Bow-mounted Riggers

[Charles Carroll]

Dear all,

The August 2015 edition of “Rowing” has a story by Jen Whiting on her
interview with Gord Henry, the founder of Fluidesign. On page 48 there are
six paragraphs that may inspire a few comments.

Cordially,

Charles

______

I ask [Gord Henry] why Fluidesign is considered one of the most productive
boat companies. “I wouldn’t say that,” he answers. “We’re the most copied
boat company.” Fluidesign designed and popularized the bow-mounted rigger.
“My sales sent up when we were copied.”

Henry then launches into a mini-course on the principles of bow-mounted
riggers and the management of torque at the entry point of the stroke. “We’ve
always had the bow-mounted rigger.”

“Always?” I ask.

“Always. I knew we would be copied. I prayed for that. My competition
validated me. In a single, the bow-mounted rigger has the most effect. At
the catch, it provides the least amount of wetted surface, so there’s less
drag and you can actually pick up the boat out of the water. In a double, it’s
half effective. In a quad it’s 25 percent. I originally did it because we
had to put backstays on the riggers for bigger rowers, so I thought why not
just put the rigger back there? And it is a pain to get out of the boat with
stern-mounted riggers; it opened up the front of the boat. But more than
anything we found we had this huge backstay [bow-mounted rigger itself]
behind the oarlock, and that kept the rigger in compression throughout the
stroke. It took me a few years to realize that it was actually lifting the
boat out of the water.”

Henry goes on, as animated as at any point during our conversation. “All
stern-mounted riggers that fail crack at the stern-most anchor point.” He
points to an imaginary joint on our café table. “Why is that? Because that’s
where they’re stressing when they’re lifting the boat during acceleration.”
Acceleration. Drive. Impulse. This man has built an entire company — and
career — on these concepts.

“If you look at our boats, you can see more daylight under the bow of the
boat during acceleration. I didn’t realize it when I did it. We figured it
out through drag testing. I know it’s true. Every boat in the 2012 London
Olympics in the singles final had a bow-mounted rigger.”


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[carl]

Thanks, Charles -

I know Gord Henry, & he's a great salesman.

I've heard very similar techno-drivel from other exponents of
bow-mounted riggers, & garbage is all that it ever is.

Any half-competent 17-year-old maths student would shred all that
incoherent guff about the rigger design lifting the boat. And that
nonsense about keeping the rigger in compression is embarrassing,
misleading claptrap which is scientifically irrational & fundamentally
false.

It provides a perfect example of what happens when:
1. a salesman realises that his audience will swallow anything he says
as long as he says it loudly & often enough
2. that audience is technically illiterate & deeply gullible.

Throughout history, the snake-oil seller has prospered at the expense of
his clients by means of similarly hyperbolic lies.

That's why the UK has its Trades Descriptions Act - see this excerpt
from the relevant Wikipedia entry:
"The Trade Descriptions Act 1968 is an Act of the Parliament of the
United Kingdom which prevents manufacturers, retailers or service
industry providers from misleading consumers as to what they are
spending their money on. This law empowers the judiciary to punish
companies or individuals who make false claims about the products or
services that they sell.
"Applying a false trade description to goods is a strict liability
offence: provided it is shown that the description was applied and was
false, the accused has to prove certain defences in order to escape
conviction.
"Each product sold must be as described and of satisfactory quality
except for any flaws obvious or pointed out at the point of sale. "Fit
for purpose" covers not only the obvious purpose of an item but also any
purpose determined at the point of sale as a result of queries by the
customer and assurances given by the trader.
"False descriptions as to services require the more normal proof of mens
rea (guilty intent)."

If the nonsense you have quoted from that article is being used in any
way to market that product in the UK, as I suspect it is, then that's a
criminal offence under that Act.

In 2008 this act was largely superseded by the Consumer Protection from
Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 to bring it better into line with EU
law. The onus remains on suppliers "not to trade unfairly and to avoid
misleading statements"

What is so impressive is that a whole sport, & its wallets, have been
taken in by such nonsense, and taken in serially.

First came the stern-mounted wing rigger. There we had science-free
arguments that this design better connected the tension (note, not
compression) from the pin to the stretcher than did a 2 or 3-stay
design. Even though on crew shells to mount these so-called wing
riggers required the sides of the boat to be lowered, such was the
technical naivete of our sport's participants that, following the
blustery World Junior Champs in Athens, the US squad pressed to have
wing rigged shells for the Athens Olympics, apparently blissfully
ignorant of the fact that shells swamp not through rigger spray but
because wave-tops overflow the tops of the saxboards/gunwales, resulting
in fully-calculable & precipitous water influxes which can rapidly
exceed tonnes/minute for an eight.

Just as this rear-mounted wing was a less-rigid substitute for the
conventionally triangulated 2-stay rigger - & I recall fictitious claims
being made by boat-builders who were fitting aerofoil-section stern
wings that these caused the boat to lift & fly! - so came the new
fashion for the even longer, & hence less rigid, bow-mounted riggers.
Although not originated by FD, it was Gord's firm which most strongly
promoted them - in the form of large-diameter (hence high-drag)
cylindrical pipes. And then the others followed, in yet another
instance of form following fashion, not function, & with various more
aerodynamic versions progressively replacing Gord's model. Because
these boats looked prettier than those with riggers apparently made from
bits of ducting, they then displaced Gord's boats.

I'm entirely in favour of experimentation & I applaud every attempt to
seek better ways of doing the job. What absolutely appals me is that
salesmen take over & promote the product to a rather naive market by
means of unfounded, insupportable & technically irrational claims.

Of course I am more than happy for readers to question & challenge me on
this matter, but their arguments had better be good & well thought
through. Sentiment & fashion may be malleable objects but scientific
fact is sacred.

Cheers -
Carl


--
Carl Douglas Racing Shells -
Fine Small-Boats/AeRoWing Low-drag Riggers/Advanced Accessories
Write: Harris Boatyard, Laleham Reach, Chertsey KT16 8RP, UK
Find: tinyurl.com/2tqujf
Email: ca...@carldouglasrowing.com Tel: +44(0)1932-570946 Fax: -563682
URLs: carldouglasrowing.com & now on Facebook @ CarlDouglasRacingShells

[wmar...@gmail.com]

> Acceleration. Drive. Impulse. This man has built an entire company -- and
> career -- on these concepts.

