Hi all

We are looking at the handicaps of the boats in our fleet and this is potentially what we have

Some of the boats have numbers that have been calculated by another club but others do not

This is the potential list if any forum member would like to provide input on the ones without numbers or the numbers that have been allocated

I have arranged the boats in what i believe be would be fastest to slowest but because the boats are so different a lot of the time the conditions dictate who goes well on the day but feel free to alter the order if you want to


Melges 32 1.098
Melges 24 0.890
Elliott 7.8 0.885
Jenneau 349 0.851
Yamaha 33
Swanson 36
Doven 30 0.709
Sailmaster 845 0.700
Walker H28
Compass 28
Marauder 27 0.690
Tophat 25
Farr 5000 0.570

As well as this we also have a couple of wildcards , a 23 foot ply boat with a taller mast that uses a Etchells main that goes well in light to medium breeze and what was a 27 foot ply boat which used to be on 0.706 but has been lengthened by about 4 foot and now has a Far East 28 keel and is having the sail plan altered with a longer boom and a articulating bowsprit to carry a fair bit more sail but is still in the build stage

Any thoughts would be appreciated

Regards Don

the doven 30 will be quicker than the swanson 36 ???????

SandS said..
the doven 30 will be quicker than the swanson 36 ???????

Methinks the Swano, like the Cav 32 and Mottle 33, is such a good cruising boat that many of them have been fitted with cruising gear which hides their speed potential. The Swanos were not a bad racing boat in their day at all; in their first few Hobarts they were always in the top 10 overall and in the trophies in their class. The top Swanos like Moonbird did well against the world One Ton champs Rainbow II (S&S) and Optimist (Carter) in Australian waters although Wathara II didn't do so well when she went to the world title in Europe.

The Doven was an early '70s Knoop designed half tonner and it did OK, with third in the national half ton titles and some good performances in JOG. However, in those older boats length and size really mattered. The Swano is a much longer boat and basically always beat the older halves (and boats like S&S 34s) to the finish line in Hobart and when racing off Sydney, often by many hours. Even on the two occasions old Halves won the Hobart, they still all finished behind Swanos.

Chris 249 said..
I reckon your order looks pretty damn good apart from the Marauder, H28 and perhaps the 349.

I've got a spreadsheet showing IRC, ORC, US PHRF and UK NHC ratings for about 2500 boats, plus other data that I use to assess comparative boatspeed (aka "cherry picking" according to someone here). I then have a few calcs to bring them back to a common denominator rating. So at the risk of being incoherent since I'm about to crash out, here's some ideas. I have given the rating, the source, and the conversion to the common denominator. Since there are variations between design and since some rules treat boats different, there are significant differences in the outcome.

Melges 32 - Rates 538 on ORC = .892 when converted to common denominator; 1.153 on IRC = .876; 24 on US PHRF = .836; 1.145 on NHC = .859

Melges 24- 628 on ORC= .764; 1.018 on IRC= .763; 108 on US PHRF = .729. .859 on NHC = .76;

These boats rate badly on IRC and (unless modified) on ORC so maybe use the low end of the average of those numbers. The US PHRF numbers for sportsboats are often pretty solid since they are not based on the measured ratings that often penalise sportsboats.

There's a huge variation in the Jeanneau's ORCi numbers, from 690 to 737. That's extremely unusual and it shows there must be many configurations. You can log onto the ORCi site for free, look up the design (under the Sun Odyssey label) and see which of the boats with ORCi certificates is closest to your one.

Yamaha 33 - 692.2 on ORCi = .693, US PHRF = .695 so say .694

Swanson 36 = NHC of .928 = .696; a bit high compared to the ORCi and IRC ratings for comparable boats like Carter "Tina" types and the early Clarionet/Boambillee/Rainbow II S&S one tons. I'd nudge that down to .685-.690.

Doven 30; Conquistador, Quintal etc were competitive with other early '70s half tonners (East Coast 31s, Defiance 30s etc) as proven by Conquistador's third place in the '74 (?) national half ton titles. Using roughly equivalent half tonners we get about .648.

I've got the old YV sheets somewhere, which I was given eons ago by the guy who ran the handicapping for Port Phillip. They give H28, Compass 28, Top Hat and Farr handicaps for individual boats. Most of these designs have several individual boats handicapped. The average of those handicaps was then used as the "class mark" for new boats of that design entering the system.

I don't think there's much info on the Marauder. I used to race a bunch of them as a kid and also raced bunches of Clansmen and Bonbridges. I can't see how the late '70s designed Marauder 27/825 could be slower than the 1930s (albeit modified) H28. The ones at Middle Harbour YC could hang in close to the half tonners like East Coasts, Currawongs etc.

At a guess I'd say .63+ for the Marauder, .6- for the Top Hat and Compass, .59 for the H28 and .55(?) for the Farr but I may have time to check the YV ratings before I leave for a few days.

The best way to calculate the Elliott's rating would be to use a comparison with the Melges on CBH and SMS, wouldn't it?

Good post, very informative

I reckon a Marauder 27 would be faster than a Compass 28 and a Walker 28. Previous owners of my boat now race a Marauder 27.

Okay, I tracked down my ancient copy of the Yachting Victoria class marks for yachts. I like this old information because back in the '80s and '90s there were many more small yachts racing. As BOTY says, the variation in sailor skill at club level means that you can't really use the performance of any one boat as a firm measure, but the Vics had been running the class mark system since the '60s so by then they had a very large base of different designs and sailors to rely upon.

