FOILER 1 Grand Prix

[Doug Lord]

Check this out:
Foiler1 GP
Address:http://www.foiler1.com/ Changed:8:43 PM on Wednesday, July 20, 2005
Does anyone know the story behind this site?
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UPDATE2/28/06-the site is maintained by Rohan Veal Moth World Champion and will be updated as time goes on; hopefully it will contain the most information found anywhere on Moth Foiler performance-just known FACTS.
See post #61, page 5 this date for a compendium of what is known at this point about Moth foiler performance.

[Raggi_Thor]

I would have to ask you, the foiler expert :-)

[Doug Lord]

Well, I've written the contact address and no response(see update below)
========================
For those that think they might want to consider building a Foiler Moth in the USA see page 5 post # 73.

[Raggi_Thor]

Doug, I would like to know more about the balance of a foiler moth.
How does it work in practice?
Probably there is a thread for this already...

[Doug Lord]

Just got an e-mail from Rohan Veal, World Champion in the foiler Moth. This site belongs to him and the concept is not dead but still being developed.
-----------------------
Raggi, if you're talking about balance in the sense of keeping it upright I've never sailed one but according to those that have the boat is very unstable to start with-takes loads of practice to sail the boat well off the foils. Weight is initially moved aft(to increase foil angle of attack) for the earliest takeoff then as the boat comes up moved forward again-a bit- depending on conditions. Once up the boat is much more stable.The boat is sailed upwind heeled to weather to unload the vertical fin and to increase RM.
Numerous Moth designers and sailors have commented(see UK Moth site) that buoyancy pods would help beginners get started.
Recently Sebastian Josse(Abn Amro VOR) sailed Veal's boat and foiled the very first time-and then was so impressed he bought the boat-see the video on page two of this forum.

[Chris Ostlind]

He foiled the first time or he foiled on the first day out? The video clearly shows him trying to get the boat going and it capsizes. Later, apparently, he does get it up on foils.

It ain't that easy and by all accounts, even from experienced, high performance, small boat racing sailors, there's lot's of swimming the first few times on the water.

I love your zeal, Doug.

Chris

[Doug Lord]

As I understand it he foiled fairly shortly after starting. No question buoyancy pods would have made his transition easier.Many Moth experts* are saying that you should plan on sailing a couple of seasons before attempting foiling. I think that's nuts: an equal number of Moth experts(designers, sailors, builders) agree that the pods would make it easier for beginners to get to the good part: foiling!
* edit-superfluous info removed

[Baronvonrort]

The pods are not allowed in the Moth class.

[Doug Lord]

Pods aren't allowed for racing according to the class rules BUT nothing says that beginners couldn't use them in non class racing to learn to sail the boat on foils.See the UK Moth website for the comments by several Moth guys regarding the use of pods helping beginners.
There seems to be some enthusiasm for building International Moths in the US(see SA under Dinghy Anarchy:" Moths in the NE USA")-at least two foiler Moths are currently under construction in Florida. What concerns me is that ALL this new Moth enthusiasm is due 100% to the foiler Moth and there are those "experts"(in the Moth class and otherwise) that are telling these guys that they'll have to sail the boat as a seahugger two or three seasons BEFORE they foil. Removable buoyancy pods would allow them to foil on their FIRST day sailing as opposed to waiting a year or so which would build their enthusiasm for the boat and class rather than try their patience.

[usa2]

All the pods are going to do is soften a crash(maybe). The reason the "experts" in the Moth class claim a Moth is more stable on foils is because that is relative to sailing one in the water. These Moth sailors have sailed the boats in the water, where they are very unstable, so that when they get the boats foiling, it seems much more stable by comparism. But how stable is a foiler Moth compared to the average dinghy in the U.S?(i.e., 420, Laser, V15, whatever else there is...)

And also, how many of the average sailors would be able to foil the thing without wiping out many times on the first day? Buoyancy pods may do wonders for rolling and broaching, but when you are on foils the main problem is pitchpoling, and that is what is going to happen. Some novice at foiling is going to think they can do it with buoyancy pods, but then they go out and promptly nose down and get catupultped off the stern. Yes, that will definitely build enthusiasm by the sailors for the class.

There is no such thing as instant gratification in the world, so i dont think sailing a moth for one day is going to end up with the sailor foiling perfectly. I would think a month or two might be enough time to get a sailor up on foils, but it is definitely not happening within the first day.

[Doug Lord]

2, the buoyancy pods are designed to help you get to foiling sooner which they will definitely do; they would have no or very limited effect when foiling.
When you've got a bunch of short attention span kids being told it may take "two or three seasons" before they can foil you've got a serious problem. Again, some of the best Moth sailors around think that bouyancy pods could help beginners -I'm convinced they could and speak from some experience: Quite a while ago I designed and built a 14 foot seahugger about two inches wider than a Moth with a bit more sail area that used pods -without them learning the boat would have taken much, much longer-if I didn't just say to hell with it.
Getting foiling at the earliest possible point is the key thing if the excitement generated by foiling is the main motivating factor -which I'm convinced it is.
Moth pods:Is this a trimaran?
http://www.int-moth.org.uk/IsthisamothSP.htm

[Chris Ostlind]

No offense, Doug, but when was the last time you pitchpoled your face into a set of wires on your first day out on a new, never been on it, boat? Did you have the sand to get back in the saddle with the red welts still showing?

If you're talking about a serious enthusiast's package, you may have a very good argument for a US version of the Moth. If it's a recreational sailor and their propensity for no-brainer, push-button solutions to everything in their lives, you have a huge chasm to cross.

I've been doing outrigger equipped sailing canoes of my own design for about 5 years now and believe me, it's a very tough argument to even get folks, who are already canoe enthusiasts, into a boat, much less sell them one.

Foiling is very cool to me, but I liken the leap from trad dinghies as I would in getting the driving public to step away from their Accords and into an open wheel sports car.

There will always be a very skinny sliver of boat dudes who will spew for the chance to drive a foiler. Some of the spewers will even spring the cash to own one outright. But the sliver of dudes ain't enough in the numbers column to justify the outlay beyond the novel few who are really into it.

Like I said, I love your energy on the issue.

Chris

[Doug Lord]

Well, Chris there's danger everywhere. I've read many a story of begining Moth foiling but haven't heard that one. I've read of guys that thought it was easy to learn to foil and of others that have struggled with it.Most every story reflects the extreme difficulty of learning to sail seahugger Moth. Many of the current short list of monofoilers are self taught with no benefit gleaned from instruction or training by experienced people-no wonder there are so many different impressions of starting out. But those kinds of crashes won't be affected one way or another by buoyancy pods-crashing is always a possibility with some systems and in some conditions. But ,undeniably, pods would help people get to the good part sooner. Moth foilers can take off in relatively light wind and the threshold is getting lighter all the time.Beginners would start in the most favorable foiling conditions to learn in-not crash and burn weather.
My point is that it will be far better in growing foiling to get those interested doing it-first in the easiest conditions- as opposed to having these same people spend lots of time learning to sail a Moth(or other foiler) in seahugging mode with no hope of foiling for several seasons.
A good friend of mine was injured badly on a Hobie cat when taken out by an idiot-you described what happened to her. If people aren't taught well sailing on any high performance boat can be a disaster.
As to what the popularity of foiling will be I think you're way off base but only time will tell. I think with excellent equipment, good instruction and a "Hobie" behind the company a Peoples Foiler could revolutionize the sport of small boat sailing.
I'll repeat this again: monofoiling is in its infancy; there are facets of the sport that have not been explored yet except accidentally-such as jumping.There's a lot of history yet to be written but the Moth started it all and is one way people can get foilng NOW. The Moth thread on SA is the second most popular "Dinghy Anarchy" thread and I believe reflects a tremendous interest in foiling-an interest that will only grow as more people witness the extraordinary performance up close and personal.
You just don't see an 11' monohull that can beat an A Class cat, 49er or match speeds with a 20' Tornado every day-it's just the begining of the revolution...
================================================
From Rohan Veal-see whole article below:
"And from my personal experience there has not been one person so far that has not enjoyed their first sail on a hydrofoiled Moth, could not wipe the smile off their face or has not wanted a second go on one."
Moth Future
http://www.rohanveal.com/articles/foiling_future.html

[Chris Ostlind]

Well, actually, Doug the reference came from the pages of the site to which you referred us with great enthusiasm.

I tell you what... explain to me how a boat, with an extraordinarily short LOA for its speed potential, can avoid being stuffed and pitchpoled at least once in awhile. When you couple this with your routine claims for extraordinary speed (about which I do not dispute) you have the recipe for a nice set of red welts across your mug, if not more serious impact slamming on other parts of your body, when being tossed at speed into the rigging. It's physics, Doug.

Secondly, what is happening to the boat's COG when it's up on foils? I would just venture to guess, here, that it's seriously being lifted away from the water's surface. Do you suppose, even a little, that a tripped foil, a caught bow surface, a poorly sailed angle into a wave, etc. will cause the mass of the boat, under the speeds you suggest, to rotate forward around the COG in a dramatic fashion?

Thirdly, do you suppose that the novice sailors to whom you want to aim this product, will not be routinely demonstrating this maneuver due to less than accomplished skill sets, poor judgement, recklessness at speed, etc.?

If you have only seen one such incident and it happened on a cat involved in a collision, then you haven't been sailing much on high performance boats. Both of these shortcomings can be corrected with a little more time in the saddle.

The picture attached supports the pitchpole potential and it's probably not unique with just a little more digging in photo archives.

You have placed yourself in a marginalized position as far as a open mind would go, seeing as how you want to market a product with foils. Any and all issues to the contrary for a new boat before it hits the water would be killer bad news to the public's perception, so I do understand the posturing.

You reference SA forums as being popular. Now, I can't speak for you, but my understanding of the SA crowd is that they are exactly the spewers to which I referred in my earlier letter. If you think that size market potential can drive a successful commercial product, then you have more money to give away than I do and I wish you much luck in the enterprise. The marketing budget alone, for a boat of this type, will cost more than the SA crowd can provide in orders. Again, good luck.

Additionally, this quote stands out in support of my argument that it's not a set-it and forget, Ron Popeil of Ronco fame, kind of sailing enterprise. Also, from the pages of the site by none other than Nigel Oswald, as follows:

http://www.int-moth.org.uk/TechniqueSP.htm

"It is likely that you are an experienced sailor already if you want to sail a Moth. You may find the experience intimidating or embarrassing, but stick with it. One of the beauties of the class is that it takes dedication above and beyond most conventional sailing dinghies. This does not appeal to everyone, but to the select few."

Case closed

[usa2]

are you going to answer the question posed by myself and Chris about pitchpoling?