>
> "If you look at our boats, you can see more daylight under the bow of the
> boat during acceleration. I didn't realize it when I did it. We figured it
> out through drag testing. I know it's true. Every boat in the 2012 London
> Olympics in the singles final had a bow-mounted rigger."
>
>
> ---
> This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
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I've wondered why anyone would claim that any kind of rigger, firmly mounted to the hull of a boat, would be better or worse than any other - without research, that is. Years ago I was given a copy of a proprietary study done at the U of Canterbury on behalf of a boat-builder, testing rigger movement under load, from three different rigger makers. IIRC the type of rigger that had two stays with a "D" type bracket, supported from the bow-ward end of the boat, held the pin with less movement, compared with a "lego" type rigger from one maker, and a conventional two-stay rigger with a backstay and a pin bolted in place at the bottom.
I kinda think/thought that as long as the rigger is firmly mounted to the boat, any force applied to it would be applied to the whole boat, and the actual point of attachment was irrelevant.

[John Greenly]

> Acceleration. Drive. Impulse. This man has built an entire company -- and
> career -- on these concepts.

>
> "If you look at our boats, you can see more daylight under the bow of the
> boat during acceleration. I didn't realize it when I did it. We figured it
> out through drag testing. I know it's true. Every boat in the 2012 London
> Olympics in the singles final had a bow-mounted rigger."
>
>
> ---
> This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
> https://www.avast.com/antivirus

Hi Charles,

thanks for posting this. It's either incoherent incompetence or baldfaced lies, and would be really funny if it weren't infuriating. It's quite astonishing!

The UK and EU laws that Carl mentions sound good. I wonder, is anybody ever charged under them, and are there convictions?

cheers,
John

[Charles Carroll]

> I've wondered why anyone would claim that
> any kind of rigger, firmly mounted to the hull of a boat,

> would be better or worse than any other – without

> research, that is. Years ago I was given a copy of a
> proprietary study done at the U of Canterbury on
> behalf of a boat-builder, testing rigger movement
> under load, from three different rigger makers. IIRC
> the type of rigger that had two stays with a "D"

> type bracket, supported from the bowward end

> of the boat, held the pin with less movement,
> compared with a "lego" type rigger from one maker,
> and a conventional two-stay rigger with a backstay
> and a pin bolted in place at the bottom.
>
> I kinda think/thought that as long as the rigger is
> firmly mounted to the boat, any force applied to it
> would be applied to the whole boat, and the actual
> point of attachment was irrelevant.

Hi Walter,

I was telling Sandy at breakfast this morning about this thread. I started
to tell her about what I was thinking of replying to Carl’s post. Even
before I could tell her, she got it …

Gord says, “In a single, the bow-mounted rigger has the most effect. At the

catch, it provides the least amount of wetted surface, so there’s less drag

and you can actually pick up the boat out of the water … It took me a few
years to realize that it was actually lifting the boat out of the water.”

I was starting to remind Sandy of the three dimensions in which boats move —
i.e. pitch, yaw and roll. I hadn’t even gotten to roll when Sandy said,
“Yes, if you are lifting the bow of a boat up out of the water, aren’t you
pushing the stern down? And if you are pushing the stern down, isn’t that
actually creating more drag? For years haven’t you been telling me that your
idea of a good stroke is to keep the boat level, move it straight, and row
though without any heaviness or effort?”

I am not even putting words in Sandy’s mouth. The quotation is verbatim.
(You can see I talk too much.)

Nevertheless, it seems to me that Sandy is right. Gord Henry in effect is
claiming that bow-mounted riggers are better because they produce more
pitch.

Warmest regards,

Charles

[Charles Carroll]

> thanks for posting this. It's either incoherent incompetence
> or baldfaced lies, and would be really funny if it weren't infuriating.
> It's quite astonishing!

Hi John,

I wouldn’t be so rough on old Gord. Gord Henry is not an engineer. He took
accounting in college and came out as an accountant. Also bear in mind that
this is not an advertisement per se. It just an interview in a magazine. If
I were quoted every time I got something wrong, I probably would be sitting
in a jail cell locked away for the rest of my life.

But I do think some of the things said are kind of silly. Or to be more
specific, you can only accept them as true if you don’t question them.

The one disturbing thing is the last sentence. ”Every boat in the 2012
London Olympics in the singles final had a bow-mounted rigger.” How do we
explain this, especially in light of what Carl and Walter have written? Carl
has posted many times that no one wants to think he lost because his
competitor had a better boat. So if my competitor is going to scull a
bow-mounted boat, than I am going to scull one, too. Fear is a powerful
motivator …

Warmest regards,

Charles

Ps The two below links make interesting reading, if you have the time.

https://books.google.com/books?id=AEsEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA54&lpg=PA54&dq=Gord+Henry+Canadian+boat+builders+Rowing+News&source=bl&ots=XydW262j_0&sig=vCHCvS9hVrmzzvk-Wdxxq0W_pH8&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCkQ6AEwA2oVChMI-pu8qoeLxwIVlzOICh08JgGw#v=onepage&q=Gord%20Henry%20Canadian%20boat%20builders%20Rowing%20News&f=false

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/rec.sport.rowing/NX3fRMmjMwk

[carl]

Charles -

My bullshit detector went into overdrive on the page before that on
which your first link landed me:
"The Diamond engineers had determined that the fairest shapes were
unrowable. From the outset they stopped focussing on shaping the hull
and instead decided to accept a shape that was rowable and then focus on
materials to make that shape as fast as possible"

I thought, on reading the stuff you pasted into the head of this thread,
that I'd heard just about as much utter nonsense as it was possible to
absorb on one day. Now it is clear that rank idiocy knows no bounds.

No competent hull designer would utter such garbage, yet I'm sure that a
whole lot of rowers will have been gulled into believing it must be
true. Another spoonful of snake oil, Sir?

While it seems clear that the author of that article was fed a pile
offal, surely to goodness their own critical faculties should have told
them this stuff makes no sense? Isn't it a rule of journalism that you
check your sources? How can we hope ever to have a technically advances
sport when it's thinking is led by people who are prepared uncritically
to publish such nonsense, fed by people who are happy to feed it to them
because they know no one will challenge them.

Please, will someone pass the sick-bag -

[John Greenly]

On Sunday, August 2, 2015 at 5:24:21 PM UTC-4, carl wrote:

>
> While it seems clear that the author of that article was fed a pile
> offal, surely to goodness their own critical faculties should have told
> them this stuff makes no sense? Isn't it a rule of journalism that you
> check your sources? How can we hope ever to have a technically advances
> sport when it's thinking is led by people who are prepared uncritically
> to publish such nonsense, fed by people who are happy to feed it to them
> because they know no one will challenge them.
>
> Please, will someone pass the sick-bag -
>
> Carl

As far as I can tell from the general quality of political reporting in this country, our journalism schools nowadays teach mostly tooth-whitening and hairstyling. And- dare I say it?- that's even more important and depressing than incompetent rowing journalism!

