On Tue, 22 Nov 2005 15:02:35 UTC, "Papa3"
wrote:

Speaking of "whatever happened to"... I recall seeing an article in
S&G a number of years back about a ship designed in the UK for simple,
low cost construction using a "new" laminate or honeycomb material.

That was the Edgeley (I may have too many 'e's in there) Optimist. The
honeycomb material was the stuff they make commercial aircraft floors
from. I don't think it got beyond prototype, but I could be wrong.

I was teaching some mature student engineers a few years back in a
class on composite materials, and using glider spars as an example.
One of the students later said "Do you think the Optimist looks like
an ASK-18?" I replied "Are you a glider pilot?" "No", he said, "but I
work for the company which built the Optimist prototype, and we were
constantly taking measurements of aan ASK-18 which we had in the
workshop."

I thought there were strong similarities in the appearance ...

Ian

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