Hall Spars Announces SCR/S Airfoil Carbon Rigging

Hall Spars & Rigging introduces the first-ever carbon rigging product with an ultra-low-drag airfoil shape. The new SCR/S — Seamless Carbon Rigging/Streamlined — is the next generation of the highly successful SCR product and is designed specifically for projects looking for the maximum edge in speed.

"This idea was in development well before we introduced SCR last November," says Eric Hall, president of Hall Spars & Rigging. "This year, we raced with SCR/S on Rampant, our chartered Rodger Martin 36, for the entire season. Combining this with fatigue and tensile testing in the lab, we confirmed the great potential of SCR/S."

A year ago Hall introduced SCR, the first reliable solid round carbon rigging product to hit the market. It is the smallest, lowest-windage composite rigging available. Thanks to a proprietary terminal attachment process for which there are international patents pending, SCR also boasts the most compact composite rigging end fittings available.

Hall SCR round rod has 15% less frontal area/windage than its nearest carbon rigging market competitor. Airfoil-shaped SCR/S just reduced that to 50% less windage. Since standing rigging is the main source of rig windage, this reduction will give any boat a quantifiable speed improvement.

"At Hall, we're obsessed with windage reduction," says Eric Hall. "With SCR/S we've taken windage reduction in rigging to its limit. It will be hard to beat," says Hall.

Hall Spars & Rigging will formally introduce SCR/S at the METS show in Amsterdam Nov. 17-19, 2009. The SCR product is a finalist in the 2009 DAME awards competition.

Hall Spars Building Mast for BMW Oracle's America’s Cup Multihull

[Source: BMW Oracle] The carbon fiber mast for BMW ORACLE Racing's new America's Cup multihull is now under construction at Hall Spars in Bristol, Rhode Island, the team confirmed today.

Located about 20 miles from Newport, the long-time home of the America's Cup, the Hall facility was a natural choice for undertaking what is a difficult engineering challenge, BMW ORACLE Racing design coordinator, Mike Drummond, said.

"It is a huge challenge to construct such a large mast and to cure the carbon in an autoclave big enough to accommodate this project," he said. "Based in the USA, Hall Spars have a leading reputation in delivering the high-quality construction we need on this scale.

"The rig program is a key component in the performance of the aero package on the multihull,” Drummond said. The rig design team is led by American Scott Ferguson and Hervé Devaux of France with support from BMW.

“It’s a real pleasure to work with the BMW ORACLE team. The Hall team thrives on innovation, and our facility and autoclave are perfectly suited for a project of this magnitude. The performance of this boat will be like no other in existence. I can’t wait to see the sea trials,” said Ben Hall, vice president of Hall Spars & Rigging.

Hall Spars & Rigging Expands to New Zealand

Hall Spars & Rigging president Eric Hall announced today that Hall Inc. has signed a letter of intent to acquire Matrix Masts, located in Auckland, New Zealand. Following the formal filing of papers (expected in mid-December) the Matrix factory will operate under the Hall name. The announcement was made from the Hall booth at the METS trade show.

Current Matrix owners Garry Hassall and Murray Jones will remain as managing partners of the new company with a strong minority share interest. Hassall was on hand in Amsterdam for the announcement.

“The acquisition of this team is a perfect fit,” commented Hall. “They are highly skilled in carbon construction, so we anticipate a smooth transition to the Hall production method. From manufacturing to service, we are impressed with the overall expertise of this team and look forward to this new venture.”

Known for the development of the highly successful “Ocean Furl” furling boom, Matrix has produced carbon spars for racing boats to superyachts over the past 21 years. The purpose-built Matrix facility, which includes a 42-meter autoclave, is positioned to provide outstanding products and service to the New Zealand, Australian and Far Eastern markets.

“With the addition of the factory in New Zealand, Hall is ideally situated to assist clients around the world,” says Hall. “Whether the client is in the U.S., Europe, the Mediterranean or the Pacific Rim, Hall has a facility and service team nearby.”

Hall Spars & Rigging currently operates factories in the U.S. and Holland. In addition, there is a sales and service office in Italy. Hall Spars & Rigging supplied the spars to the 2007 America’s Cup winner Alinghi.

