Adding extra ballast to an RL28 to improve performance, comfort and safety:

Neringa my RL28 with standard ballast of 350kg has a lively motion especially in gusty conditions and heels quickly requiring early reefing of sails.
In this video I add a permanent ballast along the base of the keel case of 140kg to improve both motion at sea and self righting ability for open water sailing. Before permanently fixing the ballast sea trials with the weight in place showed reduced heeling, later reefing and generally a better motion of the boat in gusty conditions. The weight added was more than for the standard RL28's built to survey but less than the maximum added to some survey vessels. The ballast ratio on Neringa was increased from 26% up to 36% increasing seaworthiness for open water sailing. The 40 % ballast ratio quoted on the RL site was for the few boats built for open water conditions.
Sailing performance has not been reduced by the ballast and on some days has increased performance with the ability to carry more sail for a given wind.

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