive and slow.

I am not sure what paint you have been quoted, but at 400 Euro material costs it would be 3-4 times more expensive than the very best paints used on Americas cup boats!!

An actual material cost to paint an F18 in top of the line paint is 118 Euro. So perhaps you should review your position...

Have a look on our site www.f18.fr (sorry it's in french), you can check, with all due respect, you're wrong .
You can also find our 2011 members list about 280 sailors, they all pay that explain europe financial crisis, (for 423 F18 sailors noticed by the french MNA) and the open database of F18 certificate.

No arrogance, but please consider we are also democratic than you are, and with the same spirit.
We are also huge fan of F18, with the same difficulties, perhaps more experience, because we faced questions since 1994.

Also (european song): 200 members in Netherland (country just a little more bigger than brooklyn), 150 members in Germany (90% of the coast frozen 10 month on 12) and so on to Hungarian (last world), Estonian etc..., they are all F18 sailors, like Australian, American, Argentinian etc.. not more and not less than you are.

Franck the frog
Capricorn C1,5 (all C2 parts except hull)

Macca,

A you noticed It was not a post upon Mischa's specific boat but about BCM production boats, which are finished with gel coat.

You can believe or not that opening the door of painting now, is as dangerous as allowed carbon in daggerboard.
Except that we can decide to put a limit (1,40 meters under the hull ) to daggerboard and check it quite easily.

How make difference between paints ? No arm, no chocolate means here: no paint, no problem.
The main question is not today's technology or price, it's to prevent chemical research and runaway with no limit.

Franck

Franck, I believe you are advocating the position of 1 member = 1 vote?

If so, I fully agree and with the technology available today it is well within the bounds of feasibility to enable every member to be fully aware of any proposed rule changes and then vote on them in a fully informed manner.

If this were the case, we would not be in the mess we currently see. There is no way the so called

technical report

on paint would have passed inspection by the members and then there would have been a proper review on the matter completed before any votes were made.

Franck,

So you are happy that a BCM std boat is class legal, yet Mischa's Orange boat is not?

The reason it is painted is because he wanted an Orange boat (I think so he could be easier to spot OCS!) and its not possible to make that colour in gelcoat unless you spend a lot of time and money to get it the right colour, then it will fade a lot quicker and will need to be refurbished sooner (normally you would do this with paint, but that is now illegal, so you have to gelcoat it and add around 5kg to the weight... genius!!)

Perhaps the class should ban coloured hulls, it is much cheaper to only have white gelcoat in stock and it prevents any performance questions arising... As we all know the RED ones are much faster than the rest <img src="<>/smile.gif" alt="smile" title="smile" height="15" width="15" />

the text:

but members unable to attend shall pass proxy votes to the President of the IF18CA

I do respect what you think, but be as kind to accept they could be a discussion. The

shall

, full mandatory no doubt, obviously (even for a non native english spoken) apply to members not to the WC.
You can't say I do not do my duty so the decisions are invalid. Too easy.

Here you contest decisions taken by representative of 74% of worldwide members, in a very formal way.
So the same people will read carefully the 11.1 and those representative of 74% members see that the WC decide on this dispute and

whose decision shall be final and binding.

For me this it looks like a

formal

dead end and a

formal

waste of time.

No particular emotion, just go to bed, thank you It was interesting. Orange means BFD yesterday ;-(

Actually, it's not that bad ...

not that good either!! <img src="<>/smile.gif" alt="smile" title="smile" height="15" width="15" />

I am certainly not an industry professional but regelcoated my Infusion last winter. It is certainly feasible although labor intensive to remove the old gelcoat. The finish is not what I would consider to be a professional finish but that is due to two mistakes that I made which are both a result having not done it before. I feel very confident that I can refinish the boat with gelcoat and have an excellent finished product. I cannot however attest to the weight difference as the boat has not been weighed as of yet.

Colin, Did you spray the entire boat or just the bottoms?

If you did the entire boat the weight gain from resurfacing is between 3 and 5kg

The cost to re-gelcoat an entire hull professionally is approx 3 times more expensive than to paint the boat and the finish will never be as good as original factory or that which can be easily achieved by painting.

I did the entire boat. I believe the finish of gelcoat can be every bit as good as the highest quality paint job, but you are 100% accurate in the effort required achieve that finish versus paint. I redid my boat in gelcoat because I didn't feel that

I

could produce a decent looking finish in paint (lack of spraying experience) and with gelcoat I could always sand any runs out.