--John

[wmar...@gmail.com]

Too true.
About the bow-mounted rigger - FD wasn't the first, either - Bruce... um.. Grobler? (can't remember the surname) had a small company named Pieces of Eight, in Auckland. Carbon fibre hulls, with a carbon wing-tube rigger. IIRC he had singles, doubles, and I saw a 4+ on slings once at Karapiro. The wing-tube rigger slid into a slot in the boat behind (forward of) the rower. Boats were stiff, had no decking - slides were attached at the side of the boat so there were no slide bites, and he was put out of business by chinese boat imports.

[marko....@gmail.com]

On Sunday, 2 August 2015 20:46:59 UTC+1, Charles Carroll wrote:
> > thanks for posting this. It's either incoherent incompetence
> > or baldfaced lies, and would be really funny if it weren't infuriating.
> > It's quite astonishing!
>
> Hi John,
>
> I wouldn't be so rough on old Gord. Gord Henry is not an engineer. He took
> accounting in college and came out as an accountant.

Then he really should really understand that he isn't. I think this still falls into the category of people talking with authority and presenting facts with no technical evidence on subjects they know nothing about. If nothing else it makes a mockery of those that do - lord knows there is enough bad science in the world.

[John Greenly]

Amen to that!
John

[Paul]

Bruce Lodder was his name and he tried to make the singles again a couple of years ago but doesn't seem to be anymore. Interestingly his new model ditched the bow mount carbon wing for a stern mount aluminium wing...

[s...@ku.edu]

While I would never defend what Carl correctly labels as "techno-drivel," I do think that the bow wing is a reasonable design and the carbon Filippi/Empacher versions are quite elegant. I also suspect that, as W's recall of the NZ analysis, that the top and bottom support for the pin in the compression design may have some advantage for HW men.

I've rowed several versions of bow wings, including Fluids, and can't say I felt the magic. The Fluid is a nice boat to row and I know many who are super happy with theirs. I do think that Gord could sell just as many boats by stressing the quality of his design and well regarded customer support. No need for exaggerations when you have a good product.

Steven M-M

[martin...@gmail.com]

I;ve got a pair of riggers with the D mount that are about 20-30 years old and just about serviceable (the main stay got bent in a collision) so this technology is not new. they are on a two stay rigger mounted stern and midship but have seen the same styl mounted mid and bow. All seemed to be based on boat builder preference and where they but the main shoulder / cross brace.

As to sterm or bow wing - we have had a "decree from above" that stern wings must have back stays for safety. In terms of safety it has been said that any collision without a back stay could lead to entrapment between the rigger and shell.

Obvious;y this is lessened with the back sta or bow mounted wing.

being in the luxurious position of owning 2 boats - one with 2/ 3 stay traditional riggers and one with a rear wing. then the only difference I feel is that there is more room for my fat backside in the wing as there is no shoulder there. This has led to les discomfort and shorts lasting a bit longer :)

[carl]

Actually we can take the D-shaped mounting right back into the C19th,
thanks to Michael Davis in 1875:
www.rowinghistory.net/Patents/165,072.pdf

With the sliding rigger hot on its heels:
www.rowinghistory.net/Patents/188,131.pdf
et seq.

While the equivalent of the centrally-supported C-bracket is seen here:
www.rowinghistory.net/Patents/207,070.pdf

And a laminated cloth composite construction was patented in 1879:
www.rowinghistory.net/Patents/214,911.pdf

In the USA the 1870s were evidently a time of serious inventiveness,
which we can study thanks to the wonderful resource that is
www.rowinghistory.net

Not very much that's new in rowing, despite all the hyperbolic claims of
modern hucksters?

Cheers -

[Kit Davies]

Michael Davis was busy. Here's an early hatchet blade design:
http://www.rowinghistory.net/Time%20Line/Davis%20pat%201880.jpg

The off-centre handle looks interesting.

He also apparently designed a steering footplate, though it's not
illustrated here.

Kit

[Charles Carroll]

> > I wouldn't be so rough on old Gord. Gord Henry is not an engineer. He
> > took
> > accounting in college and came out as an accountant.

> people talking with authority and presenting facts with no technical
> evidence on subjects they know nothing about

Hi Marko,

I think you may have just given us an all but perfect definition of a
salesman.

Isn’t it oft said that the first person to whom successful salesman sells an
idea is himself?

Like Steven M-M, I, too, know a couple of people who scull Fluidesigns and
are very happy with them. I suspect that when Gord started his company he
was looking for something that would make his shells stand out from the
shells of other boat builders, and that this is how he came across the idea
of a bow-mounted rigger. I seem to remember years ago that Carl wrote that
while a bow-mounted rigger doesn’t make the shell go faster, it also doesn’t
do anything to slow it down.

There is one ironic bit of science in Gord’s claim — if you are willing to
consent that psychology is a science — and this is that Gord is able to make
some of us believe that they can move a shell a little faster with a
bow-mounted rigger than they can with a stern-mounted rigger. As has been
pointed out by many people, confidence of success often leads to success.
Never underestimate the power of belief.

And there is yet another bit of irony in Gord’s interview. Gord claims that
heavyweight rowers using stern-mounted riggers need backstays. Carl, if I am
not mistaken, has argued for years that a properly designed rigger should
never need a backstay. Knowing Carl, I think it is a safe bet that he has
the math to support his argument.

Warmest regards,

Charles

[Jim Dwyer]

The only advantage to a bow mounted rigger is that you do not need a
backstay to keep the pin from twisting and this can only be felt during a
start when the forces on the pin are the highest. I don't use backstays
because I cannot pull hard enough to twist the pin at during a start. If
you fall in the water a bow mounted rigger or a boat with backstays will
make it more awkward for you to get back into the boat. I race in a
Fluidesign 2x and it is a very light, fast, stable and well built boat. In
the 2x race I was in last week the boat in the lane next to us flipped
twice! Once in the starting gates and again with 200m left in the race!!


wrote in message
news:4317e49c-6cfa-4f9c...@googlegroups.com...

[gsl...@gmail.com]

On Sunday, August 2, 2015 at 12:46:59 PM UTC-7, Charles Carroll wrote:
> Hi John,
>
> I wouldn't be so rough on old Gord. Gord Henry is not an engineer. He took
> accounting in college and came out as an accountant. Also bear in mind that
> this is not an advertisement per se. It just an interview in a magazine. If
> I were quoted every time I got something wrong, I probably would be sitting
> in a jail cell locked away for the rest of my life.
>
> But I do think some of the things said are kind of silly. Or to be more
> specific, you can only accept them as true if you don't question them.
>
> The one disturbing thing is the last sentence. "Every boat in the 2012
> London Olympics in the singles final had a bow-mounted rigger." How do we
> explain this, especially in light of what Carl and Walter have written? Carl
> has posted many times that no one wants to think he lost because his
> competitor had a better boat. So if my competitor is going to scull a
> bow-mounted boat, than I am going to scull one, too. Fear is a powerful

> motivator ...
>
> Warmest regards,
>
> Charles
You would expect the Olympic boats to be the newest generation of boats. I assume many of the top rowers are sponsored. The top of the line of almost everyone these days are bow mounted riggers so that is what you will see. Doesn't mean anything except that it is the current fashion.

