http://www.fg43.com This is the feed from official Finngulf 43 website, dedicated to following the design- and building process of the performance yacht until its launch on May 1st, 2008. Tue, 1 Jan 2008 15:10:00 +0200 http://www.fg43.com/ http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=hull1 Sun, 23 Dec 2007 15:00:00 +0200 http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=farr Tue, 17 Dec 2007 15:00:00 +0200 http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=spars Fri, 23 Nov 2007 15:00:00 +0200 http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=deckplug Sun, 18 Nov 2007 15:00:00 +0200 http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=ownersperspective Timo Kotilainen Wed, 24 Oct 2007 01:00:00 +0200 This is like a six months honeymoon, waiting for your new bride to get her shape and see her freeing herself from the moulds. Soon she will stretch out, open up the sails and slide into the bright summer day. The more I spend time thinking of her, the more convinced I am she is the right yacht for me, and I try to live up to her expectations as well; to treat her well and reach new fantastic experiences possible only because of her fantastic features. Seriously speaking, the current period of planning and suspense is one of the most enjoyable phases when it comes to owning a boat, especially when that boat is something as unique as the new FG43. The boat is an unrivalled cocktail of elegance, quality and performance. It will be a real performance yacht with plenty of sail area and light displacement. This combination is a challenging one to achieve, especially when designed to cope with our shallow and choppy waters. One needs to be able to trust the boatyard’s capability and dedication to quality in all its dimensions. With Finngulf, this is a given, as they have this very dedication in their DNA. This I can say after the happy marriage with my previous partner, the FG41 #6, “Jipii Again”. I am faced with some difficult decisions that are to be made by the end of the year. These include the color of the boat. Don’t be surprised if it will be all black. I mean all black: the hull, the super structure, the mast and even the boom. And metallic, not just normal black. Use of such a dark color is made possible by the high quality of the FG43’s surface, whereas it would be unthinkable on a standard high volume boat on which it would show the unevenness of her hips, hinting towards cellulite. And that is not exactly the kind of bride I am looking for! http://www.fg43.com/index.php?page=4 Ari Nykanen, site maintainer Mon, 22 Oct 2007 01:00:00 +0200 New images added to the Images and design renderings section. http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=mould Vicke Ruokolahti Thu, 18 Oct 2007 10:00:00 +0200 Oh happy day; the mould is perfect! Now the laminating foreman Pelle Johnsson and his crew will wax and polish the mould. The other half will be detached by the end of the week. At the same time we are building the moulds for the structural girders that will be laminated on the inside of the hull to stiffen the high load area around the keel and mast step as well as the forward slamming area. Concurrently we are working with Det Norske Veritas on standardization and certification issues. DNV is verifying the structural calculations, laminating schedules and production methodology. DNV is the notified body for CE certification and we will also certify every boat individually with DNV for the so called Module "F". When this is done we get to work on vacuum laminating hull number 1! http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=fg43interior Ilkka Suppanen Tue, 16 Oct 2007 10:00:00 +0200 This has been an exciting project for us, pushing the envelope of what we are used to doing. The FG43 interior is designed to be both practical at sea as well as comfortable in harbor. Strict weight control has been applied to all materials and components already at the design stage to achieve maximum performance. We are seeking materials and solutions that are as light as possible. It is also important to have optimal weight distribution - an area where Farr Yacht Design really excels. The study of proportions, materials and measurements has created practical and comfortable solutions, and after a lot of work on the FG43, we also feel we have accomplished interiors that are spacious yet simple, while still being light weight. In order to cater to different tastes, we have created two versions of the interior; "classic" and "modern". These both share the same architecture and geometry, but material choices vary. We feel that this boat has a very exciting balance between comfort for cruising and performance for racing, and being sailors ourselves we can't wait to get the yacht on the water for sea trials next spring! http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=annapolis Anders Kurtén Fri, 5 Oct 