aluminum wing rigger and backstays

[KitD]

Quite typical of welded aluminium, a nice clean break along the fracture introduced by the weld. Stampfli suffered identical problems and had to beef up the wall thickness, making them fairly heavy.

CD epoxies all his aluminium for exactly this reason.

[zrow]

Thanks for the picture, Mightyquinn,
As I expected, Sykes improved the rigger design:

SykesRigger2017.jpg (1.3 MiB) Viewed 1032 times

Note how different the base is. The mounting bar is more like a U cradle and the rigger is sitting "inside" not on top of the old rectangular design.

As to KitD comment, I agree that nothing beats Carl Douglas riggers quality. I wish he agreed to make custom wing riggers
His side mounted I use on my Van Dusen traditional are the best investment I made in the boat improvement.

[platypus]

Our rowing club's entire fleet is made up of Sykes boats. We have quite a number of Sykes quads, doubles and singles. All our quads and doubles with stern mounted wing riggers have backstays. We never row those boats without them. However, none of our Sykes 1X boats have backstays. Neither do any of the privately owned Sykes 1X boats stored in the sheds. Apart from one of the initially designed Sykes wing riggers, I have never seen one break. Our Sykes singles get lots of abuse from club members and all are holding up well.

Did you know that Sykes have recently introduced their new carbon bow wing rigger? A few of our members have recently purchased these and expect delivery in February. I've been rowing a Fluid bow wing rigger boat for 6 years now and are seriously looking at a SYKES carbon bow wing rigger boat mould 138.

Check out these riggers: https://www.sykes.com.au/products/carbo ... ted-rigger

[zrow]

... I've been rowing a Fluid bow wing rigger boat for 6 years now and are seriously looking at a SYKES carbon bow wing rigger boat mould 138.

Check out these riggers: https://www.sykes.com.au/products/carbo ... ted-rigger

Platypus, thank you for the most useful information. And the new rigger looks sleek.
As for the single... If the mould 138 rows as sweet as my M214 double, the switch is a no brainer.
Are they the same mould designs?
Very responsive, sets like an erg. We tested ours in "white caps" really rough water, no problem... I am not going to miss a workout because of bad weather next season.
simply love the boat!

[Stelph]

... I've been rowing a Fluid bow wing rigger boat for 6 years now and are seriously looking at a SYKES carbon bow wing rigger boat mould 138.

Check out these riggers: https://www.sykes.com.au/products/carbo ... ted-rigger

Platypus, thank you for the most useful information. And the new rigger looks sleek.
As for the single... If the mould 138 rows as sweet as my M214 double, the switch is a no brainer.
Are they the same mould designs?
Very responsive, sets like an erg. We tested ours in "white caps" really rough water, no problem... I am not going to miss a workout because of bad weather next season.
simply love the boat!

I find it interesting that Sykes have gone for what looks to be quite a “rustic” design of the wing, I might have to reach out to them to ask if they did any aerodynamic testing/consideration when designing it since the major drawback of bow wing riggers is the increase in surface area and so wind drag compared to stern wings and especially side riggers - I dont really understand why some wings come out and there isn’t any evidence that they’ve thought about how the design could be improved to reduce drag

That aside the 138 looks really interesting, massively shorter than anything out there it’s got to have the lowest shrface area and skin drag numbers around