When I hear technical nonsense I then discount every thing else they are claiming. The garbage spouted about the superiority of the Fluiddesign riggers means I discount their claims of the boat being tough.

I did row a Fluid once and it did feel really good (stable and fast). It is a very sexy boat. They obviously win a lot of races. But I don't think the standard rigger is a good design. It is very heavy and does have a lot of wind resistance. When you have a light boat over all, but heavy riggers the hull has to have less material.

A while ago their web site had statements about the weights of the boat that were inconsistent and clearly wrong (it looked like a cut and paste error, and lack of proof reading). If the technical data on the web site is wrong it looks really bad to a technical person like me. When I wrote to them and pointed out the error and they should fix it because it looked bad, I got a response that said "its been like that for four years and no one else complained". It took them a while to fix it. (As a point of comparison I pointed out a error in labeling a graph at the Vespoli web site, they thanked me at it was fixed within the hour.)

Gord is the face of the company. He should know what he is talking about.

[Ellen Braithwaite]

It's been pointed out that I am not in the league of some other folks who post on this site, but that I do know how to row. So I'll weigh in here, and hope that I might be taken seriously with some non-technical comments on a rather technical thread. First, a story and then an observation.

At the masters' nationals a couple of years ago at Lake Quinsigamond in Massachusetts, there were a couple of accidents in the warm-up area. There was a buoy marking upbound and downbound lanes, but there were no marshals and so at the end of the area, the dividing line was not quite clear. A heavyweight men's quad was going full speed in one direction and a lightweight men's double was going not quite as fast in the other direction. Collision, of course, with broken oars in the quad. The bow rigger on the double took the force of the collision and was seriously bent and the boat was broken at the point of the rigger's attachment. Thinking about what might have been the result if those two oars had hit that back on the bow person in the double is something I don't like to do. I got a phone call from the water saying that the worst thing had happened. Are you dead, I asked? Are you hurt? No, it was just a broken boat. So from a safety perspective, I will always be fond of bow riggers. (And, yes, everyone should have been looking.)

The observation is from my experience at a sculling center where a variety of boats are available for people to try. Almost always, people have a very positive response to the Fluidesigns. Random masters seem to find them comfortable and stable and fun to row. What more could someone ask for?

Ellen

[gsl...@gmail.com]

On Tuesday, August 4, 2015 at 8:35:23 PM UTC-7, Ellen Braithwaite wrote:
> So from a safety perspective, I will always be fond of bow riggers.

Totally agree

>
> The observation is from my experience at a sculling center where a variety of boats are available for people to try. Almost always, people have a very positive response to the Fluidesigns. Random masters seem to find them comfortable and stable and fun to row.

also totally agree.

>What more could someone ask for?

Less BS.

[Henning Lippke]

Am 04.08.2015 um 22:51 schrieb Jim Dwyer:
> The only advantage to a bow mounted rigger is that you do not need a
> backstay to keep the pin from twisting and this can only be felt during
> a start when the forces on the pin are the highest.

Yeah. But how much does the pin flex?
And has anyone bothered to compare pin flex with oar flex?

[Henning Lippke]

Just a few random thoughts because this really made me laugh.

First: I've never read so much BS in so few words (referring to the
interview)

> The one disturbing thing is the last sentence. ”Every boat in the 2012
> London Olympics in the singles final had a bow-mounted rigger.” How do
> we explain this

Well, it only shows that the claim that you absolutely need a stern
mounted wing because of the power transmission right at the stretcher
and all that stuff was complete bullshit as well. Look at the 2008
olympics and count the stern wings. So you think the same people that
promoted this idea now all came to reason and tell you something
sensible? BTW, didn't Tufte win 2008 in classic triangular rigging?

And to add to one of Carl's points. It's now 10 years that I got to know
Tony R a bit more, and he always said "rowing is a posh sport". Carl
didn't like that statement, but I fear there's a certain truth in it.

[thomas....@googlemail.com]

> Acceleration. Drive. Impulse. This man has built an entire company -- and
> career -- on these concepts.

>
> "If you look at our boats, you can see more daylight under the bow of the
> boat during acceleration. I didn't realize it when I did it. We figured it
> out through drag testing. I know it's true. Every boat in the 2012 London
> Olympics in the singles final had a bow-mounted rigger."

Personally the best aspect of wing riggers has been allowing the rower/sculler more room within the boat without having to change/widen the hull itself, usually by the removal of the shoulders that a more conventional rigger setup has, all Bow Wing riggers did was to expand that even more by moving the rigger completely out of the way of the sculler. Also Bow riggers (fluids in particular with their one nut size for all nuts on the boat) are incredibly easy to attach and remove, so transport and adjustment of the trim of the boat are also very easy.

Its just my own personal opinion, but these benefits mean I have a slight preference for bow riggers compared to conventional riggers, but I certainly don't expect any mechanical advantage of the bow riggers over the conventional ones, if anything I agree with the position raised on rec.sport.rowing before that the fact you need bigger stays for the increased torque on the riggers mean you probably even suffer additional wind drag, something I see Fluid are working to rectify with their new "blue" rigger

[Jim Dwyer]

Racing starts are more stable in bow mounted rigger boats compared to a
stern mounted rigger without a backstay because the pin does not flex and
alter the pitch of the blade. Big and strong scullers will notice this more
that me (a 60+ year old lwt.) After the boat gets moving the forces on the
pin are less and this effect goes away.

"Henning Lippke" wrote in message news:d2fcgi...@mid.individual.net...

[John Greenly]

Ellen's point about the protective function of bow riggers does sound like a real advantage to me. I've never rowed a boat with either bow wing or backstays, and I don't know how much that safety advantage might be offset by increased difficulty getting back into the boat if you fall out.

I notice that several have commented on perceived comfortable stability of Fluidesign boats. I wonder if maybe the increased outboard mass of the long, relatively heavy bow rigger is increasing the moment of inertia enough to make the boat tip less in response to crew imbalances? For a given total boat weight, the further away the mass is distributed from the centerline, the steadier the boat will be with unsteady, unbalanced forces due to imperfect rower technique. Don't know whether the difference would be enough to have a noticeable effect.

Cheers,
John

[Ellen Braithwaite]

For a given total boat weight, the further away the mass is distributed from the centerline, the steadier the boat will be with unsteady, unbalanced forces due to imperfect rower technique. Don't know whether the difference would be enough to have a noticeable effect.
>
> Cheers,
> John

Interesting. For a long time, at the open water rowing center in Sausalito, we started beginners with heavy longer (and older) macon blades. Provided a bit more stability and required a bit more sensitivity to the initial part of the drive.
Ellen

[gsl...@gmail.com]

Heavier oars certainly do make it easier to balance. I had people tell me they like Crocker oars because the weight is further out towards the blades.

