[Rhodes22-list] educational rebuttal

[daysails at aol.com]

Welcome back Stan!  Thanks for the continuing education and the humor.  Joe Riley Athens GA

-----Original Message-----
From: Stan Spitzer <stan at rhodes22.com>
To: Rhodes Net <bobandkathyr22 at bellsouth.net>; The Rhodes 22 Email List <rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org>; stan spitzer <stan at rhodes22.com>
Sent: Mon, May 6, 2013 6:33 am
Subject: Re: [Rhodes22-list] educational rebuttal


Dear Rhodies and Rhodes Prospects:

ecovery does allow one some free time so I would like to say a word for 
he Rhodes.
It also allows some time for writing - like what you would like 
ngraved in stone.  I had always liked "I told them I was sick" but that 
as been taken so am toying with "after an 87 year battle with natural 
auses".)
When you are young you tend to know the other guy knows more than you.  
hen you get real old, you know nobody knows more than you - at least 
hodes and politically, speaking.  I won't take the List's time 
olitically since I am always writing that book and never getting much 
urther than the changing of titles, the latest being, "MINORITY OF 
OOLS,  the triggering of the Coming Boom" - stan spitzer's first book 
n 87 years.
The Rhodes is a different story.  I did not come to bury the Rhodes, as 
o many on the List have been doing.  I have come to see that its legacy 
utlives all who live to sail - and the rest of us who sail to live.
In the beginning our contribution was creative design, not the 
reaking-in of new construction techniques.  Every builder used wood for 
he cores, rivets for the shoe box seams and thin glass for the new 
arket of the hoped for masses.  So we did too.
All we had was a shared advertising art studio 2nd floor office on 46th 
treet, so we spent the nineteen seventies at the pros from Nova Scotia 
o Wichita, watching them build their boats - and ours.
In those days, when cores were made with balsa and each square patiently 
apped to try and insure bonding, or with strips of fir or ply, we 
quirmed instinctively.  But we were only in our forties. Nevertheless 
e stared making up our own core packages to bring to the contractor: 
haped ply panels that we slotted and coated with resin.  Somewhat 
etter since many of the old Rhodes we later bought back, still had 
olid decks.  Some did not.   Today, Rhodes decks have no wood.  Cores 
re plastic.  Thickness is overkill.  We tell show lookers to skip tire 
icking and jump on our decks instead; then watch competitors 
xpressions when lookers begin jumping up and down on their decks.
In those days of simplified pricing, it was by the pound - glass and 
esin used.  The lighter the boat the more competitive, price wise. The 
entures came along and made this building, an art form.  In water it 
id not seem to matter - on land the art form had its weak points, 
articularly on trailers.  In my fifties standing in the lazaret, 
eeling the flexing hull bottom underfoot, was unnerving. Molding the 
hodes keel as an integrated part of the hull itself, made the Rhodes 
id-ship bottom, naturally stiff, whereas competitive boats bolted on 
heir keels.  Few boats had flotation. Those that did accomplished it 
ith chunks of bought foam planks, as we ourselves did - in our early 
ays; until it dawned on us to marry the two by molding the foam to fit 
he hull, then glass it in to stiffen the cockpit and bow sections of 
he boat bottom.  It also dawned on us that a modest redesign of the 
loor unit stringers and their glassing in, added more bottom 
tiffness.  By the time we moved the making of the hulls to our own 
hop, we had matured enough to have given up on the price wars.  We 
tarted to lay up the port side hull glass so it continued on across the 
ottom, and the starboard side glass lay up so it too continued on 
cross the bottom.   With the hull sides extraordinarily stiff from the 
hodes unusual compound curved flared hull shape, now its bottom was 
xtraordinarily stiff from being twice the thickness of the sides. The 
ulls we build today in our own facility are so extraordinarily stiff 
hat we lift the boats by their bow eye and transom eyes and boat shape 
hows no deflection.  This amazing difference from our early boats /is/ 
robably overkill because I do not know of any other builder who moves 