[Doug Lord]

Chris,you, apparently, didn't read my last post very well-no matter and no case at all! I've made a good case for buoyancy pods as have the Moth guys on the UK forum-removable, of course. There is no way a beginner(begining Moth sailor-see below) is going to get good at foiling by spending several seasons sailing in seahugger mode. Anything that can be done to allow foiling sooner will be an advantage. I've never said sailing a Moth is easy or that there won't be the ocasional crash and burn-so what? For every crash there are many , many hours of successful -and fun- foiling! Read Rohan Veals comments at the bottom of my last post.And my comments about conditions -and instruction.
You seem to be trying to say that because the boat might crash and burn that foiling should be discouraged or at least not encouraged. That even though I have repeatedly pointed out the whole hydrofoil scene is in it's infancy that there are endemic physical reasons why teaching new people to foil is a lost cause-HOGWASH!
Crashes may be a part of the technology or the technique-makes no difference-since both are improving at breakneck speed.To the degree that there will be crashes-again-so what? Rohans comments answer that question...
There is no question that using buoyancy pods will get begining Moth sailors on foils sooner but that doesn't mean it will be easy-it won't be but it will be loads of fun experiencing flying and the relatively high speeds in the light conditions first time foilers should start in. By the way I'm saying first time Moth sailors-not people that have never sailed before. The Moth foiler,
even with pods, is not a trainer! Nor will a Peoples Foiler be a trainer- but with the technology that can be incorporated it could be a good next step.
The fact is that Moth monofoiling has captured the imagination of many-and the number of people wanting to give it a go grows every day.
======================
edit: PS- regarding Chris's words about the "SA crowd" and budgets: SA made history with the so far successful marketing of the 30' FT10-70 orders over the website-not too shabby if it continues to work out. I say well done guys! Don't discount Sailing Anarchy or Dinghy Anarchy......

[SuperPiper]

Chris, your physics arguments could be applied to bicycling. And, pavement is a little harder than water. But we still take the training wheels off and shove our kids down the hill.

Why foil a moth? The moth looks to be one of the most difficult boats to sail even in sea hugger mode.

If someone could develop a foiler kit for the garden variety laser, they would sell 10,000 of them in the first season. No pods required.

[John ilett]

The foiling moths rarely pitchpole, what is there to trip over? There is no hull making excessive drag as would happen when other boats pitchpole.

Worst case is when the main foils comes out of the water that it can (not always) ventilate. The ventilation makes the boats come back down to the water quick enough for a spectacular nose dive but 8 out 10 ten are sailed away from.

The picture posted by Chris is not a pitch pole sequence. A capsized boat can have the sail filled with the boom up in air against the side stay. Then as the boats are so light, given enough wind the rig will roll the whole boat over it's bow. The sailor can be seen holding on to wing guiding the roll over and not flying through the air.

Have you sailed any foilers Chris?

[casavecchia]

Hi John,
what about first time out foiling?
It can be done, Manuel did it, others too did it, without pods, right?
Cheers,
Marco.

[John ilett]

That's right. Manuel from Italy came to Perth in Feb 2005 and sailed my own boat for the first time, getting up and foiling ok on the same day.

Starting out on a low rider is a good idea to learn some boat handling and anticipation particular to the moth but all you need to do is pull on the sensor wand shockcord tighter to prevent the boat from foiling or add a bit more lift to the rudder with a twist of the tiller extension. Then when you feel ready let it foil.

Windsurfing is difficult to learn too but it doese'nt seem to stop people from enjoying final reward.

Learning to capsize and right them again is all part of it, they're very quick to get going again but you could lose alot of ground when the competition is cruising at 20 knots. Makes for exciting racing.

[Doug Lord]

Super Piper- actually quite a debt of gratitude is owed by those interested in monohull foiling to the Moth innovators. If it hadn't been for the historic development traditions within that class it's unlikely the extraordinary foilers we see now and that are clearly possible in the future would have half a chance to progress beyond the fringe. Using just two foils to sail a monohull was pioneered by Ian Ward and developed into a race winning World Championship level system by John Ilett using a wand altitude control system for the first time on a monohull.
One of the most important characteristics for any foiler is the ability to get up early in the lightest possible wind- that favors a fairly high beam to length ratio(10/1 or so so) that allows the boat to transition to foiling speed early. Another reason for the Moth pintail designs is to facillitate early takeoff by allowing the crew to slide aft pitching up the bow and changing the angle of attack of the whole foil system allowing for even earlier takeoff.
Here is the begining of new develoment-a boat by Simon Maguire called the M4-note the buoyancy pods. This boat is nowhere near as developed as the Ilett foiling system but the guy is trying to come up with a Peoples Foiler. I've talked to him and he is committed to producing a boat that makes foiling easy for greater numbers of people.The M4 concept:
http://www.sailm4.co.uk/index.php
The M4 is future development as are the boats I'm working on but if you want to foil a monohull now there is only one choice: the Moth.
Given any measure of "bang for the buck" and the fact that the Moth can be home built or purchased ready to fly the boat is an extraordinary value with extraordinary technology.
Making monofoiling accessible to more people and easier to learn is a priority for a lot of people around the world- I wouldn't be surprised to see the Fastascraft Team and John Ilett come up with a major breakthru in that area as well!
As I've said before: foiling a monohull on just two hydrofoils is a revolution in sailing that ranks with the most significant changes in small boat sailing in the last hundred years-and it is only just begining.

[Chris Ostlind]

To all the foiler afficiandoes out there, these are the bottom line arguments working against your interests in having a boat that will be a hit for the entry-level, sailing public.

1.Complexity of product (perceived and otherwise)

2. Expense as an out-the-door product in which more parts on the boat equals more money to buy

3. Fiddly stuff that takes huge amounts of time to learn

4.Gimmicky technology that is way outside the envelope of what is known as a normal boat by the buying public

Everywhere, the sales of recreational products that have an expanded level of complexity are not doing as well as those that do not. The recreational sailing market is not as big as you guys think it might be. The available buying public already has hundreds of other, easier to use, distractions for outdoor pursuits. (including bikes with training wheels)

Hobie is a successful company, now, with cash rolling in the door mostly due to their sales of rotomolded, entry level, kayaks and catamarans. They still make and sell boats that are complex and fiddly, but even there, they have cut back on the models offered in their line in favor of cheaper, less complex models.

When one has an on-going business model like Hobie that is showing the way for economic success, it absolutely amazes me that someone can stand in the sun and say with a straight face, we can buck the trend in a big way and make, "MILLIONS, I TELL YOU"

10,000 units sold of a foiler? In one season? Whew! That is some good weed you've got there, SuperPipe. How about you step-up then, and toss some hard earned green into Doug's coffer and prove it? No, don't ignore the challenge. Put your money where your speculative mouth is and prove it.

For that matter... Doug. Go get yourself a refinance on your home for the necessary capital and stick your cheese in the wind, personally, and prove to all of us that we need to apologize. I'll be happy to apologize, if and when, you can pull it off with a going concern that is pumping-out foilers at a 10,000 a year clip.

Direct marketing of a 30' Sport Boat within the SA crowd of spewers, compared to the issues surrounding a small, one person techno-boat are not even close to the same. I already acknowledged that you'll get orders from the spew crowd because they are the ones who rush to the flame. Without the general public stepping-up, though, you will have a nice, little curiosity that essentially goes nowhere along with an expensive set of tools sitting in the corner of your garage doing nothing. I suggest you begin your marketing campaign with SuperPiper and the relatively few dudes who feel they have to have one of these boats. Get them to buy enough vapor while you sort out the technology in its infancy, and get yourself running down the track.

One of the really good indicators in the new, personal, Everyman's boat market is how readily they can be sold into the hotel/beach rental trade as boats avaliable for the general public when they are on vacation. Why don't you spend a few hours showing your example around to hotel owners and see how many of them you can move out the door? In fact, when you do garner a sale to a hotel beach rental outfit, please tell us who it is so we can partake of the magic when we go on vacation.

I can see it now: A young and inexperienced hotel manager in Cozumel takes a winger on a foiler and Joe Vacationer spends his entire afternoon trying like hell to get his butt up on foils in the hot sun of the Gulf of Mexico. His wife and kids are on the beach waiting for his stubborn persona and finally he does get the boat to foil. He rides that bad boy into the beach with a big grin on his face and WHAM!, he plants the foils in the sand at speed, does, in fact, pitchpole the fiddly boat and spends the rest of his two week stay in paradise in a traction cast while his wife and kids wipe his butt for him. I can hear the sound of lawyers speed dialing your number all across America as we speak. Yep, that's what the boating public needs as an entry-level boat.

Pitchpoling will happen when you start getting less than experienced sailors out on the water in these boats. Their level of understanding, as well as ability to read conditions will change the numbers dramatically. They will have expectations for being able to take their boats anywhere that they see the others guys going and they'll make liars out of all of you in the fantastic ways they can dump their boats while simply out for a sail. You said you wanted to sell to the general public and not savvy, race prepped, sailors... you get the stuff that goes with that approach and that will blow your mind when the reports start to come in the door.

While you're at it, give a call to Greg Ketterman at Hobie and ask him if he'd be willing to buy or license your design concept and put it into production. Or perhaps Hunter, or any of the other big time boating outfits to see if this type of boat fits a nominal business plan. I can't see why your concept wouldn't be absolutely stunning in the board rooms of on-going boating manufacturers. I should think they'd be falling all over themselves trying to get the deal done with you on this, the way you talk about it.

Let me guess, you've already met resistance because it's a really hard sell for a number of reasons like: not using parts already in inventory, requires a separate marketing campaign with specific road crew to haul it around to boat dealers, boat dealers are already resistant to anything foily after taking a bath on Windriders and Trifoilers, etc, etc.

Right now, you're all full of your genius vision and in the company of other committed enthusiasts, you managed to convince yourself that this is actually going to work. Now, having a genius vision isn't, in itself, a bad thing. In fact, I applaud your willlingness to hang it out there to this point. Hanging-it-out with afficiandoes is not the way to get good feedback, though. You need to listen to what is being said by folks who are not so enamored by the techno-bits and get a grip before you hurt yourself and a few others in the process.

This foiling Moth thing has been going on in Australia for some time now, so I'd like to know just how many of these boats are actually out there among the Moth enthusiasts, themselves. Has the foiling Moth taken OZ by storm and now virtually no other boats of any kind are being sold except Moths? Produce some successful numbers that prove the point. And that's in a country that is much more attuned to sailing recreation than here in the US.

The facts are just as you said it, and more... the potential is in its infancy, it doesn't pass the criteria list at the top of the page with anything like a success quotient and unless you will put your own money on the line to prove your ideas, it's going to go nowhere save for a few excitable boys who would buy anyhting that looks like they can salvage their fading manhood.

It's a good gimmick; using technology to overcome that which you could never do on your best day as a younger man. We see it everyday here, in Salt Lake City; dude is now able to afford that whizbang carbon snowboard, bindings and boots and he can, at last, carve the turns and toss 720's with the local hotshoes in the halfpipe. Dude goes home in someone else's car because he can't drive his own away from the slope due to personal damage.