Boats are unstable because the center of mass is higher than the center of rotation. You could estimate how much closer the center of mass is to the center of rotation with a heavier rigger. I'd have to think about this and take some measurements before coming up with a reasonable estimate. I would think the effect would vary quite a bit depending on the weight and size of the rower.

However it would be much easily to add some weights to the riggers near the oarlock and see if the boat feels more stable. I would guess that the hull shape of the Fluidesign is more important than the rigger weight but I don't have any evidence to back that up.

[jonathan...@gmail.com]

Having the weight further out on the oars increases the second moment of inertia, which would tend to stabilize the boat even if the overall weight is the same. Putting weight in the riggers instead of the hull will have a similar effect.

[John Greenly]

On Monday, August 10, 2015 at 4:24:00 PM UTC-4, jonathan...@gmail.com wrote:
> Having the weight further out on the oars increases the second moment of inertia, which would tend to stabilize the boat even if the overall weight is the same. Putting weight in the riggers instead of the hull will have a similar effect.

Right. Increasing the moment of inertia doesn't make the boat more statically stable. It increases its inertia against rotation about the roll axis, so it decreases the roll response to the rowers' unsteady unbalanced forces.

Just for fun, I think I will try the experiment of adding weights out at the ends of the rigger and see if I can feel any difference.

cheers,
John

[Jim Dwyer]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfQFpFrOfkw

I did this with a water bottle on one side and a gopro on the other.
I did not notice that the boat was any more roll stable.



"John Greenly" wrote in message
news:2e0b401f-4dd6-44fa...@googlegroups.com...

[jonathan...@gmail.com]

To measure the effect you probably would need to mount the shell from threads and measure the period of oscillation. Whether the effect is greater or less than the effect of pin flexing will no doubt be a topic for debate.

[gsl...@gmail.com]

The issue is not the amount of relative flex--the oar will flex much more than the pin/rigger in any reasonable design--but that the pitch will change with pressure if the pin flexes but not when the oar flexes.
I wouldn't worry about pin flex if you are not having trouble with blade depth on your starts.

[carl]

I think you are looking for cures for an imaginary problem. With a
well-designed 2-stay scull rigger there is no possible need for a
backstay to support the top of the pin.

Just considering the cantilevered (no backstay) pin with some typical data:
For a horizontal load of 60kgf, acting on a 13mm diameter pin at 60mm
from it's rigidly secured base, you find that
horizontal deflexion @60mm from base = 0.15mm
angular deflexion at that same point = 0.2 degrees

In this typical case, these very small pin movements are dwarfed by oar
bending & are smaller than the accuracy of most blade pitch adjustments
.

To understand the effects of changes in settings:

1. If we increase pin diameter from 13mm to 14mm (i.e. by 7.7%), angular
& horizontal deflexions fall by ~25%

2. If we move the oarlock up the pin by 10mm, those deflexions increase
by ~60%

Point 1 exposes the folly of the trend for bottom-mounted sweep pins to
reduce in diameter from 14.3mm (9/16") to 13mm. Point 2 disposes of
suggestions that it is better to have a longer pin than to raise a
rigger by use of shims or rigging wedges (e.g. our Hyteners).

As for the function of the backstay:
As the load is never very high over the first part of the stroke (it
can't be because it takes time to bend the oar & the oar ain't loaded
until it's bent - chicken & egg), & as the alignment of the backstay is
mainly beneficial for only the first 30 degrees of the stroke, the
backstay is only useful if the rigger, rather than the pin, is easily
deflected or twisted. Well-designed 2-stay riggers have very high
torsional stiffness - far greater than stern-mounted wing riggers -
making the backstay doubly redundant. (Yes, we do supply backstays with
our sweep riggers, but mainly because sweep rowers feel naked without them.)

Pick a soft rigger & your pin needs all the support it can get!

Incidentally, I'm sometimes asked why we don't supply Titanium alloy
pins. The answer is that a titanium pin will be only ~62% as stiff as a
stainless pin of the same dimensions. And it won't be a tough.

The next consideration is vertical stiffness. As explained above, the
movement of the end of a cantilever under load is proportional to the
cube of its length. The length of the stay from mount to pin is around
100cm for a bow mounted rigger, 80cm for a stern-mounted wing & 58cm for
a conventional rigger, with the cubes of their lengths being in the
ratio 10:5:2. Which is why you need much heavier, thicker stays on
wings. And there are much higher twisting loads on the boat their
inboard ends. So I think that arguing for a heavier rigger increasing
stability is just clutching at straws.

And then to the horizontal stiffness of wings vs 2-stay riggers:
Single-stay wings are cantilevers in both vertical & horizontal sense,
whereas 2-stay riggers are fully triangulated, so that all loads in the
rigger frame are reduced to are either tensile or compressive, so can
cause minimal movement of the rigger end (stays may bend substantially,
but they don't stretch). Cantilevers are fine if you're happy for them
to deflect under lateral load, & the load on a wing is only but
transiently aligned with its axis so it will be bending & thus
deflecting when you pull. That means your pull will be moving the pin
significantly.

I hope that sprinkling of facts stirs the pot & clarifies some thoughts?

[John Greenly]

On Tuesday, August 11, 2015 at 8:21:53 PM UTC-4, carl wrote:
So I think that arguing for a heavier rigger increasing
> stability is just clutching at straws.

I agree, I was just trying to imagine any possible reason that a different rigger could make the boat feel more stable. Anyway, I did the experiment today- added about 250g to each end of the rigger, and it made no noticeable difference, agreeing with a quantitative estimate of the change in moment of inertia.

> I hope that sprinkling of facts stirs the pot & clarifies some thoughts?
>
> Cheers -
> Carl

Absolutely, actual numbers are always greatly appreciated!

Cheers,
John

[Henry Law]

On 12/08/15 01:21, carl wrote:
> sprinkling of facts

I love it. Would that there were a fact-sprinkler in some of the wider
debates that are going on in UK society.

But there is evidence that, when deployed against people who hold a view
emotionally (rather than logically, you understand), facts tend not to
prevail; all they do is make the recipient angry because the facts don't
accord with what they "know" to be true. Can't find the reference; New
Scientist a few months back I think.

--

Henry Law Manchester, England

[carl]

I think the time-honoured expression might be "My mind's made up, so
don't confuse me with the facts"?

[James HS]

Yesterday a colleague put backstays on a boat that has never used them (12 year old empy double) and I asked why. She said she was told safety from collision!

