Victoria Upgrades divider

There's a million suggestions for Victoria model yacht upgrades,
so I thought I'd put mine out here as well.
Also see Eric's tips here.

Many sources can be found starting at our Supporter's and links page.

Photos coming soon, many are seen at the VRC tips section already

Cheap Drain plug - a squirt gun plug in a properly sized hole
$$? Free or .. maybe 89 cents if you have to buy a pack of small squirt guns.

For starters, upgrade any stock sail servo that comes in a Radio kit to something like the Hitec RCD High Torque HS-625MG or the Hitec RCD HS-645MG, these put out 91 and 133 Oz/in of torque (at 6V) over a stock servo's 49 Oz/in and are the same physical size.  These new servos are smaller than the Hitec 715 or 815 Sail arm servos, weigh less, and have enough torque for the Victoria, (they're also $30 less than Futaba's S3801) The standard servo works fine for a rudder servo.
About $45.00

Get a 6V NiMh rechargeable Receiver battery like the Hobbico HydriMax 1200mAh (or larger) One long charge on a standard wall charger and I can sail my Victoria all weekend with power to spare.
About $25.00

When you upgrade the sails, you should upgrade the mast and booms to Carbon Fiber, it cuts down on weight aloft, and less chance of bending or breaking the stock aluminum mast with plastic mast joiner.  I've been able to use much of the stock parts from the Victoria gooseneck and such on the new mast and booms. Tie the sails on with SpiderWire.
About $15.00

Change the stock single arm sail arm to a double arm sail arm I made mine out of some light aluminum, some make them from plastic or wood even.  Mine is 6 inches long with a dog leg on the jib side of the arm.
$$? Depends, could be free...

Put two fairleads in for your Jib Sheet and Main sheet, geometry comes into play here, if your double sail arm has equal length arms with equidistant blocks on it, then your main sheet fairlead should be just as far from the mast as the jib sheet fairlead is from the jib pivot (or very near) This allows the main and the jib to be "let out" equally or very near so.  You DON'T want your jib to go out to 90 degrees abeam and your main to only go out to 70 degrees abeam.  Boat won't sail as well as when both sails can reach out equally on a run.
$$? Depends, could be free using kit parts or cheap using other tips from the VRC.

Questions? Contact V32 Class Secretary