Valencia Sailing talks to Ben Hall (part II)

We publish today the second part of the very interesting discussion we had last Wednesday with Ben Hall, Vice President of Hall Spars. In this part, our conversation focused on a more detailed analysis of mast making in the America's Cup but also the other major racing classes. You can read the first part of the interview here.

Valencia Sailing: What is the most important evolution in America's Cup masts between the previous edition and this one?
Ben Hall: First of all, the rules have changed. The biggest difference obviously is the modulus of the material. From the beginning it was always intermediate modulus carbon fiber, from 1992 when the rule started through 2003. After that year, they increased it to a high modulus material, to put it in very simple terms. The America's Cup has limits in modulus you can go up to and I'm sure every team, whoever is buying their carbon fibers, try to reach the maximum. Another important change in the rules was the drop in the minimum weight of the mast. There have also been other changes such as allowing the use of PBO (high-strength polymer fiber) or carbon rigging for the headstay and the jumpers. I think there has been a fair amount of development in that field.

Valencia Sailing: If I understand well, the change was mainly in materials, not design.
Ben Hall: Not exactly, the design also changed as a result of these modifications. Another change was that they allowed the autoclave pressure to increase from 3 atmospheres to 5 atmospheres.

Valencia Sailing: Is this factor very important?
Ben Hall: We think it is. The every day pressure we use is usually 6 to 7 atmospheres. All our masts for J boats or even production masts for Bénétau boats are built at 6 atmospheres. In comparison America's Cup yachts are made at 5 atmospheres. I don't know why they kept that rule. It doesn't make any sense. Already in 1992 we had the ability to make higher pressure.

Valencia Sailing: Higher pressure is then translated into higher resistance?
Ben Hall: More compaction of the material. It is the routine pressure the aerospace industry uses, not 3 or 5 atmospheres. I believe this is due because most of our competitors didn't have the equipment to reach these pressures when the rule was created.

Valencia Sailing: How do you then compare the America's Cup to the other major racing classes? Are you involved in the Volvo Ocean Race, the TP52 or GP42?
Valencia Sailing: Absolutely, we are involved in all of them. In the VOR we did the masts for Paul Cayard's “Pirates of the Caribbean”. We are also going to build the masts of one of the teams of the 2008 campaign but I can't tell you which. Of course, as you know, we have a very strong involvement in the TP52 class. For example, in last year's Copa del Rey, out of the 21 boats there, 17 were ours. We obviously have competition there as well, but this year we are doing 5 very interesting new projects. We are doing the new Pisco Sour, Caixa Galicia, the new CAM as well as the new Patches. We also made a new 2007-version mast for Bambakou, but I don't know whether they are going to race this year.

Don't forget that we made the first mast ever for a TP52 boat, Bruce Nelson's first boat called Yassou. I actually had to interview him about the TP52 rule. It's funny because there wasn't a rule concerning the weight and center of gravity of a TP52 mast. Actually, they weighed Yassou's mast and set that measurement as the rule. We then did Esmeralda and most of the Farr-designed TP52 boats. We have an interesting and long history with the TP52's. We are now in our fifth generation of special tools for TP52 mast production.

Row of Hall-built TP52 masts in the 2006 Trofeo Balearia. Ibiza, 19 September 2006. Photo copyright Pierre Orphanidis / Valencia Sailing

Valencia Sailing: If I'm not mistaken your TP52 masts have two spreaders while other designs have three.
Ben Hall: Yes, you are correct. We are making one mast with three spreaders this year because the team wanted it. Southern Spars did the first three-spreader mast and the two teams they were involved with (Mean Machine/Mutua Madrileña and Warpath) had high budgets and ended up winning. As a result, everybody thought the three-spreader rig was better. We have carried out extensive research and we think you can achieve the same results with two or three spreaders. Interestingly enough, the TP52 class doesn't limit the modulus of the carbon fiber. As a result, the material we are using in a lot of the TP52 masts is the next step above the America's Cup.

Valencia Sailing: So, we are not sitting here in front of the highest sailing technology!!
Ben Hall: As far as brainpower is concerned, it is the peak of technology. But as far as the allowable material and the way we process it is concerned, we do higher process for production boats.

