Originally Posted by Rssailor

How sad to lose your boats and possesions in a fire. I take it you worked for Vortex model engineering? Ryan

Yes. I was one of the 6 founders of the company. My primary responsibility was the sail control actuator,
developed and marketed by me, using war-surplus target drone actuators, prior to the start-up of Vortex.
Irreconsilable differences between me and the company's owners led to my ouster, around the time of boat #560's construction.
As it turned out, that was a Godsend! It embarked me on a series of thrilling adventures that most people can only dream about living through!

wow - just saw this today- listed on 2-1, sold on 2-2 here in RCGroups
boats for sale section -look at that deck !

Thor, you’re correct when you said: “-look at that deck”!

The boat was built by the late Don Prough (AMYA member #3), of Probar Design in the early 1970’s. The deck is planked and the “dots’ that you see on the deck are toothpicks. The holes were drilled, with glue applied to the toothpicks they were inserted into the deck then sanded and epoxy coated. The deck has never be repaired or re-finished as far as I know. Don had the boat till he passed away in 2003 and remain in storage till late 2011, when I took the boat out of storage. The boat has been sail twice since coming out of storage then sold. Here are a few more pictures of the deck


Signed
Don Prough's brother, 03 Ranger

Hello S/B sailors,
The San Francisco Model Yacht Club will be hosting an AMYA sanctioned region 6 regatta (green chevrons) on Spreckels Lake on Saturday, June 30th, and Sunday, July 1st. It's also called in our club, "The Colonel Bart Cup".We'd love to have some S/B sailors from San Diego, Sacramento, and everywhere else join us. We'll have a BBQ at our clubhouse afterwards on Saturday the 30th.
And, we've secured the rights to have the S/B nationals in San Francisco in 2013. The races will be at around the same time as the Americas Cup races, which are between September 7th to the 22nd. We won't be sailing at the same times as the "big boys, so you can go and watch them too. Exact dates will be forthcoming when we know the Americas Cup racing schedule.

Bob Heacock,
Commodore, San Francisco Model Yacht Club

I'm in contact with Steve, who got S/B 560 on eBay, and I'm going to be advising him on her restoration. He's in Northern California, and hopes to sail it with the San Francisco Model Yacht Club. YAY ! I'm posting a picture of my S/B #373, which I restored in 2008.

Bob Heacock,
Commodore, SFMYC

Originally Posted by Lancer31

Yes. I was one of the 6 founders of the company. My primary responsibility was the sail control actuator,
developed and marketed by me, using war-surplus target drone actuators, prior to the start-up of Vortex.
Irreconsilable differences between me and the company's owners led to my ouster, around the time of boat #560's construction.
As it turned out, that was a Godsend! It embarked me on a series of thrilling adventures that most people can only dream about living through!

Interesting to know some history behind this boat.
You might be interested in knowing that one of your units is still working on my Santa Barbara #443. The sail control unit S/N 147.
The boat was shiped to me in Dec 2, 1971.

Originally Posted by Jim409

Interesting to know some history behind this boat.
You might be interested in knowing that one of your units is still working on my Santa Barbara #443. The sail control unit S/N 147.
The boat was shiped to me in Dec 2, 1971.

Thank you for that info! I was 40 years old, on that date. The Radioplane target drone actuators had undergone considerable modification by that time. At some point, along in there, we had the aluminum cases re-anodised from natural color, to black anodised, with red sail-control arms. Is yours like that?
Doesn't seem like 40 years, since then!

Lancer,
Yep, mine has a black case with a red arm
I have had it apart a couple of times to oil the bearings and clean contacts but it is still like a baby giorilla down in there.
Jim.

Wow! I didn't realize anyone else was still using these actuators! I have one with the natural color on a Newport 12 (#33), and a black one on a Santa Barbara (#413).

Anyone know the actual "torque rating" on these actuators?

Never checked the torque, but with a 1950:1 gear ratio, and the modern, (in 1971) General Electric permag motors we used to replace the WWII motors that were in there, there was a LOT of torque!

Here is some video coverage of the San Diego Argonauts February 2012 Sail Points for the Santa Barbara one design class.
enjoy,
Ken

SB Sail Pts 4 Feb 12 (14 min 47 sec)

Hi Ken and all,

The incident in the S/B race 3 near the weather mark raises a rules question that we don’t see very often.

Ken (red boat) on port lay line hit a stbd tack boat forcing that boat over and leading to a raft of boats at the weather mark. Ken cleared the stbd boat and rounded the mark in first place. After the offset mark, he did his penalty turn and was still in first place.

Had Ken born off and gone behind the other ROW boats approaching the mark, probably he would have rounded in about fifth place.

So my question for debate, after reading R 44.1.b, is “did Ken gain significant advantage from that breach of R10”? And as a follow on “Was the penalty turn sufficient penalty or should the penalty be to retire from the race”?

John

I assume the Sailing Instructions modify RRS 44.1 to one turn? Either way, I'd say that the red boat did not comply with RRS 44.2. Two mark roundings after the incident to me does not consitute "....as soon after the incident as possible...", especially when there were no other boats very close after red rounded the first weather mark.

Not sure I've ever seen RRS 44.1b applied except in the case where there is serious damage or injury....but there's certainly a case to be made that red did gain "significant advantage."

Since we talk about racing rules a lot I thought it might be helpful to post a simplified version of same. Again this is a simplified version, but I believe if you know what's here you will be fine the great majority of the time.

Rules in Brief R-C

Originally Posted by hiljoball

Hi Ken and all,

The incident in the S/B race 3 near the weather mark raises a rules question that we don’t see very often.

Ken (red boat) on port lay line hit a stbd tack boat forcing that boat over and leading to a raft of boats at the weather mark. Ken cleared the stbd boat and rounded the mark in first place. After the offset mark, he did his penalty turn and was still in first place.

Had Ken born off and gone behind the other ROW boats approaching the mark, probably he would have rounded in about fifth place.

So my question for debate, after reading R 44.1.b, is “did Ken gain significant advantage from that breach of R10”? And as a follow on “Was the penalty turn sufficient penalty or should the penalty be to retire from the race”?

John

I don't think its a debate, he definately gained significant advantage from stuffing it in there. He should have retired, according to the rules. That being said, I don't think I've ever seen anybody retire after some serious rules breaches in 30+ years of model and big boat sailing.

He also should have completed his penalty turn at least on the offset leg. If he had tried to do them previous to that he would of "interferred" with the other yachts even more.