[Rhodes22-list] To Rick Evans (and anybody else who wants to know)

[SVTRITON at aol.com]

hi rick
i own an r22 and am happy with the boat...having sailed a sonar for a  couple 
of years there are some differences that i note here from my  
experience...first you will not point an r22 anywhere close to the sonar unless  you furl up 
the jib to use the inner leads in which case you better have a lot  of wind 
speed or the boat will not have the power you are used to on the  
sonar....second the sail plan on the rhodes is the opposite of the sonar..sonar  drives by 
the main..r22 by the jib..the result is some lee helm in light air  which you 
probably wont experience this weekend..from marylous forecast...third  the 
sonar is a fixed keel (at least the ones ive sailed) with a greater  distribution 
of weight under the water...the r22 relies more on human ballast so  it is 
important in the test sail to have the number of people on board that you  will 
normally sail with...my test sail had six on board and i single hand for  the 
most part so my learning curve was a lot longer than i thought it would be  as 
a result of less weight..i sail in the chesapeake bay and use a 150 genny  
with the imf main and a ups for light air days..the boat is overbuilt, heavy and  
safe..obviously i choose it for what wanted. the sonar was built for a 
different  purpose so make sure what type of sailing you want to do
hope this helps
tom