2007 10:00:00 +0200 I am currently in Annapolis, USA, the self proclaimed "sailing capital of the world", having just finished a press conference for the US yachting journalists on my favourite subject of the moment, the new Finngulf 43. Interest was extremely good and most of the major sailing magazines had a representative present. As these things typically go, I gave the journalists a 45 minute PowerPoint presentation highlighting the design brief, the concept driving the central design choices and some thoughts on positioning relative to the current competition. Jim Schmicker, Senior Naval Architect at Farr Yacht Design followed me with a very interesting presentation, giving the designers viewpoints on our joint "baby". It was also good to sit down with the extremely talented team at Farr Yacht Design who has all been working so hard for the last couple of months on our project, internally referred to as "Farr Design number 620." I was happy to be able to personally convey my gratitude towards their overall talent and great work ethic without which we would be far behind schedule at this point. Today was also a good day sales wise because I was able to confirm the sixth signed contract on the new FG43 with a Finnish client. Six boats under contract is quite a reasonable achievement considering that the boat itself doesn?t even exist yet. I can't quite start resting on my laurels yet because I promised the Board of Directors that I would sell 10 boats off the drawings, so I have 4 more to go before May 1st, 2008. Anybody out there seriously interested please email me at sales(at)finngulf.com. We are currently looking at September/October 2008 deliveries for the next available 43. http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=plug Vicke Ruokolahti Sun, 8 Sep 2007 10:00:00 +0200 The FG43 drawings are very familiar to me and I have always thought that this particular design looks very slippery. But when the hull plug came in we were so amazed that we walked around it in silence for long time. The actual hull in 1:1 size is such a vivid beauty that it just was not imaginable beforehand. The plug half´s are created straight from the designers file using 5-axis CNC milling machine. This way the tolerances will be minimized and we will save a lot of time. Now the plug halves are finished through fine sanding, painting and polishing. In the next phase we will laminate the actual production moulds. At this point we are on schedule! The first hull will be laminated by the end of October. Meanwhile making the moulds and laminating the first hull we will keep on pushing on the other activities that will take the project to the next windward mark. (Such as: developing the interior, developing toilet modules, engineering the rudder mechanisms etc.) When we are done with the hull moulds, we offer a set of hard core half models of the FG43 in 1:1 size for sale as soon as we find a fitting teak plate to mount them on. Anybody have a 43 foot long empty wall for it out there? http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=dreamteam Anders Kurtén Fri, 10 Aug 2007 10:00:00 +0200 Combining the naval architecture excellence of Farr Yacht Design, the leading edge design of Studio Suppanen and our 25 years of experience in building high quality blue-water Performance Yachts is an exciting prospect for us at Finngulf. We are sharing this process on the blog you are reading. After deliberation and a number of serious discussions with some of the best designers in the industry, we chose to follow a new path for us in terms of the design process used to develop our new yacht. Farr Yacht Design was one of the obvious choices after we had decided to go back to our roots and once again create a serious Performance Yacht. After meeting the design team in Annapolis I really felt that they understood the brief. "Design a very fast Performance Yacht, one that is clearly faster in all conditions than the current models, whilst retaining the classic lines and without compromising handling and comfort below deck." A tough brief for sure, but enlisting the help of award winning designer Ilkka Suppanen really enabled proper planning of ergonomics and tweaking the interior still maintaining comfort and usability of the yacht. Please return to see more images of the boats in build starting November 1st. http://www.fg43.com/blog.php?page=launch Anders Kurtén Sun, 5 Aug 2007 10:00:00 +0200 Here we go, the die is cast. The first two Finngulf 43:s will be launched on May 1st 2008 - the launch and christening party is scheduled to start at noon. These are exciting times for all of us involved, as this new model epitomizes all the development work we have focused on over the past two years. This blog is dedicated to following the design- and building process of the Finngulf 43. Please return to check on progress. We will try to update you at least 2-3 times per month.