|
KZ Marine is pleased to announce the appointment of James Gordon to the team, with James coming on board as KZ Racefurlers Brand Manager, responsible for international sales and support for the KZ Racefurlers line.  James joins KZ Marine from a rigging background, bringing a wealth of knowledge and experience from within the sailing industry that will hugely benefit all of KZ Marine's customers. Having previously worked for some of the world’s most prestigious sailing teams including the Camper Volvo Ocean Race Challenge, before four years in the TP52 Super Series circuit with Ran and then Provezza, James has also spent time working for Team New Zealand in the AC45 World Series events. Prior to joining KZ Marine James worked for the offshore Maxi Rambler 88.
James will be the point of contact for all sales and support for the KZ Racefurlers brand - please update your records accordingly. JAMES GORDON EMAIL: [email protected] MOBILE: +64 21804227 SKYPE: KZMarine For more information on the KZ Racefurlers range click here or download the KZ Racefurlers Brochure.
1 Comment
Effective as of 14 April 2016 Keryn McMaster, KZ Racefurlers Brand Manager, is leaving her role at KZ Marine Group. Keryn will be taking a year out to travel with her family, undertaking an extended world trip, before returning to New Zealand in 2017. Keryn joined the company five years ago, following a highly successful professional racing career and time out to start her family. One of the world’s most respected female sailors her accolades include two Volvo Ocean Race campaigns.  A restructure moving forward sees Rick Hackett, Managing Director of KZ Marine Group, take up the sales and service role, building on the current high standards of service, whilst Greg East will fully take over the design and production team. Rick has always worked closely alongside Keryn whilst being involved in design and production, so a seamless handover of operations is anticipated.
“We are, of course, very sorry to see Keryn go, but pleased that her departure is for all the right reasons and we look forward to hearing about her travels,” says Hackett. “Keryn’s significant experience has proved invaluable to the Racefurlers brand and we thank her for all her efforts, dedication and hard work during her time here.”
KZ Racefurlers continues to strengthen as the furler brand of choice for the performance-focused yachts and superyachts. In demonstration of the line's reliability and high service standards in February 2016 Volvo Ocean Race announced that KZ Racefurlers would continue as the official furler supplier to the Volvo Ocean Race 2017-2018. KZ Racefurlers is proud to have been confirmed as the official furler supplier to the Volvo Ocean Race 2017-2018. "This news builds on our longstanding relationship with the Race and we look forward to working with Race organisers and the teams again to ensure that they have the best furling gear available to take them around the world with confidence," says Keryn McMaster, KZ Racefurlers Brand Manager.  Photo by Matt Knighton on Abu Dhabi Ocean Racing/Volvo Ocean Race "KZ Marine have been part of the Volvo Ocean Race for many years now and with the transition to the Volvo Ocean 65 they were an obvious choice to be furler supplier," says Nick Bice, Head of The Boatyard for the Volvo OCean Race 2017-2018. "The Volvo Ocean 65 had a few pre requisites that were required to become a supplier, no more so than reliability and that is what we got. With over 350.000 miles accumulated between the fleet of 7 boats, the performance of the furling systems were second to none in both ease of use and reliability. The Boatyard and The Volvo Ocean Race look forward to continuing our relationship with KZ Marine as fuller supplier for the next edition of the race which will also be a very popular choice amongst the teams”  Nick Bice KZ Racefurlers is pleased to announce that we are officially supporting the new FAST40+ Class and FAST40+ Race Circuit, which officially launched on the 14th of January at the London Boat Show. Defined as light displacement race boats, with an IRC TCC of between 1.210 and 1.270, the FAST40+ boats will deliver close and exciting inshore racing. “The FAST40+ Class is an ideal fit for KZ Racefurlers, with its emphasis on high performance and exciting racing,” says Keryn McMaster, Brand Manager of KZ Racefurlers. “We are proud to be supporting the Class right from it’s inaugural season and looking forward to seeing the Class continue to grow.”  Having been in the making since 2013 this new class has already seen great interest with 12 teams from six nations entered in the Race Circuit and more set to sign up. So far the fleet is made up of two Carkeek 40 MKIIs, three Ker 40+ boats, five GP42’s, one highly optimised Ker 40 and an HH42.  INVICTUS - one of the FAST40+ fleet The Race Circuit will see competition based around five key Solent-based events including Cowes Week and the FAST40+ UK National Championship, as well as the RORC Easter Challenge, Warsash Spring Championships, JP Morgan Round the Island Race and Garmin Hamble Big Boat Championships, with Class Starts at each event. The points series will commence in May 2016 at the Vice Admiral’s Cup event.  42 South As well as sponsoring the class, KZ Racefurlers is also sponsoring one of the fleet, GP42 42 South. Owned by London based Kiwi Mark Rijkse the yacht is currently undergoing a refit ahead of the upcoming racing season. “We are kitting the boat out in the best KZ Racefurler equipment and are looking forward to following 42 South’s progress throughout the upcoming season,” says McMaster.