For each design the Victorians had a "base handicap" which was IIRC created by dividing boats into Design Categories from AA to D, and then working out how fast such a design should be for its length by plotting them against a set of data curves to create a "Theoretical TCF/Length". They also had a handicaps for individual boats and a Design Average Handicap for popular designs. To me these are the critical one since the Base Handicap relied upon the designs being slotted into simple and arbitrary categories.

In case anyone is interested, I thought I may put up a few sample designs with average ratings (sometimes calculated precisely, sometimes just averaged by looking at the figures. I have two sets of data so if so, the late '80s info is first and the early '90s after a /. Note - these handicaps don't relate directly to the data I gave above - they just give some relative ratings.

These may be of interest to some and could give you other boats in the area to relate your handicaps to.

Trump Card, VDS (1 boat) .920
Etchells 22 (13 boats) - .823
Farr 1104 (8 boats) - .806
Elliott 26 (1 boat) .786
Yamaha 33 "Theoretical TCF Length" - .756
Swanson 36 (3/10 boats) - .752/.748. Yep, I know this is slower than i indicated above but now they are thought of as cruisers.
S 80 (18 boats) - .746
J/24 (13 boats) - .743
Mottle 33 (3 boats) - .738 - must have been cruisers.
East Coast 31 (4 boats) - .730
Doven 30 "Theoretical TCF/Length" - .723 which looks right
S&S 30 (11 boats) - .723
Sonata 8 (7 boats) - .705
Seaway 25 (10 boats) - .705
Noelex 25 (7/20 boats) - .700/.701
Marauder 27 "Theoretical TCF/Length" - .700 which looks reasonable but a bit too slow IMHO.
Thunderbird (15/22 boats) - .700/.694
Holland 25 (10/16 boats) - .675/.669
Northshore 27 (7 boats) - .667 (a bit slow!) = the Marauder 27 is generally similar in style
Waarschip 24 (9 boats) - .664
Endeavour 26 -.663 = the Marauder 27 is bigger and newer
Mottle 820 .662 = again the Marauder 27 is bigger and newer
Compass 28 (4 boats) - .660
Top Hat (/6 boats) - .645/.642 - note that the Top Hat was originally a hot racing boat in Melbourne.
Triton 24 (9 boats) - .640
H 28 GRP Walker - .640
Endeavour 24 (14/ ) - .645
H 28 (timber) -.610 and a note saying "anything can happen with this lot"!!!

So what about the Farr? Well, they had a Provisional figure of .610 and if you do a comparison with their trailerable yacht handicap and the Sonata 8 and Seaway 25 Victorian figures, you get about .624.

This is just about the only country in the world where there is not an established national database for empirical/PHRF yacht ratings. In other countries they have well-run national systems that amass enormous databases from races all over the country to allow people to set handicaps based on design. Here, Australian Sailing just sits around and demands wads of cash for IRC ratings and interferes with CBH ratings. I was once invited to join ISAF's Empirical Handicapping Committee and I may get into that again so I can try to spur a national system here.

Personally I think it's a really bad thing that we don't have a simple design-based handicapping system for yachts like we do for TYs, dinghies and cats. It means that you can't get the satisfaction of beating bigger but poorly sailed boats on rating - they just get their rating adjusted. There's no spur or reward for sailing a slow boat well, so there's less interest in slower boats. Sad.

Sorry for the rant.

Don
Yamaha is only 33 and a IOR 3/4 ton derivative while the Swanson is almost 37 feet long and in the very old days a 1 tonner.
Yamaha has a big bustle while the Swanson does not.

The Marauder should smash both the Sailmaster and the H 28.
Much finer underwater shape and modern foils compared to the other two. never rated on IOR as rated to high because of its speed.

Same thing with the Compass in that longer sailing length and straighter waterline. Only stability reaching would be negative.

The Doven was a 1/2 that never rated that well because of the lack of distortion in the hull ie there is no bustle and foils have much less drag it should smash the Sailmaster and H 28.
That thing is the most underperforming boat around there.
IRC terms is would be well into 0.900. (Azzurro S@S 34 is 0.935 with more hull distortion)

Interesting, usually 2 very different ways of calculation Chris and I have very similar results.

If you came to do the Port Esperance Regatta this is what you would get and I don't change the tcf over the regatta unless someone has lied about the boat.

IRC my not be perfect at the sharp end across a fleet but it does give a very good indication of the speed of the type of boat relative to another.
Over the year I might have input from the Port Esperance Regatta to the East Coast races such as Keppel where everyone has a phrf rating.

Usually I start with the IRC rating for a boat or at least a close sistership.
If no sistership then a similar class.
I did have about 100 IRC cts on file to compare to.
check how you are going against IRC results around the place and the Rating office page.
Then look at the course if a single race make little adjustments and adjust to the base you are using.
We had one guy complain bitterly that his handicap was so much higher for the PE Regatta as he did not understand that compared to BYC there was a different base and when we took him to the numbers his handicap was actually better. Can't please some people.
Your problem is that you have some chronic underperformers that whinge all the time if they don't win something.
You need to tell them to pull their heads in!

Don
Like it said the Dover is the biggest local underformer.
TYrue Blue is the Humphrey's and the boat with the biggest gift handicap. (Who gave them that) and always had to win by miles which it did.
The real surprise there is Lock on wood which should have b even fastest in that group save for perhaps the Humphrey's.

No chance the Elliott is bigger lighter and has heaps more sail
remember that is not a standard e lliott 780