Like I said, in case you weren't listening/reading... put up your own dough/personal equity in the enterprise and get on with it. Front the tooling, marketing, production space, support technology, inventory, staff.. you know, all the stuff that makes for more than a whisp of foolishness on the Internet. When you and SuperPipe get to the 10,000 units mark, give me a ring and I'll take you to lunch and apologize. Until then....

Chris

[SuperPiper]

Hey Doug:

Chris put together a lot of words to convince us foiling may not happen.

Do you think that deep down he is afraid that it might?

[Doug Lord]

I've got to tell you that is one of the most pathetic,pessimistic, unfounded, diatribes I have EVER read on any subject! Based on four points that are totally ridiculous with little or no foundation in the real world with NO appreciation for the effort being expended by many people to develop a facet of sailing that was just born in 1999. Such unrepentent horsemanure!
That's the kind of attitude that justifies itself on a hardened hypothesis based on a conmplete lack of understanding of what is actually happening; speaking authoritatively of technical issues, boats and equipment of which the author simply has no accurate knowledge . An hypothesis of doom built on vacuous assertions dredged from the depths of a dead or dying imagination and delivered in a ponderous (and onerous) lecture of startling composition. Takes my breath away!
Now I know what "resistance" to new technology REALLY means- this is a manifesto of hopelessness....
I just hope your pathetic, hopeless, pessimistic comments are as wrong as they are ugly!!!!

[usa2]

that was quite a speech

[RHough]

that was quite a speech

Did you notice that it did not address any of the real questions? Did you notice that it contained no facts?

Commercial foilers have been available for years.

There must be a reason that we don't see 1,000's of Tri-foilers on the water every weekend.

Here is another way to look at foilers:

What conditions are required to foil?

What percentage of the time do those conditions exist?

What conditions prevent foiling?

What percentage of the time do those conditions exist?

Can conventional dinghies be sailed in conditions where foiling is not possible?

Will a sailor be able to enjoy more or less time sailing in a foiler or a conventional boat?

I don't expect any answers and I'm almost certain not to be disappointed. :)

[Doug Lord]

This thread is about monofoilers not multifoilers. Multifoilers, while having high top end speeds are poor performers in winds under about 15 knots . Monofoilers on the other hand can foil in wind conditions from around 8 knots on up this week. Next week they'll be able to foil in 5 knot winds. And do it upwind while pointing as high or higher than other boats. That's the major difference between the multifoilers and monofoilers:the Moth can foil in conditions that most people sail in every day-the multi's require too much wind.People that have built "Peoples Foiler" prototypes are all trying for the same thing: earliest takeoff possible not the highest top end speed(necessarily). Other major differences from a technical perspective include the fact that the multifoilers develop their own righting moment and have 50% more "surface penetrations" (3 foils vs 2 foils)than a monofoiler which uses crew weight and sailing technique to create righting moment.
The Moth can sail in the conditions any other dinghy can sail in and foil in most conditions beating almost any dinghy or skiff or cat under 20' in conditions that suit them both.Because of this ability to take off in light air time on the water is more and more time on foils in the Moth class-and that will be true of a Peoples Foiler as well.And that will make all the difference in the world in marketing these boats to sailors.
But the bi-foil monofoiler technology is just starting out-there are possibilities for their use on almost every size boat-the OUT 95(31') is going to sail on a bi-foil system next year and Bethwaite, Langman and others are looking at the monofoiler concept in anything from full flying 60' keelboat foilers to"semi-foilers " designed just to foil off the wind and retract their foils flush with the hull in non foiling conditions and upwind. Several designers are looking at "foil assist" systems requiring no altitude control for a wide range of different boats.
This is an exciting time led by the incredible development in the Moth class and by pioneers such as John Ilett and sailors like Rohan Veal and others-and it will change sailing for the better forever.

[usa2]

and how many people want to foil?
Seriously, this doesnt seem to be an easily marketable idea. Especially if it is for people with previous sailing experience. Would your average Laser,420, or Vanguard 15 sailor want to continue sailing in their respective, already very competitiver classes, or would they want to ditch that completely and try to learn to foil? A
It may make people initially attracted to the sport, but then they realize that they need to know how to sail well in normal boats to be able to sail a foiler. So maybe they will join another class, and enjoy it there so much that they forget the foiler idea.
Or they will just say "whatever" and spend their money on a big screen TV instead.

[Doug Lord]

Time will tell..

[RHough]

This thread is about monofoilers not multifoilers. Multifoilers, while having high top end speeds are poor performers in winds under about 15 knots . Monofoilers on the other hand can foil in wind conditions from around 8 knots on up this week. Next week they'll be able to foil in 5 knot winds.

They will never foil reliably in true wind below about 6 knots, at least not on this planet. But you've read and understood Bethwaite so you knew that.

... "Peoples Foiler" prototypes are all trying for the same thing: earliest takeoff possible not the highest top end speed(necessarily). Other major differences from a technical perspective include the fact that the multifoilers develop their own righting moment and have 50% more "surface penetrations" (3 foils vs 2 foils)than a monofoiler which uses crew weight and sailing technique to create righting moment.

LMAO, physics is physics. You condemn what you call "multi-foilers" for being too fast while admitting that what you call "mono-foilers" are designed for early lift-off rather than top speed.

Mono = one .... mono-foilers have two foils. Can we assume that mono-foilers cannot count? There are true mono-foil water-ski's, but this thread is about sailing foilers.

What you are comparing are single track foilers to multi-track foilers.

The speed that the craft can lift off is a simple relationship between sail area, foil area, and wind speed. A multi-track foiler could be designed to lift off at any speed a single track foiler can lift off. The multi-track boat would not have to rely on superb skill and reflexes to sail. At higher speeds, after the single track foiler has run out of righting moment, the multi-track foiler will sail faster as the weather foil comes out of the water.

pssst ... it is the same physics that make multi-hulls faster than mono-hulls in any size above demitasse. :)

The Moth can sail in the conditions any other dinghy can sail in and foil in most conditions beating almost any dinghy or skiff or cat under 20' in conditions that suit them both.

Have you ever sailed in SF Bay? I would really like to see a foiler moth in 30+ and 4 foot chop. Hell 20 and 2 foot chop. I've sailer a Laser in those conditions, bring on the foiler ... LOL

Now sail in 2-6 knot conditions ... way too funny.

But the bi-foil monofoiler technology ...

Is that kind of like a two wheeled uni-cycle? :D

[Doug Lord]

What I was comparing is the actual performance of the multifoilers that have been marketed vs the actual performance of the Moth monofoiler.The Hobie and Rave just wouldn't foil in lighter air where the Moth does-big difference. A multifoiler COULD be built to take off early as well but those two boats don't. By the way, my F3 RC multifoiler takes off reliably in 5mph(not knots) of wind.
As I said before the Moth is proving on a regular basis that it is probably the fastest sailboat under 20' beating cats, skiffs and everything in between in conditions that suit both boats. From what I hear the boats handle rough conditions quite well and have raced succesfully in tough conditions all over the world.

[usa2]

Moths+2 foils/multiple foils=multifoiler.

You wouldnt be able to market it as a monofoiler.

[RHough]

Moths+2 foils/multiple foils=multifoiler.

You wouldnt be able to market it as a monofoiler.

Don't confuse the issue with facts or logic. :)

[RHough]

By the way, my F3 RC multifoiler takes off reliably in 5mph(not knots) of wind.

For extra credit, can you explain why or why not that has any relevance to a Moth?

Please include the nature of air on planet earth and the effects of scale. Support your conclusion with numbers, formulas and graphics as needed. Show all your work, cite references. :)

[Doug Lord]

See www.monofoiler.com for the aeroSKIFF™ and other monofoilers.
The modern definition of monofoiler originates from the Moth class where the two foil system was deemed legal and the three foil system a "multihull configuration". In fact the original monofoiler was the Monitor which used a three foil system(actually multiple "ladder" foils in three positions) followed by a couple of other boats using three foil systems a 470 and FD in the 70's. Ian Ward sailed on just two foils for the first time in history in 1999; John Ilett and Rohan Veal made a two foil altitude controlled system a World Class race winner.

[Baronvonrort]

Doug
At the brass monkey regatta on Sydney Harbour the Moths did not beat any of the skiffs.
Keep fantasising!

[RHough]

The modern definition of monofoiler originates from the Moth class where ...

they cannot seem to understand that mono means one and then count the number of foils they use.

It's pretty basic, Mono ... one channel, Stereo ... two channels

The foiler Moths are Mono-Track Stereo Foilers! MTSF's :cool:

[Doug Lord]

Baron, I know the story of that regatta well: anti foiler guys use it all the time to prove how the foiler Moth doesn't really perform well at all! It was a bad day for sure-only two Moths one sailed by a new guy to foilers and one by the world champion in a borrowed boat. Both boats broke down and the gusty conditions gave them a fit. Too bad... But the recent Australian Moth speed record was 23.3 knots (I think) and the UK record is slightly higher. That's plain incredible performance for an 11 footer. Add to that the long lists of races where the Moth beat a fleet of A class cats, 49ers in the UK and 14's in Australia as well as recently matching speed with a Tornado in Aus. See the C cass thread on SA and look what they say about C class catamaran speed-about the same or slightly faster then the foiler Moth!

[RHough]

Add to that the long lists of races where the Moth beat a fleet of A class cats, 49ers in the UK and 14's in Australia as well as recently matching speed with a Tornado in Aus.

Please post the "long list". Results please, not anecdotes. :)

[Doug Lord]

Randy, do the research yourself-this stuff is scattered all over the web. I'm hoping that it will all be gathered together in one place -perhaps on the Foiler 1GP site before long.

[RHough]

Randy, do the research yourself-this stuff is scattered all over the web. I'm hoping that it will all be gathered together in one place -perhaps on the Foiler 1GP site before long.

I feel no need to support your claims. Apparently neither do you. :)

[Doug Lord]

Thats right Randy-I don't need to do a thing to support my "claims"-they're supported by the facts-facts mostly accessible to anyone.
Just heard from Rohan Veal and the Foiler 1 Grand Prix site-the original topic of this thread- will be updated before long with more Moth foiler facts.

[Nobody]

Baron, I know the story of that regatta well: anti foiler guys use it all the time to prove how the foiler Moth doesn't really perform well at all! It was a bad day for sure-only two Moths one sailed by a new guy to foilers and one by the world champion in a borrowed boat. Both boats broke down and the gusty conditions gave them a fit. Too bad... But the recent Australian Moth speed record was 23.3 knots (I think) and the UK record is slightly higher. That's plain incredible performance for an 11 footer. Add to that the long lists of races where the Moth beat a fleet of A class cats, 49ers in the UK and 14's in Australia as well as recently matching speed with a Tornado in Aus. See the C cass thread on SA and look what they say about C class catamaran speed-about the same or slightly faster then the foiler Moth!
Doug

Put up or Shut up. I know you are enthauastic but your claims are verging on that of a religous cult. Also on SA is a thread about how people over estimate the speeds of boat and how a single GPS data point for max speed can be many knots too fast. Here are a few simple questions. I have tried to find the answers but a google search has not revealed any outcome.