Which is more likely, tipping in and having trouble re entering, or a collision where the backstay deflects.

Could I convince? Could I heck!

James

[mruscoe]

There was advice about backstays from British Rowing at one point, but
it's hidden away on the website. That's from three years ago though, and
it doesn't seem to have reappeared in any more permanent and official form.

https://www.britishrowing.org/news/2013/june/27/safety-update-rowers-and-coaches

[carl]

Our sport is awash with people looking for, even inventing, rules to
obey & to beat others over the head with while themselves ignoring the
most obvious of rules: "Use your brain!"

We had that 3 decades back, when FISA introduced minimum boat weights.
It made absolutely no sense, it was based on irrational fear from
non-boatbuilders that failing to intervene would lead to an arms war of
ever-lighter shells at ever higher prices, there was no evidence to show
that the then-current range of boat weights had any effect on results &,
to go on, had it made any sense it was calculated to penalise the
lighter competitors in any event. it also created a continuing demand
for boats to be as light as legally possible - after all,"Surely FISA
wouldn't have legislated for boat weight it weight made no difference?"
Tell that to the Marines!

One example of a cynical attempt to invent rules for personal advantage
was brought to my attention some years ago. A club bought a perfectly
ordinary 2x rated for a 70kg crew. 2 lightish club members then claimed
that only they should use it as, they claimed, if a crew of higher
weight went out in it & it got swamped, then it would lack adequate
flotation capacity. All a pile of nonsense, but used by a couple of
office politicians to claim sole title to the club's shiny new toy.

We had discussion on RSR a while back on rigger-end injuries, backstays
& so on, following a crunch on the Tyne, UK, where a rower in an eight
was hit in the back by the stern-mounted wing of a quad. 13 people that
day were rowing with inadequate regard for the first rule of navigation
- always keep a good lookout - & at least 1 of those crews, if not both,
was on the wrong part of the river. I believe it was nasty for the
injured party. So then the same people who didn't & still don't seem to
care whether an economically-priced shell in widespread use does or does
not have fully subdivided buoyancy, such that a hole can cause the crew
to have to swim, formulated recommendations that everyone fit backstays.
I have not been notified of this & there is no evidence that a
well-designed & made rigger would have the kind of damaging impact
caused by the sharp, forward-projecting outboard end of that
stern-mounted rigger.

[martin...@gmail.com]

Carl - they may not realise that you make anything other then single sculls so haven't informed you ;-P

however I totally agree that if you did a risk assessment then there should be no way any rigger can injure a person no matter what shape or size.

Two boats should not collide let alone head on at speed. If they kept to their side of the river that includes the oars so you have a couple of lengths of flappy stuff between riggers anyway should you transgress the line although they can cause damage to a person in a clash.

Which reminds me - did ZdT ever get back to you?

[s...@ku.edu]

Carl,

If Alan Campbell came to your shop thinking of rowing a CD, would you consider recommending backstays?

Steven M-M

[carl]

No, I would not. And if he felt he wanted them I wouldn't refuse. If,
however, the matter was up for discussion then I might suggest that we
further increase rigger frame stiffness - say to the level of our sweep
riggers as we can always make an even stiffer rigger with minimal change
in weight & windage - which is the advantage of us having the necessary
machinery, engineering insight & skills under 1 roof.

The client has the right to make their own choices & a successful
athlete is a complex & remarkable person. It may be that a few of the
things which matter to them could be shown to be less than helpful in
blunt engineering terms, yet if having them makes them happier that gain
in confidence may still outweigh any small physical detriment.

When someone is evidently successful it's impertinent for others to
presume to tell them what to do. So if a sculler believes something
will help then, while I might disagree, & I might ask them why (if the
matter is up for discussion), my job is to meet their stated
requirements to the very best of my ability while, if asked, also
helping them towards that which may further improve their performance.

[Lucy]

I probably shouldn't say this, but in the interest of poor old Tyne not taking our shame, the incident you refer to actually happened at Tees. I remember the day clearly as I turned up for my first ever L2R session to find one instructor injured in the collision and the other, his wife, doing an admirable - and, I later learnt - entirely typical impression of complete unflappability (Is that a word? It is now...), looking anxiously over my shoulder up the approach road for the ambulance expected any minute while at the same time completely convincingly explaining what had happened and how rare these incidents were so we really shouldn't worry.

Dick Wilkinson eventually appeared on the back of a launch looking very cheerful considering his injuries. That turned out to be completely typical as well. As a side note, he's Club Chairman this year, though Janet has promised to keep her usual weather eye on him... Oh, and I've never heard anyone getting excited over riggers without backstays in our boathouse either!

As you were...(*goes back to lurking and reading as usual...*)

[s...@ku.edu]

On Wednesday, August 12, 2015 at 12:12:03 PM UTC-5, carl wrote:

> On 12/08/2015 16:43, @ku.edu wrote:
> > On Tuesday, August 11, 2015 at 7:21:53 PM UTC-5, carl wrote:

Thanks, Carl. I thought that would be your answer, even with someone as powerful as Campbell. Steven M-M

[gsl...@gmail.com]

On Wednesday, August 12, 2015 at 6:37:28 AM UTC-7, carl wrote:
> > There was advice about backstays from British Rowing at one point, but
> > it's hidden away on the website. That's from three years ago though, and
> > it doesn't seem to have reappeared in any more permanent and official form.
> >
> > https://www.britishrowing.org/news/2013/june/27/safety-update-rowers-and-coaches
> >
>
> Our sport is awash with people looking for, even inventing, rules to
> obey & to beat others over the head with while themselves ignoring the
> most obvious of rules: "Use your brain!"

Unlike the boat weight minimums, this is "advice" for boats "other than singles" not a rule. It is also would be needed precisely when people are not using their brains.


If one were to be hit across the back with a rigger, a bow mounted rigger is at an angle to push you away from the on coming boat which at face value seems preferable. But that assumes all other things are equal.

However one is far more likely to capsize than to be hit by another boat (and much more likely than being in a collision where the type of rigger would be much help). Any thing that makes it more difficult to get back into the boat seems far more dangerous than changing the type of rigger.

[andymck...@gmail.com]

I'm slightly uncomfortable with this line of thought. The advice that the bow rigger on a boat bigger than a 1x should have a forestay seems eminently sensible to me. But then I row on a slightly winding river, and amazingly enough sometimes people don't keep to the navigation rules and stray across a few metres off their line. Saying 'if they keep to their side of the river accidents won't happen' is like saying 'if they don't catch crabs they won't capsize' and veers awfully close to the 'I'm an elite rower so I can go out on my own in freezing conditions because I'm too good to have an accident'.