Rick and Keryn will be walking the show at METS (Marine Equipment Trade Show) this year. Held in Amsterdam METS is an important event in the annual marine calendar and we are looking forward to meeting with old and new contacts alike.  We love this shot of Bella Mente at the Maxis in Sardinia in September 2015. The mighty Bella carries our furlers - a KZ6 Inshore Top Down furler on the prod with a new extension strop using KZ custom parts, and a KZ4 Inshore Top Down Furler on the genoa staysail.  KZ Racefurlers has just completed work on our largest ever furlers: our new KZ25 furler and KZ25 Xtreme Head Swivel 25T furler. The first set, ordered by Mike Toppa of North Sails Florida, has just been completed for a new build Nautor's Swan yacht and is on its way to the yard in Finland.   The launch of these new models expands our range out to 25T safe working load (SWL) with a break load (BL) of 45T. The KZ25 Head Swivel is an 'Xtreme' version with all stainless steel replaced with titanium to save weight. This unit weighs only 3540gm, compared to a standard version at 5420gm, giving a saving of almost 2kgs.  Pen for scale - look at the size of these things! KZ Racfurlers have just completed a full new set of racefurlers to be used on a new build Botin 65 ft racing yacht in Italy. She'll be carrying KZ6 Offshore Furlers with titanium down fuckers for 2:1 tack lines, KZ6 integrators for Top Down Furling and KZ6 Head Swivels and KZ2 Inshore Furler set for the staysail. These red head swivels are our new range of KZ8 with a SWL (Safe Working Load) of 8T. The red colour differentiates them so they don't get mixed up with the KZ6's - and was made especially to match a colour request by the boat. We thoroughly enjoyed working on the project, and particular thanks go to talian rigging company SOLUZIONI TESSILI!  To stay on the water longer, keep your equipment functioning the way it should do. We recommend every season that furlers and head swivels should be stripped and cleaned, spindles should be crack tested, pin holes checked for elongation and new bearings fitted with new grease. At the recent Volvo Ocean Race stopover in Auckland, we saw a huge difference between well maintained furlers and those that had received little love on the long ocean stretches. Teams which had a good maintenance schedule ultimately spent less on their equipment, as the only thing needing to be done was a clean, regrease and reassemble. Poor maintenance resulted in not only needing new bearings but in some cases, new spindles and housings as well.  Pictured here, above and below, is a poorly serviced unit from one of the Volvo Ocean Race teams. When we collected it for servicing, the bearing was in pieces and ceased into the housing. This furler had done 15,000 NM with no servicing. In these conditions we would expect the furlers to be checked and re-greased every 5000NM !   Talk to one of the team today about scheduling in a service for your KZ parts.
Newly-launched Maxi 72, MOMO has been equipped with a full set of KZ Racefurlers. Built by Italian yard, Persico, the 72 foot yacht is carrying our 6T inshore series furlers, head swivels and integrators for top down production sails with associated components.  Credit: Momo Racing MOMO's prod furlers have KZ Marine titanium foreguys for the tack line which allows for a captive 2:1 tack line connection to the furler as well as a built-in facility to set up pull back lines for in line peeling. Completing the KZ Marine equipment onboard are 2T inshore series furlers and head swivels for the spinnaker staysail.
Already showing her racing credence, MOMO won her first event of the season, the Menorca Cup 2015, coming first in the Maxi 72 class. She was in good company, with all competitors in the Maxi 72 class bearing KZ gear. |
AuthorKZ Marine Group is the world's leading marine hardware manufacturer. Archives
April 2017
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed
