I know you are considering Van isle, and I am considering joining you as crew. Any idea on the costs yet?

It depends on how long the sprit is. If the Asym is no larger in area than the symmetrical I don't think it impacts your rating. You are allowed a certain length of sprit without penalty; I can't remember how long though. If I recall, the downside is that PHRF does not allow you to carry both a sym and asym.

Do you think an Asym will be an advantage for the 360? My first reaction is that it wouldn't be, but I haven't sailed down the outside so I would be talking out my ass.

The costs are looking like $2000 for a full share per person and 2 weeks of racing. You could do just a week if that works into your plan better and the costs reduce accordingly.
This covers food lodging and fees. Its does not cover an insatiable thirst for Beer!

The penalty is -3 seconds for every foot over J. and +6 seconds If I say I will only use one or the other. But If I want to use ether in a race I don't get the 6 sec bonus. Can't imagine ever using both. Once you have used a sprit you will never go back.
Rodney Johnstone Is advising us on the most competitive measurements to use. But suffice to say that the Asym will fallow my motto of Go Big or stay home. now if you see me out looking for a new mast next fall you know what happened.

And Yes the Asym will be a huge advantage for all distance races.
I have done a fair bit of distance racing and I am sick and tired of getting to the up wind mark or island to round Half an hour ahead of boats that owe me a ton of time only to have them run over me down wind and beat me by 8h over 35 miles! look at our results in Swiftsure this year. Any one have A drill so I can put some holes in Zulu and that flying tiger! So we always win the race to weather but then come around the mark and get slaughtered with our undersize kite made for the heavy air of the eastern seaboard. Reaching and broad running the Asym is the only way to go. I ask you if there is any respectable builder still using a Symmetrical spin? And if they are ask why? Are they trying to follow an archaic class rule?
Now for Beer can racing the Symmetrical is the proper thing as you're trying to run deep. But in point to point racing you're just heading to the next puff and trying to get around that next island and you can always find some wind that will bend your way.
Except at Swiftsure.

And I have sailed the Van Isle before. Be It on Oriole so that was a bit different doing 18 knots with a spinnaker the size of a baseball field. But yes the A sail is the only way to go.

Well the Beneteau First series are still using syms and doing quite well. The First 40 took 2nd and 3rd corrected in Sydney-Hobart

While I am not arguing that asyms aren't great, I think getting run over down wind is a bit more of a function of our tubby hull that is better going upwind than down than the asym. The flying tiger is a planing hull so of course it is going to walk past us downwind. An olson 30 and Hobie 33 are also going to walk right past us like we are standing still with the symmetrical kites as well.

While it is undersized in the light stuff, our boats are heavy air queens so I don't feel I want a bigger kite when the wind gets up. Try as we might, without honkin waves this hull doesn't want to break free and a bigger kite just makes me think that hole in the water will get deeper and put a lot of stress on the rigging for little speed gain. This may be different for the asym though because of it's more efficient shape.

I am looking forward to seeing the final product though!! It will definitely be cool!

My 2 cents on the asym/sym advantages.

Many of the newer faster hull designs dont see app wind angles beyond 130 degrees in all wind conditions. If you look at our polars our app wind angel at 12 knots is 150ish and back to 170 degrees at 16 knots true. Thus I beleive a sym works well for the boat, a all asym polar curve for the boat will not be as verstile.

I tried a "modified" melges 24 kite with the same idea to go all asyms and I did not like it. I dont beleive the boat has the boatspeed to make asyms a verstile sail. I do think there is a place for an asym reaching in distance race, but I dont think you are going to see a huge speed increase.

I got a new sym 2S Airx .5 (600) for last season and love it. I was very competitive in light and medium air. Under 12 knots true I was faster than t-tens I sailed against. Over 12 they would start slowly moving on me (which they should).

The Friction Loss Pac Cup recap is a great analysis of what sails they liked while racing to Hawaii in this forum as well.

^ Good thoughts.