heir boats around supported at only its two extremes.
In those days masts in our category were mostly supported by three stays 
maybe a forth as a backstay) and stepped on a well connected mast 
abernacle.  With only the jib stay forward of the pivot point and the 
ost likely to fail; bringing the mast down - and part of the cabin top 
p, damage to boat and crew could be noteworthy. Reading, we learned 
hat masts with this kind of elementary rigging, were subject to 
pumping" symptoms.  Observing, we noted the vaccination for mast 
umping on larger sailboats was lower shrouds, fore and aft of the mast 
ivot point.   Extremists from the start, we went from 3 to 9 stays, and 
 screwed-on "break-away" mast step. The results (worth the increase in 
osts and slight increase in rigging time):   A superior mast load 
istribution on the hull.  A breaking jib stay (the most likely stay to 
ail on a sailboat) does not bring down the mast.  The evolution of the 
hodes mast hoist system.  The wiping out of mast pumping.  The built-in 
ertical life line effects from multiple spaced out shrouds.  The safety 
f redundancy. The evolution of the Rhodes unique traveler system.  And 
ven if the sore loser of the race you just won, pulls all 9 stay pins, 
our deck top does not feel the pain.   Remember, the 4 additional lower 
hrouds are there to take the pumping action out of your mast (and 
upport it in an emergency if ever an upper shroud failure).  However, 
o those creative early-boat owners who over-tighten or somehow manage 
o sail into obstacles to loosen or even pull out these innocent 4 extra 
hain plates, take comfort in knowing that in the latest Rhodes they are 
lso glassed into the deck to make their damaging a bit more difficult.  
or those who, at sometime or another, have to see what happens when 
ailing under a low bridge or trailing with the mast up or trying to 
ake down an overhanging tree branch the easy way, and are annoyed by 
he results, sorry, we have supported your boat's mast to the best of 
ur abilities - so far.
In those days most decks and hulls were joined with rivets.  Fast, easy, 
ot so strong because they were aluminum.  They did not allow for a 
ontrolled drawing in (spacing between deck and hull) and their shaft 
steel) sometimes broke, remaining inside the compressed rivet, 
ventually leaving dripping rust stains.  The alternate, glassing deck 
o hull, took its toll on workers and hence builders. Nuts on bolts, too 
ifficult.  SS screws through the deck and threading into the hull, 
ctually turns out to be the best way to go. Stainless is strong and 
orever and allows spacing control. General Boats benefits from the best 
uality control possible - our owners.  Because we do not sell through 
ealers we are able to cup our ears.  If no screams, we know /that/ idea 
s working.  If we are mistaken we get first hand field reports and we 
an turn on a smaller dime than the big guys. New Rhodes decks to hulls 
re bolted at the transom corners' chain plates and main upper shroud 
hain plates and screwed together in-between.  Winches, cleats, tracks, 
hat carry shear forces, are installed with machine screws threaded into 
ur thick glass layup.  Does that work?  You have told us it does.  Not 
nce in all our years have we lost a single deck or any hardware so 
ttached.   We rest our shear load case.    Deck/hull seam leakage?  The 
oat is not intended to be sailed with the rail under water, but that is 
nevitable.   And here we have goofed.  We just assumed everyone knew 
ow to use a caulking gun and observed many of our earlier workers did 
ot.  For those in the latter class we point out that you advance with 
he gun in front of you forcing the sealant up into the cavity as you 
rogress, NOT with gun moving away from its chore so it is pulling on 
he sealant.

he moral of all this is the same as in the closing scene of the movie 
lassic "Some Like It Hot" where Joe E. Brown, sitting in the back seat 
f a motor boat, puts his arm around Jack Lemon who, in a dress, is 
earing a blond wig and Lemon pulls off his wig in his final frustrated 
ttempt to prove he is not a woman, to which Brown persists his 
dvances, gleefully delivering the movie's last line, "Nobody's perfect".
Except, of course, a recent Rhodes.

s


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