Down Under, Bill Hutch is also busy building. He has first made a wooden plug, then a mould, and finally moulded a glassfiber hull.
http://radiosailingshop.com.au/index.php?main_page=page&id=6

Phanchita Supasirithanawat (www.rcsails.com) from Bangkok Thailand sent me these pictures of a down-scaled Noux design built to the RG65 rules. It's called a Noux65.

There is a video here http://www.rcsails.com/noux65.htm

FIN-43, my current Noux-design IOM, is packed and ready for shipping to its new owner next week. I made a holder for the bulb from tube-clamps, and disassmbled the rigs today. Everything fits nicely into my 110x30x26 cm boat box.

The plan for 2009 is to cnc-mill plugs and make moulds for a variant of Pikanto, Graham Bantock's latest design. It's important to use time and effort on good design and good moulds. I want the boat and the components to come out of the moulds almost ready to use. Keep it simple stupid. CAD-design time and time on the cnc-mill is cheap, hours spent moulding and hand-building are expensive (for me anyway). More about that later. It also looks like we will be milling a new set of bulb, fin, and rudder moulds in December-January. We're happy to mill moulds for other people too, but most people don't answer the second email where I tell them a fin-mould costs 500 euros (which we think is reasonable).

Another view of the spray-painting setup.

The bulb is home-made, cast in a plaster mould.

Here is Steinar's first boat, now completed and painted. I posted some building pictures earlier here and here.

Steinar asked if there is a Noux-logo. Sure! I just need to post it online in some common format. Stand by...

Steinar from Norway wrote to tell me about his Noux project. He started out building a planked wooden Noux (above), but it ended up too heavy, so instead a wooden plug was made (below)

Using this plug Steinar has now made a mould and moulded a few glassfiber Noux hulls. There's no standard deck solution for the Noux yet so Steinar has invented his own, with a central round hatch for access to the electronics.

Boris from Switzerland sent me these two pictures of his Noux project which he has just started - thanks !

I've had a couple of requests for reduced shadows for the Noux by people wanting to home-build the boat using planking or other methods. Here are the lines with 1-6mm offset from the outer hull surface. A DXF file is attached to the pdf, click the small paper-clip next to the text to save the DXF as a separate file

Aussie Green and Gold paint scheme.

Peter: " Glassing the balsa with West System epoxy was easy. Final weight of the boat with all deck fittings in place and a bit of paint – 612 gms – well within budget. The whole shell of the boat including the foredeck is just so stiff and strong – 3mm balsa over shadows – pre primed inside and out with Wests diluted 10% with MEK (Don’t tell Mr West – they don’t approve but it works so well over balsa) – then 3oz satin glass cloth on the outside using full strength West and 3/4oz glass cloth inside with 5% MEK dilution"

" Realising why the foredeck overlaps the cockpit – to provide a place for the mast ram - I had cut 50mm off the cockpit balsa moulding and then had to add the extra 50mm back in 0.6mm ply – while difficult it proved to be very strong and so eliminated the need for deck beams to hold the mast and keel box."
" Drilling the holes for the winch – the tolerance between screws and centreline of the pulley axel are very close - I ended up making a template and drilling through it"

The plaster bulb mould ready for pouring. "The name FAT NOUX comes from the extra in the beam and the thickness of the keel – I poured the keel lead and it had to happen – FAT keel – 2.5 Kg out of the mould so a lot of shaving with the wood plane and its down to the budget figure on your web site."

Ball race mast head fitting for crane, sail uphaul with the ability to adjust the tension on the mainsail jack stay.

Boom and vang fitting with ball races – works so smoothly

Pictures and text by Peter Trimmer, Australia.

Nice looking laminates ! I am hoping to receive a detailed report from the builders on how these were done, i.e. plug treatment (release agent), gelcoat, layers of fiber, resin etc.

Here is yet another deck design for the Noux. This is the plug for the deckmould shown above. I am told the idea was to minimize the volume of the cockpit and thus minimize drag related to water carried in the cockpit in heavy weather.

Rumors say that Wallin&Ginström are planning to build a deck (cnc milled plugs ofcourse!) in the near future according to the original Noux 2 plans - but you never know... stay tuned!