1. What is the fastest speed a Moth has gone over a timed 500m course?

2. In which regatta did the foiling moth beat a fleet of 49ers?

3. In which regatta did the foiling moth beat a fleet of A class cats?

If you just tell me the places I will do the work and find the results.

Don't get me wrong. I think the moths a cool and do go very fast. I have seen them sail by me several times and admire them very much. It is just your claims seem over the top and you refuse to provide any evidence.

Nobody.

[Doug Lord]

1) fastest on a timed 500 m course -no idea-see Rohans site and the UK site. I just read yesterday where Rohan did 23.3 or similar but can't find it-go to his site and write him(www.rohanveal.com)
2)John Ilett sent me a newspaper clipping over a year ago describing Simon Payne(UK) "as the fastest thing on the water" and sailing at the same handicap as a Tornado.I don't remember where the regatta was but it was in England. Further he said he was "about 15% faster" *** than the 49er's in that regatta. Write John at Fastacraft about it-he may still have the clipping he sent me.
3)Go to Rohans site and read his diary about year and a half ago where he describes beating a fleet of A class cats in 5 out of 6 races. Unfortunately, there were numerous reports on the Aussie A class site under "hydrofoils" about A class sailors being passed by Moth foilers but most of that info including Rohans description of this regatta was destroyed. There may be a few comments still there at the very begining.
========================
As I just posted the Foiler 1 GP site, maintained by Rohan, will have new info added-hopefully on a regular basis.This thing is getting big enough that his information needs to be collected and available in one place. The performance of this boat is simply astounding and up to now it's been hard to pull the facts together-hopefully from now on there will be one site with it all.....
++++++++++++
*** The Moth foiler is not 15% faster than a 49er-; according to te Australian yardstick it is one minute faster over a 'standard course'.See post # 61

[Nobody]

1) fastest on a timed 500 m course -no idea-see Rohans site and the UK site. I just read yesterday where Rohan did 23.3 or similar but can't find it-go to his site and write him(www.rohanveal.com)


I went to the site I couldn't find anything about 23.3. The other site you mentioned (http://www.foiler1.com/foiler_moth.html) lists 22.3 and the MAX speed recorded. Is this a max GPS speed subject to about a 5 knot error or the speed sustained over any sort of distance?


2)John Ilett sent me a newspaper clipping over a year ago describing Simon Payne(UK) "as the fastest thing on the water" and sailing at the same handicap as a Tornado.I don't remember where the regatta was but it was in England. Further he said he was "about 15% faster" than the 49er's in that regatta. Write John at Fastacraft about it-he may still have the clipping he sent me.


This is the thing that concerns me. You are running around the internet with statements like the foiling moths are fastest thing on the planet yet it is all based on chinese whispers. Relying on a newspaper clipping that calls him the "fastest thing on the water" is crazy. I could think of a lot of things that are faster. Sure most of them have a internal combustion engine but they would certianly blow past a moth. Put up some credible evidence or shut up!

RYA yardstick numbers are here.
From http://www.rya.org.uk/NR/rdonlyres/8E9F3CB6-C605-4E21-9121-29DED55A1364/0/DinghyClassDataReport.pdf

I suspect that these are for the non-foiling moth but the results from Australia show that the foiling moth is about 10% (6 minutes in a one hour race) faster than a non-foiling moth. This stilll means that the foiling moth is not as fast as a 49er.



3)Go to Rohans site and read his diary about year and a half ago where he describes beating a fleet of A class cats in 5 out of 6 races. Unfortunately, there were numerous reports on the Aussie A class site under "hydrofoils" about A class sailors being passed by Moth foilers but most of that info including Rohans description of this regatta was destroyed. There may be a few comments still there at the very begining.


I found this on his site in reference to the when searching Rohans site for A Class.

"Monday 29th November, 2004

> Had two fantastic days of sailing against the A class cats and Robby and Glenn on their Tornado at the Go For Gold Regatta. Tim and the three Dave's really taught me a lot on how to sail fast upwind, and as a result I can now match them on speed and height. Downwind is a different story. Due to the lower drag on a Moth hull and rig, I could sail a lot lower and faster than them, effectively being around about 15% quicker down to the bottom mark. Needless to say I beat them around the course in every race that I could foil in, while finishing around a minute behind Robby."

Was this the entry you talked about? So faster than a A class (when foiling) and slower than a Tornado.

I also found this on http://www.rohanveal.com/2004_blog_archive.html too

"Monday 6 December, 2004

> Raced on Sunday against the 14's at Sandringham in 13-15 knots with 0.5m chop. Finally I beat Lindsay Irwin around the course, and by a minute or so as well. Port tacked the fleet at the start and never really looked back. Think I have got downwind foiling in Port Phillip Bay chop sussed now for maximum VMG without launching into space."

So a foiler moth is just a little 1 minute over a race faster than a I14 in ideal foiling conditions. How much slower or faster is a 49er verses a I14.



========================
As I just posted the Foiler 1 GP site, maintained by Rohan, will have new info added-hopefully on a regular basis.This thing is getting big enough that his information needs to be collected and available in one place. The performance of this boat is simply astounding and up to now it's been hard to pull the facts together-hopefully from now on there will be one site with it all.....

Hopefully the SFS Brass Monkey regatta this comming year will be well attended and the conditions will suit foiling so you won't use that as an excuse. Then we will have a realistic comparrision of the relative sailing speed of the various classes.

Nobody

[John ilett]

The UK moth site has many speeds recorded http://www.int-moth.org.uk/VavavoomSP.htm

The GPS speeds are max speeds, I believe that the GPS numbers are much more accurate than any 5 knot error. Many of the moths carry the GPS and all record very similar numbers.

[RHough]

The UK moth site has many speeds recorded http://www.int-moth.org.uk/VavavoomSP.htm

The GPS speeds are max speeds, I believe that the GPS numbers are much more accurate than any 5 knot error. Many of the moths carry the GPS and all record very similar numbers.

I had a GPS speed of 12.4 on my Catalina 30. All 12,000 pounds of her on a 25 foot waterline. Am I great sailor or what? Catalina's are the best, because I have a GPS that says so ....

Timed run over measured distance.

Numbers please.

---
Edit: looking at the gps photos posted on that link it looks like the boats average 5.7 or so and have peak speeds in the 20's. Gee, since they can record averages, why don't we see 18-19 knot averges with 20+ peaks? My 12.4 in a Catalina 30 is looking good.

[casavecchia]

Having been able to see in the flesh what a Moth foiler can do, can make a world of difference.
Marco.

[RHough]

Having been able to see in the flesh what a Moth foiler can do, can make a world of difference.
Marco.

After viewing all the video at int-moth.org, I suspect why there is no measured 500 metre speed. They don't foil for 500 metres at a time?

I saw some nice moderate boat and wind speed sailing. Most tacks and gybes dropped the boats off the foils.

When the wind was up (15? 18?) I saw quite a few crash gybes (try to gybe, crash, recover on opposite gybe). I saw very few clean mark roundings in conditions that are routine for other boats.

I saw several crashes that were very close to pitch-poles, in fact if I had not been told that Moths don't pitch-pole I would have thought they were. :)

The Moth show should be on Saturday Night Live, they certainly are "not ready for prime time players."

[Doug Lord]

Check the SA thread for the "Building a Moth" thread-early in the thread for comments by Phil S. fairly recently in which he describes matching speed with a Tornado off the wind.
-----
Randy, you certainly are entitled to your interpretation of what you're seeing-but attacking the whole Moth class as "being not ready for prime time" is a bit of a cheap shot at one of the most exciting sailboats of all time.
Bi-foil monofoiler technology , though very new is one of the most significant sailing breakthru's in history with foiler Moths consistently winning most major class championships against "normal" Moths. And the record of comparisons against other boats will only grow. You've got to admit(you?-nah -I guess not!) that for an 11' monohull to whip a fleet of A class cats or I14's or 49er's and to match speed with a Tornado downwind is quite significant. Speeds on the GPS have comp up the same-above 23 knots - in the UK and recently in Australia-half a world away. Are they accurate? I'll be damned if I know. Are they significant-probably.

[Baronvonrort]

Doug
The only people without a hard luck story in racing are those who win!

Emmet Lazich was a top moth sailer before he moved into the 18ft skiffs and he has sailed 49ers and 12 ft skiffs.

Emmet has recorded speeds that are faster than the foiling moth in both his 49er and 12 ft skiff.

It is a pity Emmet never had a GPS when he was racing the 18ft skiff.

Interesting to hear all these claims from you about the speed potential of foils when you have not figured out how to get your thing to actually start foiling.

Moths,14's,18ft skiffs it appears we can get them all up on foils here in Australia.

[Doug Lord]

"..haven't figured out how to get your thing to actually start foiling." You don't know what you're talking about!

[Baronvonrort]

Photos Doug!

[Doug Lord]

When I'm satisfied that the aeroSKIFF™ is 100% I'll arrange for foiling photos. Right now the boat is being modified with the addition of a single sliding bench seat, buoyancy pods, shiftable main foil, a wand and some sail handling improvements. Though it has foiled using the manual control system-twisting the hiking stick moves the main flap- the workload is too great for singlehanded foiling hence the mods.Later this year I may try an interchangeable main only 182 sq.ft. rig...

[Chris Ostlind]

Geez a guy takes a day off from the fray and a whirlwind of hot air has spread across the water from the foiling proponents.

1. Foiling boats can be very cool as curious sidebars to the sailing world, but they are not now, nor do I suspect, will they ever become mainstream sailing vessels.

2. I'd enjoy a sailing session or two on a foiler, but I don't want to own one as a regular boat, due mostly to the complexity of stuff required to get out on the water.

3. Dougster is on a foil-borne drug and he can't say no to his Jones.

4. This isn't a Fulton's Folly type of episode from where I sit. I am open to the concept, but it has to be shown to be more practical, more affordable and simpler to operate than that which is already available in order for it to make any sense to me as a marketable product. The Industrial Design world has some very real component obligations in order to produce a successful product with lasting value. Right now, I don't see the adherance to the regimen that all designers have to meet in order to get a viable product into the marketplace. This is nothing more than a cool wet dream at this point with big claims, hot air and nothing to show, other than "the other guy's stuff" just isn't enough from where I sit. (as if this thing weren't already enough to handle, you now want to install another level of complexity to the design with a sliding seat? Why not an enema bag charged with nitrogen, or a toothbrushing function, or a DVD viewer that is waterproof?)

5. Foilers can go fast in the right conditions, but so can a Chevy BelAir with a military surplus turbine on the roof. Your point is...?

6. I truly wish you a lot of luck, Doug, but unless you can toss some of your own green on the table and bring this world beater bad boy to market, I just don't see it happening on any scale more than the fringe that it currently occupies. Make it so and I'll apologize; but then, that isn't really good enough for you.

