Great to finally get in contact with some of our brothers "up and over". I had the distinct pleasure of meeting one of your racers by the name of Craig Oliver whilst on a visit to Washington D.C at XMAS time. Craig showed me his boat and the type of equipment you blokes are running with over there. It was certainly an eye openner for me. You have access to some great material helping keep your weight down. I obtained some phone numbers for Gary and Dale Whalmsly and gave them a call while State side and they were both terrific. I have talked to Gary on a couple of occassions in regard to chasing propellors for which he is puting the word out on your web site on my behalf.

I would like to just to tell you a bit about our class of boats over here. We consist of a small but enthusiastic group of competitors numbering about 15 in total. We run a stock as a rock Toyota 4AG-E Twin Cam 1600cc engine. Within the rules the fuel injection may be removed and the engine run twin side draught 45 mm Weber carbies. Most racers have adopted this in preference to fuel injection due to the simplicity and reliability of the carbies.

With this combination we generally get about 7500 to 8000 rpm. These engines are just about bullet proof with very few meltdowns experienced. Many of the boats over here are quite old by any standard( 10 - 15 years). Quite a few still competing are the old "shovel nose" design. These boats are about 14 feet long and of fibreglass or wood construction. There have been a couple of attempts by various racers to update througgh building Studecker design boats however these were built too heavy and never really performed well. There is one Jones designed boat racing which was hand built by a young bloke by the name of Steve Scott about 7 years ago. After some initial teething problems he has won everything over the last 4 years. An American built Carbon Fibre boat was imported about 2 years ago however the owner, who also races a Grand Prix Hydro , has not found the time or money to get it on the water. I have actually just finished building my own Jones dsign hull from plans I obtained 3 years ago. THis is an older Jones hull of some 10 years. More recently a boat builder in New South Wales, some 12 hours drive North of here, has started building some very fast and lightweight wooden boats. Although none has yet gone accross the Kilos we suspect that these boats are getting about 110 mph in the straight away. Needless to say none of the older boats can keep up.

We generally tend to run on some fairly rough water over here and hence there is a tendancy to build the boats a little( ok a lot ) heavier than you might. I'm not exctly sure of what you consider rough water but the video I will send Gary will give you some idea.

We run on a course about 1.8 km in length over 3 buoy turns. Our speed record stands at 101 mph achieved by Steve Scott in his home built Jones boat.

All the racers here are out to enjoy a good time on the lake and basically run for $50 tow money at the end of the day. Needless to say that after racing we all head to the pub for a beer and brag about who would have won if only .....

Well thats a brief wrap up of where we are at. I certainly am impressed with what I have seen of your WEB site and the organisation you have pushing your sport. We only wish we could get some of it over here. Who knows, maybe one day we might get some money together and come over with a couple of boats for a drive around the lake.

I hope this might be the start of further correspondance between us and I look forward to sharing this contact with my other racing mates. We compete here under the banner of the OZ LITES.

Hope you all had a great XMAS newyear.

p.s.... I really am desperate to get onto some R.H Mercury spline props in the 9 or 10 inch diam by 15 to 16 inch pitch. We have nothing here to work with. Can you help?