One of my crew has an old San Juan 24 modified to carry an Asym and apparently it was a huge improvement, and those hulls are as IOR as they get. He also put a deeper keel on it though, so maybe that is the magic combo.

I have always thought that an increase to the J/30 ballast/displacement ratio would pay huge dividends or at least a deeper keel (maybe 6 foot?) Don can you stick a deeper, higher aspect keel on when you make the change and let us know how it goes?

Friction Loss Pac Cup recap - dont know how I missed this previously - great rundown on taking our boat offshore!

John - how exactly did you modify the Melges 24 kite? I've read about using this kite as-is on the 30 in these forums. My sailmaker in Charleston even recommended trying one as-is to see what I think about it (flying it off the pole with the pole all the way down). He sailed the J/30 for many years and says I'd have no trouble with the rig.

Our Atlanta/Lake boat is a Melges so I have a couple older chutes laying around I plan to try. I'm a bit concerned that I'll quickly blow the thing in a decent puff...the M24 of course "gives" a lot more when the pressure comes on and I would expect lighter overall chute construction.

We rarely buoy-race the J (all point-to-point) so I think we are perfect A-sail candidates...no need for versatility, frequent need to be fast on a reach. If you compare the two chutes we are only talking about ~30 ft/sq more area, but would expect more shape efficiency.

I suppose if I got rid of the extra size, I wouldn't even have to tell the measurer.

-dan

I have an asym as well as a symetrical (class kite). We consider it essential to have the "a" sail for PHRF racing. Last season we won a couple of races strictly because of the "a" kite. This year, I don't think we had it out of the bag.

I don't remember what "code" it is. It's sized for reaching in 10-15k true wind. we fly it from the pole with the pole down to the pulpit. It has a narrow range but when you are in that range, 65-100 degrees, in moderate to heavier air it is faster than either the #1 or the class kite

Dan,

Correction, I actually modified how I fix the pole on the deck and not the actual kite. The M24 kite has a long luff and the pole on the deck helps the luff curve. I rivited a ring on the mast at deck level, and made a padded clamp bolted to the headstay tang/tack hole. I beleive the kite is a little smaller than class kites in area. FYI there are 2 M24 kites. I have the runner

Very easy to fly, but not necessarily faster. I agree with Russ a reacher like a 3A should have a good nich in distance races. May go 3S instaed b/c of PHRF hit. The Friction Loss guys seemed to like their 3S as well.

Amazing. I have been looking for this info and here it is coming out of the wood work. I knew that there had to be others trying this out. I am eating this up so keep it coming .
I want to hear all the pro and con statements so I can make informed decisions.

From My calculations we only need to get the boat moving one knot faster to make this pay. That sounds like allot but I have sailed displacement hulls with and without Asym and we get that performance improvement easy.

As well we are going with a proper sprit. Sticking it 4-5' in front of the bow. Not just on the pole. that will help fly it and allow for deeper angles. and yes your right that normally you only see 130 but that is also due to speed. if you go to deep you slow down. And Jybe's will no longer be free. they will be slower and cost time so that has been considered.
for the point to point racing this has got to be considered.

Also we are looking at moving the hoist up to increase sail area. but I do not want to go to the top of an unsupported mast. next I will be looking for a mast! The J92 went up only 1.5' and my question to J/Boats was that the safe call.
I have been crazy in the past an caught with my pants down and all the laundry up. granted we hit an all time record for the boat at 14kn but that is something I dont want to repeat. Tony Lost his mast on Radiant Heat in that race and It was only dumb luck that i did not as well. so I do want to keep the rig safe and not go crazy oversize here.

Any way keep it coming good and bad. I want to hear from any one that has info on this.

Scott I work for the government not embezzling the government!
no keel modifications. at least not yet. The mad scientist lab has only one project a year.. your going to get me labeled an X-J30 and then my rating will be 99! Then I will go Buy my circumnavigation boat! a J30 with roller furling.