&. My comments have been negative for the most part because you have the hyperbaric chamber of optimism covered in spades. No product ever survives in the market without being wrung-out by those who have alternative insight. If you are this afraid of havoing your design called-out, I can only guess how you'll respond at the first boat show you attend where the public will unflinchingly ask the same questions, only they won't be so nice. Ask me how I know that, already?

You never addressed any of the concrete issues from my previous letter, so I have to assume you don't have your collective act together on anything but a pipe dreamer's level.

How about the marketability issue?

How about the fiddly parts issue?

How about the ability of the average guy to sail one and not a super stud with hundreds of hours of experience? (you may remember that cars used to have these fiddly little levers on the steering column for fuel richness and spark advance/retard) There's a reason why they're not there anymore)

What happens when you hit something in the water? (you know, like kelp, jellyfish, floaters, plastic bags, fishing line, dead boat designers, etc.)

How about the production costs of having to produce expensive foils at two ends of the boat that can be easily damaged by an innatentive recreational sailor? (not expensive you say? Take a look at the prices on the Fastacraft site and swallow hard. And that's from one of the proponents of the genre in who's interest the cost of an affordable foil set would be very obvious)

How about the suitability for the rental trade where thousands of recreational sailors get a start each year?

Bubba Doug? It's tough to grow-up and face that which has to be faced every day by adults; Namely the ability to back-up your claims and produce the wonder boat that foils in 5, is easy enough to sail that a rank comrade could step aboard and get that baby to fly in a lesson or two and can go out the door at a price that allows it to compete with a plastic Hobie Wave.

That's why I challenged you to refinance your house, stick your cheese in the wind and prove us all wrong. You comfortably ignored the challenge because you don't have the sack. What you do have is the hot wind necessary to sell used cars and that's about it.

Get off the vapors and the old age desperation and get a real take on what is working out there. The marketplace has it's own truth, my boy, and right now, you're not even close to meeting the entry fee. Well, that or consign yourself to the pages of Gizmo, Popular Mechanics and eBay as a curiosity of the time.

Is that plain enough for ya?

[RHough]

You've got to admit(you?-nah -I guess not!) that for an 11' monohull to whip a fleet of A class cats or I14's or 49er's and to match speed with a Tornado downwind is quite significant. Speeds on the GPS have comp up the same-above 23 knots - in the UK and recently in Australia-half a world away. Are they accurate? I'll be damned if I know. Are they significant-probably.

Repeating these claims over and over does not make them so. These are not a "long list".

As usual, when asked for any facts to support your claims all we get is attacks. Same thing in the power assist debate, same thing in the CBTF debate. No hard facts from you ... ever.

I posted about what I saw in several videos on the Moth site. May I assume they were not made to make the boat look foolish?

At Laser worlds, half the fleet does not crash at the gybe mark. Certainly not many in the top 25% of the fleet ... compare that to what is shown in the Moth video.

[John ilett]

So they're tricky to turn, big deal. They make up for it everywhere else. Theyre a development class etc and will always be a challenge.

I guess you could crash a laser too if you fall asleep, could happen!

[RHough]

So they're tricky to turn, big deal. They make up for it everywhere else. Theyre a development class etc and will always be a challenge.

I guess you could crash a laser too if you fall asleep, could happen!

I think that the foiler Moths are great little boats. I think they are exciting to watch and would probably be a hoot to sail.

Nothing I've seen makes me suspect that they are easy to sail. At 50+ and over 200# I can still get a Laser around a race course, I doubt that I could foil a Moth at all.

As wonderful as the Moths are, IMO they are not mass-market boats. Doug has some special medication that has convinced him that small foilers will sell like beer at a ball game.

Nothing he has said, and no facts that I can find support that position.

The facts of the moment are that foiler Moths are faster than non-foiler Moths under some conditions.

That is a very far cry from foiler Moths being faster than A-Cats, 49er's, and Tornado's.

The comparisons are ridiculous.

There would be more truth in me claiming that my Catalina 30 is faster than 49er. At least I can create a race that would prove my claim.

[Nobody]

Check the SA thread for the "Building a Moth" thread-early in the thread for comments by Phil S. fairly recently in which he describes matching speed with a Tornado off the wind.
-----


Doug is this the thread you mean?

http://www.sailinganarchy.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=29873&st=0

I have read it through twice and can't find any reverence to a Moth beating a tornado downwind. Perhaps you could post a link to the post directly.


You've got to admit(you?-nah -I guess not!) that for an 11' monohull to whip a fleet of A class cats or I14's or 49er's and to match speed with a Tornado downwind is quite significant. Speeds on the GPS have comp up the same-above 23 knots - in the UK and recently in Australia-half a world away. Are they accurate? I'll be damned if I know. Are they significant-probably.

Yes doug it would be good for an 11' monohull to whip a fleet of 49ers or keep pace with a tornado downwind but you have yet to provide ANY evidence that this is the case. I am still waiting and you a still avoiding the issue.

Here is a paper that assessed the accuracy of the speed output of a gps unit. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=15519597&dopt=Abstract

It was published in 2004 and so is reasonably new. Their results showed that the error was less than 0.8 of a knot 64% of the time. This random type of error is significant in that there are a small number of points that are much higher is error than that. This is why you get a single fast point however if you look at the track you get a lower speed.

I will say it again. I have seen but not sailed a foiling moth. They are awesome when they fly by you out of the water. I havn't sailed aginst them but hope to in the future to see how fast they are. All I want you to do Doug, is be accurate in the claims you make. In the long run exagerating will only frustrate people when their expectations are not met.

Nobody

[usa2]

absolute speed is not everything and that is why marketing a so called "monofoiler" or whatever you want to call it wont work in the U.S. Nobody except the few people who want the sensation of flying a small dinghy will be attracted to it. Most people sail because they want to take their friends out and have a good time on the water, or they do competitive racing in an established class, usually one design in the U.S.
In Australia you may get a few people interested, but seriously, if you were there, would you rather have a Moth versus a 12, 14 or 18 foot skiff? Or you could be part of the crew on the numerous ocean/coastal racers.

[Doug Lord]

These are facts ,not assumptions, speculation, or exaggeration. I try very hard to be extremely carefull about what I report regarding the exploits of the Moth. There will always be people who dispute anything they don't understand and /or fail to comprehend the nature of the Moth monofoiler revolution.There is always room for reasonable people to disagree about the interpretation of these facts but as time goes by the extraordinary nature of the foiler Moth and the technological revolution it is spawning will become clear, in my humble opinion:
1) First reported on SA over a year ago: John Ilett, while testing a new set of foils, recorded a boat speed of 19 knots in a 10-12 knot wind.SEE BELOW FOR MORE ON GPS SPEEDOMETERS.
=============================================
2) First reported 2004: Rohan Veal beat a fleet of A class cats in five out of 6 races. The full story is in a previous post here or on www.rohanveal.com In addition, there were many comments on the Australian A Class catamaran forum regarding A Cats being passed by Moths prior to the loss of much of the data there. However, at least one such comment remains: by AUS 797- "He sped past me in 12 knots absolutely flying". Go to the Aussie A class site and click on hydrofoils.
==============================================
3) Almost every major Moth Championship has been won by a foiler Moth in a wide range of conditions.
===============================================
4) Phil Stevenson, on the Dinghy Anarchy forum under"Building a Moth",page 2 of Dinghy Anarchy, post #38 did match speed with a Tornado catamaran that was flying it's spinnaker. Phil was 6th out of 7 Moths and writes eloquently of the Moth foiling experience. Read it.
================================================
5) Rohan Veal has beaten a fleet International 14's -see a previous post and his site.
================================================
6) Rohan Veal has just set the Australian Moth speed record at 22.9 knots which he considers so-so and feels that the boat is capable of MUCH faster. He used the Velocitek 12 Channel GPS described below.
================================================
7) This is one I got wrong because the original newspaper clipping was lost. I had remembered it as Simon Payne beating a fleet of 49er's. I was wrong in this case; I apologize and I will continue try my best to make sure it doesn't happen again.This is a quote from the Fed week 2004 website sailed on Chichester harbor in the UK:
"Tacking under East Head shore proved the favored course except for the Foiler International Moth
sailed by Simon Payne whose speed over the water
and with most of his hull out of it, was such to make little difference to his course, crossing the finish in an amazing 1hr 12 min. almost half an hour ahead of the leading International Canoe..."
http://www.hisc.co.uk/fed2004/fedmonday.htm
Headlines from a newspaper clipping describing the event: "Moth proves astonishing sight in windy Fed Week". From the article:" And they were certainly rewarded this year, by the amazing sight of Simon Payne's state of the art International Moth, by far the fastest craft on-or more correctly-over the waves.
Designed to lift up on to foils on its daggerboard and rudder, it literally flew over the water, outpacing the fastest ribs and drawing urgent radio calls from the committee boat for it's location.
Payne won every race in his class, the fast handicap, by a huge margin. His yardstick number already low could have been lowered to that of the fastest Olympic dinghy, the Tornado catamaran, and he would have still headed the fleet."
================================================
8) According to Rohan, Simon Payne(UK) just broke 23 knots for the first time and used a Velocitek S3 12 channel GPS speedometer.
According to Simon Paynes website the accuracy is plus or minus .2 knots and goes on:"DOES NOT PRODUCE IRREGULAR OR "SPIKED" READINGS. At this time no other recreational GPS speedometer can provide reliable readings updated at 1hz.."
http://www.kasail.com/team/simon_payne.html
================================================
9)The 49er-Here is what Rohan says about the 49er: "I have raced the top 49er guys here on the bay a few times and can beat them around the course as long as it is over 8-10 knots constantly. If not they kill us.Generally, when there is enough wind, we are quicker upwind but they get us downwind(if it's choppy water only though).
I did this racing so they could work out a handicap for the foiler Moth in Australia based on a good yardstick of the 49er and they worked out 'officially' that the foiler Moth was 1 min quicker around a standard course(whatever that is) than a 49er. So the 49er yardstick is 84 and the foiler Moth 83." (from an e-mail to dl)
================================================
10) C Class cat comparison- See the thread "Little America's Cup Perth 2007" on SA main forum page post #150 and others where people who should know claim the top speed of a C Class cat is 24 knots. Considering that using accurate ,reliable, measurement the foiler Moth is currently topping out at around 23 knots the picture of what high performance really means becomes even clearer.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
None of these accomplishments by themselves mean too much but the aggregate taken over the last two years presents a picture of an incredible 11' sailing machine.The Foiler Moth is leading a revolution in sailing , sailing technique and sailing design the likes of which we haven't seen in a very ,very long time!
There will be updates to this thread as they come in as well as to the Foiler 1 site.

[John ilett]

Rohan had also told me that in one of the very light wind races of the recent Australian champs that he had only managed to hydrofoil properly on two of the five legs of the race but still finished a very close second (by some seconds) to Les Thorpe the defending Australian champ who was lowriding. So foiling just two of five legs will put a foiler pretty even with a non foiler.