Valencia Sailing: Does the manufacturing process differ from one class to another?
Ben Hall: For most of the masts we do, the America's Cup is different. I would say that the way we do our VOR, TP52 or even GP42 masts is inherently better than the way we build an America's Cup mast. That's all I can say.

Valencia Sailing: Does all this high-end technology trickle down to cruising boats?
Ben Hall: If you look over the years, I would say absolutely yes. As far as carbon fiber technology is concerned there are always things you learn from the America's Cup, especially related to the manufacturing process and tooling or simply innovative and interesting new ways of making things. When rules allow advances, they always take place. Take for example the ropes, Gottifredi Maffioli is using Dyneema, PBO and all the future fibers. I wouldn't say the technology is trickling down, it is dropping down, the transfer is immediate. As far as design is concerned, it certainly trickles there, but if you talk to any America's Cup designer, they will assure you that what they design outside the America's Cup is more advanced. They are locked in a certain rule and their hands are tied. As a result, most of the advances take place outside the rules.

ITA-99 of Mascalzone Latino Capitalia Team being towed out of Port America's Cup with her Hall-built mast. Valencia, 15 March 2007. Photo copyright Pierre Orphanidis / Valencia Sailing

Valencia Sailing: Would you be in favor of making the rules less stringent?
Ben Hall: I don't know what would be the best for this event. I think it's a good thing to have a stability in the rule. If it changes frequently then the high-budget teams would push out the less funded. The effort and time dedicated to the development of a new boat is so extensive that if they had to do it in every campaign that would be unbearable. If for example they decide to have a 90-foot canting keel boat for the next Cup, most of the smaller teams would simply disappear.

I hope a European team wins this Cup so that all the teams will have their boats, masts, infrastructure in place and get into the next one right away. If now the America's Cup leaves Europe it's a wild card on what will happen to the event. It's clear to me there is no other place in the world that has the sponsorship attention of the Mediterranean and it's incredible what you see even in the GP42's. In the US we can't get that, even regional banks such as Caixa Galicia or CAM fully funding TP52 or GP42 teams.

Valencia Sailing: My final question concerns the future. What areas is your R&D department working on?
Ben Hall: The refinements in the America's Cup class are getting increasingly smaller each year. We are now in the fifteenth year and the rule tightens. When there was a change in the materials for the masts, older masts were no longer competitive and as a result everybody had to change them. If there is a similar change in the rule there will be also be a considerable effort of R&D.

In general lines, research in mast making is concentrated on materials. In the future there will be some other material besides carbon fiber that might take over. We don't see it right now.

Valencia Sailing: Titanium?
Ben Hall: No, not titanium. There have been parts of masts made out of it but it will be some other fiber that might be developed. Right now you must have heard talking of carbon nanotubes. We are testing some nano carbon fiber right now with interesting results but that might only be a small step and other fibers might appear in the future. It will not necessarily be a carbon fiber but these developments don't usually take place in the marine industry. Most of the times they are first developed in the aerospace industry and then picked up by us.

Outside of the material field, there will probably be evolutionary rather than revolutionary changes in the types of rigs. We will see more rotating masts and we have been working hard for several years on a rotating mast that has no shrouds at all, like an aeroplane wing. It is an interesting concept and traditionalists don't accept it but it is a direction we might see in the future.

Victory Challenge's SWE-96 being hoisted inside Port America's Cup. Her mast was built by Hall Spars. Valencia, 12 March 2007. Photo copyright Pierre Orphanidis / Valencia Sailing

Valencia Sailing talks to Ben Hall (part I)

With just three weeks left until the first races of Louis Vuitton Act 13 all teams are feeling the heat. Every available hour is spent on training, racing with other teams and testing. This increased activity is a gift for Valencia Sailing since in the following weeks the Who's Who of the international sailing industry will be concentrated right inside Port America's Cup,

For that reason, when we received an email from Ben Hall that wanted to talk to us we were very surprised and pleased. Ben is Vice President of Hall Spars, the famous American spar manufacturer, founded by his brother Eric. He was in Valencia to check on his clients and we took the opportunity to sit and talk about his company, the America's Cup, the other major racing classes as well as all general matters concerning masts.