A forestay seems like one of those 'why wouldn't you?' akin to heel ties, bouyancy and the cox's lijejacket. It adds some extra safety, without adding significant cost or weight. There is clearly a line between probability of capsize and probability of collision, and it's probably somewhere between a 2- and a 2x. By the time you get to 4s and 8s the probability of collision is way higher than the probability of capsize.

On a small river getting back in the boat really isn't an issue, as considered opinion on our stretch of rural Thames is that you shouldn't attempt to board the boat in open water - 20 metres maximum swim puts you into standing depth water by the bank. The biggest issue is then minimizing mud transfer into the boat. The logic is that while a successful open water re-entry is satisfying, a failure on a cold day can rapidly escalate from embarrassment to tragedy - so stay safe. Of course on open water without convenient shallows a different assessment will apply.

[John Greenly]

This sounds extremely sensible to me. I myself am on the other side of the risk balance, I think, because I row mostly on open water and I know from difficult experience that anything that makes it harder to get back in the boat could make a fatal difference in really tough conditions. But for river rowers in a lot of traffic the calculation would indeed seem to go strongly the other way.

thanks,
John

[martin...@gmail.com]

If we just take this incident on the Tees as an example, the quad had bow mounted wings? the 8 presumably had backstays? And Dick Wilkinson was injured by a rigger..

what happened to the other bowman of the quad? did he escape any injury?

Dick hit the "forestay" of the quad - it could be said that if it was a 2 stay like carls stern mounted then he would likely have had an extra couple of feet to slow/stop before hitting anything and reduce injury. If they were 3 stay then he may have bent the backstay rather than hit a very stiff wing. To me if anything this makes the bow wing even more dangerous in a collision of this kind. It is designed to be stiff and unyielding and consequently large. Due to being mounted behind the person it has also taken several inches of space away from a collision zoner.

Perhaps in the interests of safety bow mouted wings should be banned - a bit like bull bars on cars in the UK

[Kit Davies]

In mitigation, a bow wing will give you a glancing blow in a head-on
collision, unlike stern-mounted riggers, or bull bars for that matter.

As with a lot of things, their safety relies on the specifics of the
incident, and there isn't a safe-in-all-circumstances design. Each
feature has risks and rewards and it is up to the individual to assess
the best design for their bit of water.

Kit

[martin...@gmail.com]

would it really be glancing?

yo would have to change the direction of a very long thin thing (or 2) for it to be a glancing blow. not an easy thing to do especially with your back.

I agree that an individual could perform an assessment for their stretch of water but what if it wasn't suitable for another stretch? 2 sets of riggers? more fixing points etc.

I was thinking that my only real conclusion was that having a wing removed the necessity for a shoulder to support the rigger at the middle of the boat thereby increasing the available room for my ever increasing backside to get towards the stern for a catch.

I then remembered that janousek and CD (I think) have very thin shoulders as these are composite not timber so that blew that argument out of the water.

Think I will now go and put my head in a fridge for a bit . :-)

[LakeGator]

The part of this discussion in regard to the mitigation of collision injury reminds me of a great television commercial for the TR6 in 1968. I am sure I would be only person who remembers it.

The commercial was in response to another commercial for the 1968 Pontiac GTO which was very impressive in having the first plastic bumper that could sustain a slow speed collision with no damage. The GTO commercial showed it hitting a brick wall at a slow speed and the amazing bumper with no damage afterwards.

The TR6 commercial showed the new TR6 driving at a higher speed toward at what appeared to be the same brick wall and making a very abrupt turn to drive around the wall. A narrator in a very upper class British accent then says "At Triumph we avoid striking obstacles."

Obviously, avoiding collisions is far more important and effective than reducing the damage. As Kit and others have already noted the effect of rigger design can have either reduced or increased damage based on the various factors. The collisions that are most dangerous are those where a large crewed shell hits a rower. The most severe cases of which I am aware were having the bow ball of an eight striking the back of a sculler. In these cases, the bow rode over the deck of the sculling boat and no sort of rigger would have saved the sculler from severe injury. Probably the bow mounted wing rigger may have caused the bow of the eight to be raised higher and, probably, cause even more damage to the victim.

[carl]

Did I misunderstand you? There's no way a wing rigger (bow- or
stern-mounted) can raise the boat.

Putting that to one side:
The effect of design features on injury during a collision is anything
but simple to analyse. The boat has a range of potentially dangerous
features but the human target has many points of vulnerability. And,
for example, you may be worse injured if at backstops as that puts the
impact point a little further ahead with less time for reducing impact
velocity but, more importantly, by having your legs down means they'll
lock rather than bend under externally applied load, making the impact
that much worse for you.

First in any list, before equipment even, I'd place "learn the
reverse-feather emergency stop procedure". Hardly any rowers know about
it, & fewer still have ever practised it. Which is like passing your
driving test without showing you can stop the car in an emergency. It
is a grave coaching deficiency. So you row an eight whose all-up weight
is nearly 1 tonne; it has a pointed bow & lots of other potential
nasties projecting from it; it cost more than most cars; forward vision
is severely restricted; bow has her back exposed and unprotected - & you
have no brakes. How smart is that?

On RSR we've explored prevailing ignorance of reverse-feather stop
technique. Those who've never used it assume it must make them crab,
injure themselves or fly out of the boat. But they couldn't be more
wrong. Reverse-feather safely stops the boat well inside its own
length. But fear & poor training are terrible bedfellows, so if you ask
almost any crew to stop suddenly you get the backs of blades dragging
over the surface, a shower of spray & the boat runs on. It's criminally
stupid, yet absolutely normal.

The first rule of injury limitation is to prevent collisions by keeping
a good lookout - at all times, period. So it's imperative that the crew
take some responsibility for their own safety. That means learn &
practice reverse-feather emergency stops. It means each rower being
aware of what's going on around them. And it means giving your crew
immediate warning if it's on the wrong side of the river or course, or
in any other way heading into danger. It's a duty of care which, too
often, is over-ridden by the command "eyes in the boat".

So now to the safety of equipment:
First of all, consider the bows. They could hardly be better shaped to
go right through someone, driven on by up to a tonne mass moving at
close to 6m/sec (20 feet/sec or 13.5mph). Now double this if both boats
are at speed. But how many shells have utterly useless bow balls -
perished, held by a projecting bolt or screw, or pointing upwards?
Nearly all, in my (wide) experience. So any hard impact is likely to
skewer right through the bowels of it's human target, or sever the
spine, or break ribs. If you've seen how a rower looks like after
someone's bows went through them you'd not want that done to you. And
you'd worry far more over the generally inadequate & un-policed
defectiveness of most of the bow balls in your club.