[RHough]

Thank you John.

From your post I see 3 skippers have beaten 4 other dinghies.

Veal beats Int 14's ans A-Class cats
Stevenson matches speed with a Tornado
Payne beats a Canoe

That is the list.

... Add to that the long lists of races where the Moth beat ...

I guess three = long for someone that thinks two = mono?

I think the Moth's are cool, I'm just tired of them being touted as the best thing since sliced and the future of boat for the common sailor.

The 49er:
The 49er-Here is what Rohan says about the 49er: "I have raced the top 49er guys here on the bay a few times and can beat them around the course as long as it is over 8-10 knots constantly. If not they kill us."

Hmmm ... One of the top Moth sailors *can* beat 49er's *if* the conditions are right .... how does that compare to the BS that Doug has been spewing?

[John ilett]

Every class would likely have a best condition that suits their boats.

More wind, less wind, chop etc

The fact that the foil moth can pace these classes at least means it could be considered on par or similar.

I know it's hard swallow the fact that an 11ft boat can be so fast but it's a different beast. They have very minimal drag in comparison to a 14ft hull or two 20ft hulls. Hey the rig has less drag too.

As others have mentioned they have exceptional upwind speed of steady 12-15 knots and this is where they make up most ground on other classes.

Also remember that these designs/foil systems are just a few years old with plenty more fine tuning and development to come, so you can expect more speed with more ease soon enough.

[Baronvonrort]

This Foiler 1 Gp which just had its round at the skandia week shows what boats the moth was competing against.
Formula15's
Contenders..
Tasars
ok dinghy's
Laser radials
125's
29ers
420's
Lasers
It was surprising after all these claims of outstanding boatspeed from the Moth to have Rohan say 420's could beat him upwind and he also struggled against the ok dinghy.The elapsed times in the races hardly back up these claims of great boatspeed and the the boats he was racing against can hardly be called fast boats!
I would like to see what our world champion in the Tornado cats (Bundock?)would do to a world champion Moth sailor!
I am not the sort of person who compares a world champion in the moths against nobody's sailing another boat type.A good comparison would be world champ against world champ to give credibility to your claims.
You should check the race results before making ludicrous claims Doug!
Follow the link he provided.
Where did Rohan finish in all the races Doug?
Maybe you should read all of Rohans website.

The Moth is not a suitable boat for the old fat unfit unskilled sailors and those who have won a world championship in moths have usually been sailing them for years before they can win.
Trophy hunters avoid the moth class because it is very difficult and time consuming with all the hours that have to be put in before you can win.

So lets look at what Rohan has put on the Foiler 1 gp website.
1.Faster than a A class cat...well the A class was also slow in the brass monkey regatta and who said the a class was fast anyway.
2.Boat speed is also faster than the wind speed.....Big deal the 18ft skiffs have been sailing faster than the wind on all points of sailing for about 25 years.
3.They produce amazing crashes at height and speed.......No argument from me on that one.
4.they are 1 tenth of the cost of an 18ft skiff.......$15 000 for a new moth and i could get an 18ft skiff on the water much cheaper than Rohan believes.
5.Optimum weight for skipper 60-80 kg.......Yes the moth is for smaller men.

I like the moth and have followed the developments in the class from the time they were scows.

My first ride on a hydro foil was the Manly ferry and they were replaced by a cat.

[Doug Lord]

Nobody(with apologies to nobody) claims the foiler Moth is fast in very light non-foiling conditions: not me, not John, not Rohan. You conveniently "forgot" to mention that the race you quoted was sailed in extremely light, patchy wind and the Rohan didn't sail the last race in NO wind dropping from 2nd overall to 5th. Foiler Moths excel in 8-15 and that window is opening wider all the time.
You conveniently forgot to read the Chichester regatta story sailed in very windy conditions didn't you? 2 years ago...
Or the story by Phil Stevenson who, at around 186 pounds is heavy for the Moth class but who nevertheless matched speed with a Tornado. Perhaps you also missed the bit about the yardstick: one minute faster around a 'standard' course than a 49er.
The claims backed up by the FACTS show the Moth faster than an A class cat, International Canoe ,International 14 and 49er and matching speed with a Tornado(2 reports under the FACTS above) IN CONDITIONS WHICH ARE SUITABLE TO BOTH BOATS.
And with a max speed damn near that of a C class catamaran.

[casavecchia]

http://www.moth.it/Video/MothMeetingCVCE.wmv
In this occasion the Moth was faster than the A class Cat.
I was there.
Marco.

[Paul B]

I will say it again. I have seen but not sailed a foiling moth. Nobody

Well that puts you a leg up on ol' Douggie.

His "foiler" still hasn't, has it? Right, it's always "under development". Convenient.

A year ago he claimed he would have a 20 foot foilerer ready about now, to prove the foiling thing could scale up and smash an upsized Eighteen. No evidence of this yet, eh?

Right up there with the 12 foot foiler he was developing with a "major" boat producer, along with a 16 footer as I recall.

What about the 18 foot canter he had in development?

Oh, and the Mini that was going to scorch the existing fleet using his patented keel thingmabob? Haven't seen that spash yet, have we?

[Chris Ostlind]

This is way off the pragmatic objective of whether one of these dudes can be manufactured cost effectively, with simple-to-use controls like other "People's Boats" and with the utility and compelling usefulness that you can see on any of a dozen (or more) small day-sailing machines already in the marketplace.

Nobody disputes that foil equipped Moths can achieve some astounding performance marks in the correct conditions. At least, nobody should be disputing the good word of many well known proponents. That data is out there within plain view unless there's a worldwide conspiracy to flummox the sailing public, and I don't have that impression.

That has never been the issue for me and never will. But technology for technology's sake is not compelling enough in a world of cluttered products. There has to be pragmatic utility, or the game itself is limited.

When you look at the car racing environment, you can see that on certain types of road race tracks, a very small shifter equipped go-cart can establish faster lap times than can many larger, more heavily horsepowered vehicles such as 800HP NASCAR rigs. This is because the NASCAR machine is out of its element and it can't be made to do that which it is not designed to do.

Unfortunately, the conditions don't always cooperate for the common, recreational sailor and when those situations are present, the foiler will not be as cool as the owner thought it would be. Unfortunately, those types of uncooperative conditions are present more often than not.

When you couple that with the big learning curve and the damage susceptibility of the foils, the fact that any plastic bag, or other crap in the water will virtually destroy the horizontal lift of the foils and the shear number of parts to be fiddled with (not to mention the wacky addition of a sliding seat) you have moved as far away from a "People's Foiler" as you can get.

You have entered the heady world of performance skiff dujour with all its wonder. This paradigm is in direct opposition to the paradigm of a "people's boat" in which any Joe can climb aboard and get it on with a smile on his face in a wide array of water and wind conditions.

To have a successful product that has inherent complexities, the complex technolgy has to be embedded in the design in such a way as to make it, in fact, simpler to operate and not more complicated.

All wheel drive, automatic braking systems, airbags, evolutionary transmissions, heads-up displays, you name it in the automotive industry... they're all passive technologies with little, to no, adjustment necessary from the owner/driver. If you want to sell a mass market device to the public in these times, you have to have a simpler product, as they perceive it, and there's no other way around it or you are doomed to a self-limiting market place of afficionadoes.

There's nothing wrong with that, but it's not the same game.

When Doug can definitively demonstrate a boat that is, in fact as simple as a Laser in all respects, he will will be able to claim he is producing a "People's Boat" with a foiling performance potential. I look forward to saying I was wrong, but it's my opinion that it's not going to get done in my lifetime. I have outlined the definitive reasons in previous postings and have not heard or seen anything to counter the arguments in subsequent postings from either John Ilett or Doug Lord.

What I have heard and seen is vitriol and invective from Doug, designed to create a smokscreen around the issues. This is the type of argument platform that is usually reserved for those who have no legitimate response, so they shout really loud about nothing in order to generate the noise that will hopefully make the real issues go away. John's responses have been presented as a gentleman and his products reflect his integrity in his efforts to bring foiling Moths before the public.

For the life of me, I don't know what you thought you'd be getting from a group of educated and insightful enthusiasts when you dropped your People's Foiler" in front of us. Of course, you're gong to have the concept scrutinized with all its half-baked ideas tossed around publicly. You could have taken it all in with an eye to learning from the many points of view and possibly made your product better, simpler, more likely to be manufactured. Instead, you took offense when folks with experience stepped-up and said, "hey, wait a minute... what about this?"

Doug, you can civilly engage the argument or you can continue to blabber around the issues; your choice. It would be really good if you could simply address the complexities and manufacturing issues in a straight forward and honest fashion while recognizing that there's a credibility gap present that hasn't come close to being addressed. Another harangue about speed-over-water issues is not the direction that resolves hard problems like the ones stated.

You could get the entire mob of guys here on your side by turning down the jets on the performance angle and getting to the meat of the topic for this "People's Boat". Come on, what do you say?

Chris

[Nobody]

The fact that the foil moth can pace these classes at least means it could be considered on par or similar.

I know it's hard swallow the fact that an 11ft boat can be so fast but it's a different beast. They have very minimal drag in comparison to a 14ft hull or two 20ft hulls. Hey the rig has less drag too.

As others have mentioned they have exceptional upwind speed of steady 12-15 knots and this is where they make up most ground on other classes.


John,

This is a long way from what Doug was/is spewing forth about the Moth being 15% quicker than a 49er. 15% is 9 minutes every hour.

Don't take my comments here as critisism of the moth. I really like them and think they are very cool. If I was 70kg I would be building one. I just get frustrated when soo much exageration is repeated over and over.

Nobody

[Doug Lord]

I apologize(as I did earlier) for the comment about "15% faster than a 49er"; that's what I remembered reading and I should not have said it without having the paper in my hand. It won't happen again. Under the Australian yardstick the Moth is one minute faster than a 49er on a standard course.

[Paul B]

As others have mentioned they have exceptional upwind speed of steady 12-15 knots and this is where they make up most ground on other classes.

This makes them 10 - 20% faster than an ACC boat upwind. What's the tacking angle at this speed?