Given the excellent spring sun and the beautiful scenery we talked for almost two hours, watching as well the yachts going out for their daily training routine. Because of its length, the interview will be split into two parts, with today's first installment touching more general issues of the company and its involvement in the America's Cup.

Valencia Sailing: Can you give us a brief history of Hall Spars?
Ben Hall: Hall Spars was founded by my brother Eric in 1980 and initially had 4 employees. He had previously been with a couple of mast makers. He started his career in Bremen, Germany, in a 50-50 joint venture between North Sails and Balken Masts. He then worked for Stearn Sailing systems with Tim Stearn, one of the biggest race boat mast makers in that time. He finally moved to the mast division of Schaefer Marine and when the company decided to abandon mast making, Eric started Hall Spars in Bristol, Rhode Island. When Eric started the company I was working with another competing mast maker, making similar products and trying to sell them to the same customers. You can imagine in family reunions the awkward situations this fact lead to. As a result, I joined Eric and his business partner Phil Garland in 1984. Phil is still with us and is taking care of the rigging part of the business.

Valencia Sailing: When was Hall Spars first involved in the America's Cup?
Ben Hall: It's a family affair. I first steered an America's Cup yacht when I was 13 years old, almost 50 years ago. My father and I were on the New York Yacht Club cruise and I got to sail on the Weatherly, not able to move, sitting squeezed in one place but I was allowed to steer her during the tow back. In addition, my father worked as test pilot for Grumman Aircraft. Back then, Grumman made some very high-tech spinnaker poles for the early 12-meter class boats. Even by today's standards, these things would be considered high-tech.

Valencia Sailing: I suppose they were made of aluminum.
Ben Hall: They were very thin aluminum skin, half a milemeter thick, on aluminum honey comb either side and then autoclaved with epoxy. Back in 1962 that was very exotic technology. My older brother, Ned, sailed with Bus Mosbacher in two America's Cups, in 1962 on Weatherly and in 1966 on the Intrepid. Then, in 1970, Intrepid was totally reconfigured and Eric did all the mast design work. Everything on that boat was of the most advanced technology at that time. They had titanium mast tops and even strips of Beryllium glued on each side of the mast and Eric would have to climb to the top after every race to glue them back on because they started peeling off.

Valencia Sailing: Let's talk about the company's first involvement in the America's Cup.
Ben Hall: It dates back to 1983, in the Cup in Newport, when we built the mast for France III, aluminum of course. The first carbon fiber product we made was a spinnaker pole in 1984, for maxi yacht Boomerang. At that point Dirk Kramers (currently member of Alinghi's design team) and Eric had the vision that one day all masts would be made of carbon fiber. We were surprised though to see it happen a lot sooner than expected. In the 1987 Cup we did booms and spinnaker poles for America II, both out of aluminum and carbon fiber. In 1988, we were involved with the engineering on the softwing sail on the famous catamaran, Stars & Stripes US1. We also made a great number of poles out of carbon fiber for Team Dennis Conner.

Valencia Sailing: When did you make the first mast entirely out of carbon fiber?
Ben Hall: In 1992, Taro Takahashi, mast designer from the Japanese challenger (currently holding the same position at Mascalzone Latino Capitalia Team) approached us to build a carbon fiber boom. After we did, the designers of Bill Koch's America3 saw it and liked it a lot. As a result, they also approached us and expressed their wish to have items manufactured by us under the condition to make autoclave products. They added that if we invested in an autoclave and bought one they would keep us very busy throughout the Cup year. That's when we made our biggest investment ever and bought a big autoclave. They did keep us very busy and we built almost everything for them, except the mast. We built many booms, spinnaker poles, keel structure, rudder posts. As a result, we learned how to process carbon fiber. We had aircraft engineers that came and assisted, making sure we understood how to use the autoclave. We learned how to make tooling very quickly, which is also very important.

In 1995, we built more booms and poles and the first carbon fiber we ever made was for Young America. Our team working on Young America's spars consisted of Dirk Kramers and Scott Ferguson (currently responsible of the mast program at Luna Rossa) and we built a very innovative mast in 2000 for Young America. At that time there was no rule about the court length of the mast. Right now it is 430mm but back then we made a wing mast that was almost 700mm wide. Everybody tries to make their mast twist as much as possible but that was a very innovative mast and nobody had anything like it. Obviously the boat had problems, it broke but didn't sink.

Valencia Sailing: Was that due to a construction error?
Ben Hall: Not at all. As a matter of fact, when the boat broke and folded, they took the mainsheet, trimmed the boom down hard and kept the boat from actually sinking. They said that the boom saved the boat. There was nothing wrong with the rig but after that their performance deteriorated. They were psychologically beaten. They did rebuild the boat and although at that point their score in the Louis Vuitton Cup was 11-1 or 11-2, Ed Baird and the rest of the crew didn't come back.

Valencia Sailing: So, we arrive now at the 31st America's Cup in Auckland and your involvement with Alinghi.
Ben Hall: It's a funny story. After the year 2000 we wanted to reenter the America's Cup and make more masts but nobody really came to us knocking on our door. In addition, Alinghi was then an unknown team from Switzerland and people were wondering about them. But with Russell Coutts and Dirk Kramers hired by Alinghi things changed. Coutts was impressed by our innovative mast of 2000 and as a result they decided to go with us on an exclusive basis. We felt it was the correct decision as we didn't want to work for more than one team. Unlike some of our competitors, we had a lot of production work and much less one-off projects. We realized the America's Cup projects interfere with your normal day-to-day business and when it is over you lose some of your regular customers. We were very careful not to overbook and happy to sign an exclusive contract with Alinghi. We had a very good relationship with them, we worked hard and fortunately everything worked out well and they won.

Valencia Sailing: Can you reveal how many masts you built for Alinghi in the previous America's Cup?
Ben Hall: I'm sorry but this is impossible. Let me tell you one thing though. They had a budget for masts and even if people think that they freely spend vasts amount of money, each of their departments has a strict budget and they stick to it. They got a very good value for the money they spent and everything was very tightly controlled.

Valencia Sailing: This brings us to the 32nd America's Cup in Valencia. What is your involvement this time?
Ben Hall: We have four teams in Valencia. In addition to Alinghi, we work with Luna Rossa, Mascalzone Latino Capitalia Team and Victory Challenge. The difference this time is that masts for Victory Challenge were built in our Dutch plant while for the other three they were built in Rhode Island.

Valencia Sailing: Does the fact you have four customers create any problems or conflicts, especially if you consider that Luna Rossa is one of Alinghi's most threatening challengers.
Ben Hall: All four syndicates have very strong design teams. If we had to do all the design work ourselves, in house, then we wouldn't be able to take as many teams. We are manufacturers after all, like the boatbuilders. For each project we have the same type of structure. First of all there is the primary design that comes from the team. They do all the research and we are not involved with that. They have a mast designer who gives us all the drawings to build the mast. We manufacture it and we have a project manager assigned to each team who of course is in connection with our engineering department.

Valencia Sailing: Do you make any suggestions on possible improvements?
Ben Hall: It's funny because some of the newer teams would approach us asking, “How does Alinghi do this?”. We obviously don't comment these things but the only thing where we interact, no matter who is designing, is when we observe discrepancies such a pin of 11mm that is supposed to go into a hole of 10mm. It goes without saying we can't either comment on what Alinghi did in the previous Cup. We are extremely careful with that and we think it's a fundamental question of trust. We can have some difficult situations such as the one a month ago, when three masts of three different teams were in construction simultaneously in our factory, at different stages of completion. All three teams had their people visiting our offices at the same time and it was a juggling act. They had to stay in different offices and all our employees had to be careful about who was were. It is also a primordial issue of security for the teams. People can't just walk around the shop unattended.

Valencia Sailing: How long does it take to build an America's Cup mast?
Ben Hall: It all depends. The tooling is the first step and you must have it made. Assuming also that the mould is there and if you start from that premise then it's usually a process of 10 to 12 weeks. Sometimes it can be accelerated a little bit but it has never been more than 12 weeks. It of course depends on whether it's a newer design or one that has been done before but as I said it is almost always in that frame of 10 to 12 weeks.