Oh dear, this is a real hot potato. These are my own thoughts and they are not pointed at anybody. Shoot me down and crucify me if you will, I will move into Kody's dog house, at least she loves me.
I think I have to agree with Gizmo in that we haven't been as professional as we could (even should) have been. There has been a wonderful amount of info and hard work presented by everyone here. And without this shared info, I personally would still be floundering around in the sand. It's a tremendous achievement to build a sand yacht as cheaply as possible. But I think the word "cheaply" has been a poor choice of words. I think a better word to describe what so many have been trying to do, is the word "economical". The word economical implies a serious interest that embraces great design and superb engineering. Yet all this notwithstanding, I think the greatest area where a very professional aura can be introduced is in the presentation of the work performed. To explain, I see so many photos of parts, components and completed frames that lack the "WOW!" factor. The probem is (??) that the components have not been presented in a professional manner. Yes, we all want to share what we are doing and quite rightly so. But so many photos display terrible rust on the parts, welds that look daggy and workshops that look like a fight had developed within them. (Yes, I'm guilty of that too). When I look at other web sites of parts that have been made, the pieces so displayed have been sand/glass beaded to show the fineness of the welds or the integrity of the assembled parts. It doesn't matter how good/bad or indifferent the welded/assembled job is, if it's clean and shiny or beautifully painted, it will look a million dollars and it will display that fabulous "WOW!" factor. I have always believed that a well finished part displays the personal pride and integrity of its builder. It may be undersize, have holes in the wrong place, be made back to front, but if its displayed with the right attitude, who would know? When I marked the work my apprentices did for me in the USA. a well present job always got high grades. It showed that the person took great pride in what he/she did. Without the attention to details such as described, I believe that integrity suffers and we will be the ones who will miss out in presenting a "WOW!" factor to the world.

Kody

lachlan3556 said...

We definately look different to many other landsailing 'groups' I've ever seen (around the internet). Yes, we don't appear as profesional. Would you also be asking if we think this is hurting our sport?
It appears landsailers in Aus are generally more restrained with spending than our european friends, it is more for the fun of it all (Yes we are playing around ).
I've spoken to 'water' sailers who made me feel as though they were 'snobbing' landsailing as less than their current passtime and therefore wouldn't step down to this 'lower' form of activity. (These racing types get snotty. They can't sail as fast though.)
I don't belive we are greater or lesser than anywhere else in the world, we portray ourselves as having a lot of fun and that seems to be the current reason for landsailing in Aus .

I agree with all that you have said Lachlan, in particular the last paragraph. I think it typifies the Aussie attitude in general no matter what activity one is involved in.

Recall the time when we won the America's Cup off the Yanks. The whole country went into celebration. Not because we had won a yacht race, but that we had won it despite all the dirty tricks the Yanks pulled and it was a ton of FUN knocking the Yanks off their perch.

To cap it off we had our then P.M., Aussie Bob (he had to have been drunk THAT night) say on national television, "Anybody that sacks his worker for not turning up tomorrow is a BUM." Not exactly the way one sanctions a national holiday, but as a once off it doesn't get much better.

In answer to Gizmo's question:- the public image of landsailing in Australia? I think it is like many things we do here. It may appear and be somewhat "Rough and Ready" but it works for us. Are we serious or are we just playing around?

YES!! Don't know which it is but we are either "playing around seriously" or "seriously playing around". Take out the "playing around" and we ain't going to bother.

The wealth of knowlege, experience and new input that is flowing in the "Land Yachting" forum of the Seabreeze site tells me that the sport is very much alive and well in Australia.

Australia was extremely well represented by four independant competitors at the recent "World's 2008, Rada Tilly, Patagonia", who achieved very credible results under adverse conditions. That they did this without support or even sanction of ALSA (our alleged National Body), shows THEIR committment to the sport and ALSA's lack of committment.

This of course brings us back to the unavoidable question:- "A National Body - Do We Have One??"

Maybe a "Phoenix" will rise from the ashes of the dead bird.

Adios Amigos and via con Dios till we meet again, Cisco.

P.S. For an objective point of view let's ask our Chilean friend jeqs. Come on Juan, tell us honestly, you are an educated man. Are we a bunch of "whackers" over here. Tell us the truth mate, we will not be offended. We have skins thicker than a rhinosurosurosuros. (Please pardon the colloquialisms.)

cisco said...
P.S. For an objective point of view let's ask our Chilean friend jeqs. Come on Juan, tell us honestly, you are an educated man. Are we a bunch of "whackers" over here. Tell us the truth mate, we will not be offended. We have skins thicker than a rhinosurosurosuros. (Please pardon the colloquialisms.)

Well!!!! what can I say from here!!! Australian landsailing has been always a reference for us here. Its influence in terms of "hardware" has been stronger than the information we got from the other side of the Andes.

Some 9 or ten years ago, we received a plan for building a landsailer, it was the "pacific magic".

It is really amazing how this landsailer evolved here. and in the other side of the Andes in Argentina, they have their design based on frech promos. even the Body (cockpit) was really different to ours, ( yours). it was a simple design compared to the ones the used. we managed to exchange bodys for sails. and from those "australian bodies" they used to have a new design, (we saw it at Rada Tilly).

We are using mostly Windsurfing masts, Polypropilene sails ( the same material used on camping tents floors) and plastics wheels.

We are recreational landsailors, we want to have fun and enjoy meeting new people, and if we are able to harvest new landsailors, the job is done!!.
I think that all of you are making a great job keeping this sport alive there.

I wish I could afford a class 5 sport or a Standard, or even a Seagull promo, but it could cost more than my car, so we will go on building our own landsailers and seeing what you are doing there, ( all kind of designs,) we will continue learning from you all.


saludos de chile.

juan enrique. ( something like john henry!!)

p.s. maybe some of you could come here and take a look from this side of the ocean.

Well said everyone, this is a great thread.

Just one minor point Ian, we have probably one of the best sail makers in Australia very interested in our sport, Ken O'Brien. When you want a great sail, look him up (Oh and give Landyacht all you've got, he can take it! )

Hopefully a lot of the ideas about how we present ourselves on this forum will come in time. Bear in mind this landyacht section of the forum is not yet one year old (our 1st birthday is on 13/8/08)

I think our sharing talking discussing and yes even our arguing to a certain degree is helping achieve what we all want to. Keep it up!!

My 2 cents worth .

here we go



......Here in Australia we don't have the publicity and therefore the popularity European or American landyachting,Sure there are some great venues in Australia but we don't have the population density in the areas were landyachting is really good,an example is here in Brisbane there are beaches but they are fairly ordinary for landyachting ,to find a good flat hard beach which would be able to sustain a decent number of landyachts to hold racing and regattas ,you would probly have the drive to Yeppon 7 hrs away..Is there even and organised racing in Queensland ( and I'm not talking blokarts)..we don't have any dry salt lakes anywhere need here that I know of.(If Ayres lake or Lafoy was within 1.5 hrs from a capital city Ithink you would find the sport more popular and mainstream)

As for the yachts where sailing who cares if they look daggy ,if you want to build a shinny masterpiece on wheels to look at BUILD A HOTROD ,Our yachts are built to serve a purpose that is to sail over the land as cheaply and as practically as possible .By this I mean If built strong as not to break ( as most of us don't have 1000 acres of dry salt lakes to run on). Sure some of these flash looking yachts in Europe look great but I guarantee they would not last 2 hours where I sail ,first stingray hole you hit at speed would be the end of it .A mate of mine had one (can't remember the class or brand I think it was made in S.A had a fiberglass cockpit big pocket luff sail would have been 12 ft wide and 16 foot long..was great till the front wheel kept breaking off ,I think we got 2 hours out of it one day).

It's all about getting bums on seats you pretty much gotta outlay $4000( can'''t see $2000 in materials myself) on a blowkart or get off your freckle and built your own ,they may look rough,bit rusty,crappy ,old second hand reject sailboard sails who cares not everyone here is an engineer or a welder ,fitter turner .,or a sail maker nor do they have the funds to employe them........as long as it's safe and holds together "Who Cares"


""""""build it strong and sail it like you stole it"""""""""



Jay.

In my build I've tried to be different, realizing that this was likely to be detrimental to the versatility of my landyacht. This was to show the Lefroy mini apart from being a excellent entry level (price, transportable etc), can from a design point of view be a challenge for the more experienced builder like kody(Landyacht did a far better job showing simplicity for the less experienced). Also bringing in new ideas, hopefully this will help generate new ideas and lateral thinking that your talking about (maybe someone will come up with a winged keel). I believe if we focus on a good entry level landyacht the upper classes will develop as people progress and abilities outgrow the entry level. Class Landyacht building and racing needs to be encouraged.

Yep, agreed Landyacht, I think its going great guns!! I'm just glad Laurie started this great forum, Seabreeze and welcomed us landyachters into it. It certainly feels like home!

And thanks to the great people on here I've learnt a huge amount. I personally think, collectively we're all doing a great job promoting this sport!!

Thanks very much for the international perspective Jeqs and Mr Nice, its great to hear!! Please let your countrymen (& women) know that they are very welcome on here as well.

As I said in another post Dan, while we're suffering thru winter here I'd love to hear more about your sailing season!

IMO it is up to each and every one of us to promote land sailing as a sport, preferably one that is family based. We can all do this by: sailing safely, obeying local laws, being freindly to new comers, passing on contact details of others or this website and most of all be welcoming of all regardless of how *agricultural* their yachts may be or what they have cost to build. From small things big things grow.

As to websites sure it would be good if all our clubs and our national assn all had these wonderful specky looking websites however this takes time and often money from somewhere (usually from busy club members who would rather go sailing). Currently we do not seem to have the $ or more important the human resources to do this. I think what we have access to for free on this site has been the biggest bonus to landsailing in Aus since the wheel was invented. thanks Laurie

If we want to see the sport develop further in Australia the most important thing is communication. Communication between individuals and the clubs does not cost anything and is priceless.

Susan