[Doug Lord]

For those interested in the Foiler Moth there is hope in the USA. Check out Dinghy Anarchy(under Sailing Anarchy Forums) and there are several threads regarding the homebuilding of the boat with input from Steve Clark and Phil Stevenson. Steve seems to have come up with a price around $3800-including mast and sail. In his list foils are $500 but I don't think they are hydrofoils-but I'm not positive. Both Steve and Phil Stevenson seem to have bought into the idea of sailing a seahugger Moth for some period of time before adding hydrofoils-two or three seasons has been mentioned.
I think that buoyancy pods and going with foils right off the bat might be a good idea-but I haven't sailed a foiler Moth-but then again neither has Steve. There is some discussion of this subject on the Australian Moth forum. And as mentioned earier discussion of buoyancy pods on the UK forum-see link in one of the earlier posts. From an expense standpoint ready built foils from Fastacraft are expensive but first class and they can get you going without having to reinvent the wheel. Even the seahugger Moth needs a rudder foil- I don't know whether the aft seahuger foil and aft hydrofoil are equivalent but John Ilett would. You could sail the foiler Moth as a seahugger with buoyancy pods until you felt comfortable enough to try foiling in the right conditions. Even with Johns foils and the rest of the stuff on Steves list you are talking about getting one of the fastest sailboats under 20' for in the vicinity of $7-8000 ready to fly* + your labor. Which is about the same price as new Hoot and half the price of a new Voodoo. Bang for the buck is unexcelled with the foiler Moth!
------------------
Cost estimate USA International Moth, see
post 186:
Sailing Anarchy Forums
Address:http://www.sailinganarchy.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=29873&pid=646995&st=100&
----------------
Foils- My personal opinion is that no one should attempt to build the hydrofoils unless you have the capability of doing them at the highest level including using pre preg. John's foil package comes with the wand altitude sensor as well:
http://www.fastacraft.com
-----------------
* New ready to fly International Moth from Fastacraft not including shipping:$12,094 US as of today.

[CT 249]

John, having sailed against/shared a course with foiler Moths on a few occasions, it's obvious they are amazing machines and in the right conditions for the foiler it's hard to see any singlehanded mono other than a Formula board hanging in with them.

But can I ask whether you think a boat's performance should be judged across a full set of conditions, or just in the conditions that suit that boat and may not be ideal for the craft being used as a comparison?

When we are assessing all-round performance, how can we allow for the fact that some craft (many boards for example) are incredible performers in a breeze, but cannot actually finish a normal race in other conditions, or will be miles behind all-rounders?

How do you think when talking of performance, we should allow for the fact that some craft (foilers) are amazing in 8 knots+, but not very good performers in lighter winds?

What about those boats that are not incredible in any one breeze, but great all-rounders; is it fair to just imply that they are second-rate because they may never be quite the fastest in any particular wind?

Is it reasonable, fair and accurate to say "design X beat design Y in race Z, therefore we can say design X is faster", without mentioning that the conditions may have been ideal for one and not the other, or the fact that X may be really slow in other conditions, or that Y was just behind in that race but would beat X by a lap another day?

How do we "rate" craft that perform incredibly well in some rare conditions? Is it OK to say "type D is the fastest craft in the world" because in freak conditions, type D could beat an 18 or a foiler Moth or a C Class or a 130' cat?

By the way, what do you consider to be a fair overall yardstick for a foiler Moth, and what sort of boat are they competitive with in say 6 knots? One of the Brits punched some numbers indicating speed around Laser Radial level - does that sound OK (it's a lot quicker than a FW board which seems to be the only small singlehander that can rival the foiler in a breeze isnn't it)?

[Doug Lord]

I've been thinking a lot about this and it seems to me that if the boats are compared when racing IN CONDITIONS THAT SUIT BOTH BOATS then that gives a fair assesment over the widest range of conditions.
Chris, what singlehanders do you sail that can beat a foiler Moth in conditions that suit both boats?

[RHough]

IN CONDITIONS THAT SUIT BOTH BOATS then that gives a fair assesment over the widest range of conditions.


Not hardly. If the conditions that suit both boats are a narrow range it proves nothing. It only proves that you have two or more narrowly focused boats and one is faster than the other.

[Doug Lord]

I don't think so; if you don't compare boats that are racing IN CONDITIONS SUITABLE TO BOTH BOATS
one boat will always be at a disadvantage.

[RHough]

I don't think so; if you don't compare boats that are racing IN CONDITIONS SUITABLE TO BOTH BOATS
one boat will always be at a disadvantage.

You mean water and some wind blowing?

Of course one boat will always have an advantage. The better boat is the boat that wins over the W I D E S T range of conditions. Giving away performance in some conditions to excel in others has always been the design trade-off.

If you want to compare racing boats, you compare them in conditions suitable for racing. Those conditions are some breeze to ??? knots depending on the class. Certainly a dinghy should be competitive in 1 to the low to mid 20 knot range. 8-15? is very one-dimensional.

[Nobody]

I don't think so; if you don't compare boats that are racing IN CONDITIONS SUITABLE TO BOTH BOATS
one boat will always be at a disadvantage.


But Chris does raise an interesting piont. A windsurfer can do 48 odd knots over a 500m course and probally higher for short bursts. It makes the moth look pretty lame at ONLY 22.3 knots. :eek:

In the conditions that the moth could do its 23 the windsurfer is probally not going much faster.

In 3 knots of breeze an 18ft skiff with its big rig is going to be pretty quick...

Obviously these three will never compete on a level feild.

Nobody

[CT 249]

I've been thinking a lot about this and it seems to me that if the boats are compared when racing IN CONDITIONS THAT SUIT BOTH BOATS then that gives a fair assesment over the widest range of conditions.
Chris, what singlehanders do you sail that can beat a foiler Moth in conditions that suit both boats?

1) There's one that I sail that MAY beat a foiler Moth in conditions that "suit" both boats in terms of both having their approximate design wind; this is a cat that is a bit slower than an A Class. I have not seen the reports of foilers beating GOOD A Classers REGULARLY and therefore I remain unsure whether they do so.

I am NOT (repeat 50,000 times NOT) saying foilers cannot beat As. I am merely saying I have not seen a detailed report of this occurring and no-one can point me to one.

2) It seems quite possible that the foiler may beat all the singlehanders I sail in conditions that "suit" both boats in terms of them having their approximate design wind. It's an incredible tribute to Moth foiler performance that we even have to consider this, considering the size difference.

3) Define "conditions that suit both boats". It could be said that the conditions that "suit" my boats depend on who I'm trying to beat. All my singlehanders can beat a foiler in some conditions I think.

4) To say we should ONLY use the conditions that "suit" both boats seems very unfair to the all-rounder. What if boat X goes 110% as fast as boat Y in "ideal" conditions, but only goes 50% as fast under 6 knots and only 80% as fast over 20 knots?

Obviously using conditions that "suit" both boats means the narrowly-focussed one will "win".....secondly, I can think of two current monohull singlehanders that have totally different wind ranges - one "suits" about 8 knots +, the other is designed for about 8 knots -. They don't "suit" the same conditions so cannot be compared at all.

5) There still remains the problem. When you assess speed, do you use speed across the whole range, wins across the whole range, wins across the ideal range for one boat.....?

Say two boats race seven times with the following results;

Race 1, 15 knots - X wins by 10 minutes.
Race 2, gusty 20-25 knots - X wins by 1 minute.
Race 3, 15 knots - X wins by 10 minutes.
Race 4, 6 knots - Y wins by 24 minutes.
Race 5, 8 knots - Y wins by 1 minute.
Race 6, 15 knots - X wins by 4 minutes.
Race 7, 3-6 variable - Y wins, X cannot finish in time limit.

So which is faster? Drop R7 if you want. Which is faster?

EDIT - When Rhough said "You mean water and some wind blowing?" he's giving an example of the problem. I sail a $1500 12' singlehander that can probably beat ANY sailing class in existence in the world in freak conditions of dead calm or almost dead calm. Therefore if we got these conditions one day when we were racing and we beat the Skiffs, foilers etc, would it be fair for me to say "Class X is FASTER than 49ers, 18s, Formula boards, 18s, foiler Moths, seahuggers" just because Class X CAN do so sometimes?

Note again - I am NOT saying foiler Moths are not amazing performers and possibly (possibly) the fastest of all singlehanded monos.

[Nobody]

1) There's one that I sail that MAY beat a foiler Moth in conditions that "suit" both boats in terms of both having their approximate design wind; this is a cat that is a bit slower than an A Class. I have not seen the reports of foilers beating GOOD A Classers REGULARLY and therefore I remain unsure whether they do so.


There was a letter about a newspaper article that reported that someones sister had read in an online forum that someone had sailed a moth foiler faster than an A-Class cat. It must be true.

Nobody

[usa2]

"There still remains the problem. When you assess speed, do you use speed across the whole range, wins across the whole range, wins across the ideal range for one boat.....?"

I think what has been done here is comparing boats which are completely irrelevant in regards to one another. Nobody really cares about absolute boatspeed. How many people care that a foiler Moth can beat an A Class Cat in certain conditions? Nobody. How many people care that a foiler moth can beat a Laser? Not many, but you'd better hope to hell that it can because guess what? YOUR DAMN BOAT IS FLYING! Thats like saying, look at this, my F-14 Tomcat can beat your old car across the country at 50,000 feet. Oh yeah, well try taking your F-14 across the country on the interstate! If you leave the ground, YOU LOSE!

Don't compare Moth's to other classes, nobody cares at all, except a select few. Seriously, how many people care when a Melges 24 surfs past an AC boat training on SF Bay? They are two different kinds of boats.

And, if we are allowed to compare different classes/types of sailboats, well all of the boats mentioned are slow, because supermaxi's have them beat. BUT WAIT, THERE IS MORE!!! The 30m "supermaxi's" can be beaten by small multihulls!
"But they are two totally different kinds of boats!" some of you will whine as you read this.
Yeah, well so is a foiler versus a monohull in the water, and a foiler versus a multihull, so stop making stupid comparisons.

Sorry everyone, i just had to vent:)

[Doug Lord]

An 11' monohull beating an 18' catamaran? Rubbish! Everybody KNOWS that couldn't happen!

[Neverbehind]

In my limited experience with a moth (1 1/2 season and then i sold the boat because of technical problems) i managed getting up on foil within my first month, 2 months later i had this process down and was sailing in 15+ knot flat water breezes. I had only been able to clock about 16 knts in all of my attempts (inexperience-bad boat?) later that season up on foil i hit a half submerged log and my foils snapped, i'm not sure if ill ever be able to touch another moth again.

[Neverbehind]

keep your lycra on folks. also note that 16 was a peaking speed-not entirely steady.

[RHough]

An 11' monohull beating an 18' catamaran? Rubbish! Everybody KNOWS that couldn't happen!

Anything COULD happen. For instance, lightening could strike and make sense of your post .

I wouldn't bet on either. :)

[John ilett]

John, having sailed against/shared a course with foiler Moths on a few occasions, it's obvious they are amazing machines and in the right conditions for the foiler it's hard to see any singlehanded mono other than a Formula board hanging in with them.

But can I ask whether you think a boat's performance should be judged across a full set of conditions, or just in the conditions that suit that boat and may not be ideal for the craft being used as a comparison?



I was only saying that 8-15 knots are the most favourable conditions for a moth to compare and compete with other classes. Those classes would also have their own most favourable conditions. eg I am sure comparing I14's to 49ers would create debate also. 8-15 knots may be a small band of the overall 5-30 knot range but it is still a reasonable chunk of very normal/common light-moderate winds.