One interesting note about weights. A gallon of gelcoat weighs about the same as a gallon of paint. I don't know if there is more transfer when spraying gelcoat versus paint due to the viscosity differences. I refinished a Hobie 18 in paint a couple of years ago. At the time I worked for a car dealership that had a bodyshop and paint booths so it was easy to slip the painter a 100 dollar bill and some paint and let him spray it. We used more material on that boat then I used in gelcoat on the Infusion. With the paint we had a sealer, than a primer, the paint, and finally the clear coat.

To be perfectly honest, if I had it to do all over again I would do gelcoat again. I don't have the money to pay a pro and I don't have the skills to do paint myself, at least not at the level to achieve results better than I can with gelcoat. 3-5kg's does suck though.

To paint an F18 from scratch will use about 3.5 litres of paint, The coverage with paint is much better than gel, so its less than half the weight of gelcoat by the time you are done.

To do what you have done and spray over an existing surface will use about 1.5-2 litres.

new style paint systems allow you to paint in one shot, greatly saving weight, time and effort.

Hi Kris

As promised my take on facts of the sensational news I published last week:
http://catsailingnews.blogspot.com/2011/12/f18-rules-fact-sheet-illegal-spinnakers.html

The goal is to bring some light on wc decisions and current (in my opinion) rules mess.

ISAF published three complementary documents (and not only one <img src="<>/cool.gif" alt="cool" title="cool" height="15" width="15" /> ;)) you can check here:
http://www.sailing.org/2129.php

-first is interpretation, in order to prepare the second one:
-second is amendment
-third is class rules up to date

The second text (amendments2012) is the key one. The main point is paint on hull.
ISAF text is clear and confirmed last world council clarification:

The following amendments to the Class Rules have been approved to be effective 21th February 2012.
Rule C.7.2
Amendment: Add new rule to read as follows:

C.7.2 MODIFICATIONS, MAINTENANCE AND REPAIR
(a) Holes not bigger than necessary for the installation fittings and passage of
lines may be made in the hull.
(b) Sealing strips of any suitable material for centreboard/daggerboard slots are
permitted.
(b) Routine maintenance such as painting and polishing is permitted without re- measurement and re-certification, providing that the intention and the effect is to polish the hulls only.
(c) Each hull shall have at least one inspection hatch. All other fittings are optional

Rule D.2.3
Amendment: Delete rule and renumber accordingly.
Rule D.3.1
Amendment: Add “polyester gelcoat” after “glass fibres” so the rule now reads
as follows:

D.3.1 MATERIALS
(a) The hull shells shall be built from polyester or vinylester resin, glass
fibres, polyester gelcoat, a core of PVC, balsa or felt, the combination of wood-epoxy, injected plastic, which shall not be altered other than locally for fittings, and passage of equipment and normal reinforcement. Epoxy glue is permitted for joining components. Every material that is not expressly permitted is prohibited.

END

In a few words: boat maker have to used polyester gel coat, paint can be used for repair only under responsability of sailors (that's why ISAF moved the item in the class rule).
So painting an entire hull, isn't

routine maintenance

and obviously breaking the rules.

So the class gets itself into a total mess and takes the band aid approach..... very nice.

And painting an entire hull can certainly be classified as routine maintenance.

No mess here, all boat makers with the same rules.

WC confirmed by ISAF now make it crystal clear.

Rules can change but with one year notice, in order to be fair.

Painting after repairing a hull is allowed without re-certification ISAF words

providing that the intention and the effect is to polish the hulls only.

You can now ask ISAF if painting an entire hull is routine maintenance for an ordinary club sailor...

I just did. <img src="<>/smile.gif" alt="smile" title="smile" height="15" width="15" />

No problem.

ISAF just confirmed F18 World Council and say no entire hull painting but polyester gel coat finish only.
Not less than three files in 2 days: interpretation doc to prepare the amendment and updating class rules:

http://www.sailing.org/2129.php

Then you ask ISAF:

hey, look my entire hull painted, it's ok because only routine maintenance, isn't it ?

Good luck indeed Macca... ISAF has been crystal clear on your last asking (the first document), it's hard to believe that they now will say

Yes, what we write is without any importance, it's not big deal, do what you want...

This rule (as other one) can be changed but with one year notice, in order to be fair.
All the boat maker playing same game.

Franck, I have discussed the matter with ISAF and they have confirmed that painting hulls post manufacturer is within the class rules.

I agree Macca, it's written

Routine maintenance such as painting and polishing is permitted without re- measurement and re-certification,...

please notice the second part, it's also interesting

...providing that the intention and the effect is to polish the hulls only.

When you get a written ISAF answer just share it.

You have to polish the entire hulls after you have sanded all the gelcoat off.

Or you simply build the boat with no gelcoat, then paint it after its built as the normal maintenance procedure.