Everything else comes way down the scale of injury potential. Yes, we
should think seriously about it, but we should not over-egg that
particular pudding. Even so, there are no good collisions to have
between rower and bits of boat. In my view the next most dangerous
aspect of a shell is the forward-pointing end of a stern-mounted wing
rigger, which is so often hard & sharp, & if it hits you will do so
without the load being spread over any other part of the rigger.
Remember that, to minimise the injury from any impact, you need to
maximise the contact area between you & that which hits you, & to
eliminate sharp edges.

[Jim Dwyer]

> Obviously, avoiding collisions is far more important and effective than
> reducing the damage. As Kit and others have already noted the effect of
> rigger design can have either reduced or increased damage based on the
> various factors. The collisions that are most dangerous are those where a
> large crewed shell hits a rower. The most severe cases of which I am
> aware were having the bow ball of an eight striking the back of a sculler.
> In these cases, the bow rode over the deck of the sculling boat and no
> sort of rigger would have saved the sculler from severe injury. Probably
> the bow mounted wing rigger may have caused the bow of the eight to be
> raised higher and, probably, cause even more damage to the victim.
>

Did I misunderstand you? There's no way a wing rigger (bow- or
stern-mounted) can raise the boat.

Carl:

You did misunderstand her. If you read above she was talking about the wing
rigger raising the bow of an 8 during a collision. This is possible. There
is a picture from the Head of the Trent where the bow of an 8 "rode" right
over top of another.

[carl]

One boat riding over the other is neither impossible nor, in collisions,
so unusual in near-head-on collisions. Similarly, an eight riding up
over a low river bank (& the bow then snapping off under the impact &
subsequent bending loads) is also not unheard of.

If the case of the sculler being speared by an eight referred to that
particularly awful collision just before the Head of the Charles some
years back, I believe no bow-mounted riggers were involved but a
defective bowball & some navigation errors were very relevant. For an
eight's bow to over-ride a single is predictable as the single has less
freeboard than the eight (&, just occasionally, I've had to repair the
consequences of such collisions).

What I can imagine, & please forgive my earlier misunderstanding, is
that that part of a bow-mounted rigger which runs across the boat itself
might provide a sufficiently smooth & solid platform over which an
oncoming bow might lift & launch itself to an impact higher up the
sculler's or bow-man's back. Was that what had been meant?

Maybe we boat-builders should install an impenetrable cow-catcher where
presently a shell's washboards stand, capable of withstanding a head-on
impact from an oncoming bowball-less eight? That might greatly reduce
the scope for skewering people's backs. It could even double as an
aerodynamic feature & wave deflector, although it might make boat
racking a bit more complicated. Worth pondering, I think.

[andymck...@gmail.com]

I can see another CD patent coming...but just so I get in first: air bags! Collision injury prevention and buoyancy in one neat package. In fact make the air bag a full crew sized life raft and you have super safety.

More seriously if you want to reduce collisions then a key issue is visibility. At this time of year in the UK, evening rowing is wonderful, but as light draws in and the sun gets lower, spotting a rower dressed in the standard issue navy t-shirt at a safe distance is hard, especially for a sculler/steersperson with middle aged eyesight and work-dulled reactions. It's quite easy to see a swan on the water at a distance where a sculler in black is invisible. It might, of course, be argued that hitting a swan is more dangerous, with the inevitability of suffering a broken arm.

Each autumn we wage a small campaign on this: getting people to wear dayglo or bright tops - it makes a real difference - especially coupled with lights.

Andy

[Henry Law]

On 19/08/15 09:40, andymck...@gmail.com wrote:
> a rower dressed in the standard issue navy t-shirt

Worse still in our club camouflage colours of green and black ...

When I was safety advisor I introduced (against significant opposition,
would you believe) a club rule that while training on our own water all
single scullers and the bow rower in every crew boat would wear a
high-vis top, for this very reason. It's slipping a bit now, I'm afraid.

[carl]

On 19/08/2015 09:40, andymck...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Tuesday, August 18, 2015 at 11:16:36 PM UTC+1, carl wrote:
>> On 18/08/2015 21:01, Jim Dwyer wrote:

<snippage>

>>
>> Maybe we boat-builders should install an impenetrable cow-catcher where
>> presently a shell's washboards stand, capable of withstanding a head-on
>> impact from an oncoming bowball-less eight? That might greatly reduce
>> the scope for skewering people's backs. It could even double as an
>> aerodynamic feature & wave deflector, although it might make boat
>> racking a bit more complicated. Worth pondering, I think.
>>
>> Cheers -
>> Carl
>>

>

> I can see another CD patent coming...but just so I get in first: air bags! Collision injury prevention and buoyancy in one neat package. In fact make the air bag a full crew sized life raft and you have super safety.
>

Rats! But by no means a stoopid idea, Andy.

> More seriously if you want to reduce collisions then a key issue is visibility. At this time of year in the UK, evening rowing is wonderful, but as light draws in and the sun gets lower, spotting a rower dressed in the standard issue navy t-shirt at a safe distance is hard, especially for a sculler/steersperson with middle aged eyesight and work-dulled reactions. It's quite easy to see a swan on the water at a distance where a sculler in black is invisible. It might, of course, be argued that hitting a swan is more dangerous, with the inevitability of suffering a broken arm.
>
> Each autumn we wage a small campaign on this: getting people to wear dayglo or bright tops - it makes a real difference - especially coupled with lights.
>
> Andy
>

And there I'm right with you! Some may recall my relatively recent call
for standard hi-viz, multilayer winter kit as compulsory wear for
Juniors whenever water & air temperatures fall below defined levels?

To hell with club camouflage. Ensuring that the target is visible (as I
know Henry advocates) is an effective route to collision reduction, & if
when someone does end up in the drink in cold weather they have kit
which provides every possible chance of survival ought to be a statement
of the bleedin' obvious.

Not so very long back, Henning sent me info on a highly wearable PFD
system which is popular among some German clubs, & that could do with
receiving wider attention. Over to Henning as my hands are rather full
right now, thanks not least to a colleague coming off his bike last week
& breaking a collarbone. Having perfected the flying bit, my colleague
now needs to practice those landings ;)

[Henning Lippke]

> Not so very long back, Henning sent me info on a highly wearable PFD
> system which is popular among some German clubs, & that could do with
> receiving wider attention. Over to Henning as my hands are rather full
> right now, thanks not least to a colleague coming off his bike last week
> & breaking a collarbone. Having perfected the flying bit, my colleague
> now needs to practice those landings ;)

This is becoming the new club colours, at least from October to May.
http://www.secumar.com/products.e.531.939.html

It looks surprisingly good to see a crew go out with these. We don't
enforce any clothing colour scheme, so this makes them look uniform even
when wearing totally different base layers.

Oh, and it floats when needed :-)

[christoph...@gmail.com]

I cycle by the river on my way to work and my observation is that in good and poor visibility hi-viz clothing is very effective. However in the dark hi-viz clothing is invisible and white clothing is much the most visible.