The foiler moths performance v sea hugger amongst it own class has a much larger favourable wind range probably from 7-25 knots which pretty much covers 95% of conditions that you are likely to encounter at a regatta and obviously enough to win those regattas which makes it a succesfull racing design.

[Steve Clark]

Just to clarify:
The number quoted by Doug was a Bill Vining's first cut at costing the Bill of Materials.
It is in no way a "price" but an indication to those looking to build a foil Moth what they would have to spend. The quoted number for foils is what we think the materials and parts are cost to build our own foiling system.
My first impression, based on that number, is that Fastacraft is delivering a pretty good value.
SHC

[casavecchia]

and quality is extremely good too.
Marco.

[Doug Lord]

I moved this post here so that the building comments are more or less in the same place...This contains the pricing referred to in Steve Clark's post #88....
===============================
For those interested in the Foiler Moth there is hope in the USA. Check out Dinghy Anarchy(under Sailing Anarchy Forums) and there are several threads regarding the homebuilding of the boat with input from Steve Clark and Phil Stevenson. Steve seems to have come up with a price around $3800-including mast and sail. In his list foils are $500 but I don't think they are hydrofoils-but I'm not positive. Both Steve and Phil Stevenson seem to have bought into the idea of sailing a seahugger Moth for some period of time before adding hydrofoils-two or three seasons has been mentioned.
I think that buoyancy pods and going with foils right off the bat might be a good idea-but I haven't sailed a foiler Moth-but then again neither has Steve. There is some discussion of this subject on the Australian Moth forum. And as mentioned earier discussion of buoyancy pods on the UK forum-see link in one of the earlier posts. From an expense standpoint ready built foils from Fastacraft are expensive but first class and they can get you going without having to reinvent the wheel. Even the seahugger Moth needs a rudder foil- I don't know whether the aft seahuger foil and aft hydrofoil are equivalent but John Ilett would. You could sail the foiler Moth as a seahugger with buoyancy pods until you felt comfortable enough to try foiling in the right conditions. Even with Johns foils and the rest of the stuff on Steves list** you are talking about getting one of the fastest sailboats under 20' for in the vicinity of $7-8000 ready to fly* + your labor. Which is about the same price as new Hoot and half the price of a new Voodoo. Bang for the buck is unexcelled with the foiler Moth!
------------------
Cost estimate USA International Moth, see
post 186:
Sailing Anarchy Forums
Address:http://www.sailinganarchy.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=29873&pid=646995&st=100&
----------------
Foils- My personal opinion is that no one should attempt to build the hydrofoils unless you have the capability of doing them at the highest level including using pre preg. John's foil package comes with the wand altitude sensor as well:
http://www.fastacraft.com
-----------------
* New ready to fly International Moth from Fastacraft not including shipping:$12,094 US as of today.
**edit: 3/3/06 Bill Vining has added that he forgot trampolines and estimates $500US for them.

[gggGuest]

Dear oh dear guys, a lot of determined opinions here with insufficient experience to back 'em up. I've sailed on the same track as some of the top foil Moth guys and a former helm of mine is one of them. 500m plus staying on foils without crashing is not an isue for them. Doesn't make for very interesting video though.

These boats are way way more impressive than you think when you seem them stacked up alongside you, video doesn't give you the half of it. As for "nobody cares about absolute boatspeed or whether a foiler can bet a A". Nonsense: everyone cares, that's the big thing everyone talks about. I don't think absolute speed or even increased speed is a way to increase sales figures, but its guaranteed to have a huge impact on the incidence in bar room conversation.

I really don't see an alternative to learning in low riders first. When wing tip floats hit the water you get a massive off centre drag hit. On a foiler I'm quite sure that's going to stuff you in the water. Floats might make a low rider more accessible to the beginner, but they have major downsides - they cause the boat to invert immediately on capsize and be much more difficult to recover from a capsize.

[Raggi_Thor]

Just a simple question from a non-foiler, What is better with a foiler moth than a new design made for foils from scratch? There are some nice pictures of a trimaran-like boat with foils like the "Windrider", http://www.kayaksandpaddles.co.uk/canoe/kayak/uk/shop/productpages/escape/windrider-rave.htm

[CT 249]

I was only saying that 8-15 knots are the most favourable conditions for a moth to compare and compete with other classes. Those classes would also have their own most favourable conditions. eg I am sure comparing I14's to 49ers would create debate also. 8-15 knots may be a small band of the overall 5-30 knot range but it is still a reasonable chunk of very normal/common light-moderate winds.

The foiler moths performance v sea hugger amongst it own class has a much larger favourable wind range probably from 7-25 knots which pretty much covers 95% of conditions that you are likely to encounter at a regatta and obviously enough to win those regattas which makes it a succesfull racing design.

Thanks John.

I'm not quite sure that world-wide, you will get 7-25 knots 95% of the time, though. But yes, these are VERY successful racing designs.

[Doug Lord]

Jim, I have to disagree with you on buoyancy pods -you should read the stuff on the UK site about them. I sailed a 14 footer that I built years ago with pods and a main hull beam to length higher than a Moth and they really help. If the pod buoyancy is below the all up weight of the boat the pods will sink just like the wing would normally and if the beam with the pods is wide enough a capsize is unlikely in the first place. I never had a pod cause any form of directional instability in well over 100 hours of sailing my experimental boat.When you sail with pods you don't sail with them in the water-and keeping them out is how you learn.And you do learn because you don't capsize. The penalty for incidental contact is not a capsize,pitchpole or spinout -just a slight slowing. The Moth guys on the UK site all thought it would help(if I remember correctly). The pods don't have to extend down like hulls-they're there to prevent rollovers BEFORE you get on foils. After foiling they would have little or no affect on the boat.Foiling stability
is greater than seahugging stability and most of these guys want a Moth to foil not to invest 2-3 seasons to master a seahugger. Using pods will help you to master a seahugger while preventing most capsizes and allowing the begining Moth sailor to foil much sooner. In addition to that the characteristics of handling the boat with foils but not flying would be learned by starting out with foils. And as John said they don't have to foil just because the foils are there but when they are comfortable and using guidance from people like John they can then foil when they are ready and in suitable conditions. I believe pods would make a huge difference in the USA where they would help to maintain the excitement level by providing a much, much quicker transition to foiling.
The fact that they are illegal for class racing is a moot point in the USA since all this is just starting-beginners could be allowed a waiver or something like it for a given period of time. That time frame would be much less than making that beginner roll over every two minutes for a year or so. Again, the pods HELP to learn the characteristics of sailing a very narrow boat-they don't insulate the sailor from those characteristics.
------
Raggi, the Rave is a neat boat to sail and capable of real high speeds. Unfortunately, it is also out of production. The Rave foiling system uses the foils to develop righting moment so the crew can just sit in the center of the boat. Quite a cool ride!
----------------------
edit: Raggi- it occurred to me today that thats really not the whole story on the Rave compared to a monofoiler. The boat was heavy and would not foil well in light air especially upwind. From a technical perspective the monofoiler has an advantage due to a technique developed by Rohan Veal: heeling the boat to weather. This allows the vertical fin to be unloaded reducing the chance of ventillation and allows part/most of the lateral resistance to be generated along with lift by the hydrofoil. According to the guys that have sailed the Moth this in turn allows the boat to point at least a well as any other monohull upwind while still foiling.Upwind foiling in a Moth is it's best point of sail from a course perspective as best as I can tell, and certaily in comparison to a multifoiler that can't use it's foils in the same way. From my experience sailing a Rave and talking to Moth sailors I'd bet a Moth would take the Rave thruout the 8-15knot range and maybe even at somewhat higher windspeed. Another technical point is the difference in rigs: the Rave rig is, in essence, a low cost modification of a cat type rig whereas the Moth uses a rig that has been proven superior for high speed sailing and is another key to the Moths incredible foiling performance-especially upwind. Hope that gives you a more well rounded perspective on the two types of foiling.

[Eric Sponberg]

This seems a perfect time to post some drawings. I have worked with Doug Lord on developing the People's Foiler concept, to get the basic parameters of the boat down on paper so that we can study it further and begin a more detailed design when the opportunity comes.

I am not a foiler sailor, I am a naval architect. I have never sailed a Moth or a foiler-equipped boat. My business is designing boats to meet client's needs, and to advise on how they can and should be built. It did not take a long time of study of the videos available on Moth foilers to understand how they perform. I listened to Doug explain his ideas for foiler design, his background in model foilers, hydrofoil control, and I probed him with questions on design, construction, and performance to better understand how this boat could be built.

I came away thinking that there were some pretty innovative ideas there that would be worth pursuing. Certainly, everything about the boat is buildable, there are no new gadgets that have to be invented, really, just current technology that needs to be put together in the right combination to make this boat perform as intended. At this early stage, I don't know all the answers. Will the boat sail as we hope--easy to launch off the beach; able to foil in low wind speeds; able to accommodate up to two people of varying weights; able to go totally airborne and re-enter the water without crashing; able to flip upright easily in the event of a crash???? These are all questions that will require at least one prototype, and preferably two prototypes, to be built and tested. Neither Doug nor I have the funding personally that it would take to put these prototypes together, but somebody out there might, and if they have an interest in this project, we would like to talk to them further. We have put cost numbers together in a design, build, and test program that we think is realistic.

I do know this much--I think this boat will work--that is, it is possible to build, it will sail, and the ideas incorporated into the design are worthy of development and hold a lot of promise. Properly funded, built and tested, I think this boat holds a lot of potential create a whole new realm of sailing.

Eric

[carlos reynoso]

Just curious, Doug and Eric, but have either of you guys had a discussion about the commercial viability of foilers with Greg Ketterman at Hobie? Greg's a good guy, an engineer and supremely qualified to offer an important opinion on the matter.

When it comes to putting techno-creative ideas on the water and getting people to actually buy them rather than argue, Greg has mountains of experience in the area. If this were my boat project, Greg's the first guy I would call for background on the matter. Next, I'd call Andy Zimmerman, the former CEO of Confluence Watersports, the makers of the Windrider Rave. Andy was instrumental in the concept, design and marketing of the Rave and now has his own product development business in North Carolina.

Both of these guys would be terrific sources of info on what works and what doesn't in the selling of a foil-borne boating product in the US market. If you only consider the process from the very tiny, racing oriented foilers from other parts of the world, you have completely ignored the realities of the market here in the US and you do so at your own peril.

Nothing of these two individuals have ever been mentioned in any of Doug's postings. Instead, we've been routinely exposed to reports about foilers in England and Australia with nary a whisper as to how they've already performed in the US marketplace. If you like, you can try to purposely define the AeroSkiff as a monofoiler which would suggest that you find none of the Rave/Trifoiler lessons appropriate. I would suggest that the general boat buying public doesn't view it that way until they are already very well educated as to what is and what isn't a mono or multi foiler. To them, if it has foils, it's a foiler. If you want to create a differentiation in that perception, then you'll have to spend the money to do it.

You can read about the Trifoiler in Greg's own words here: http://tinyurl.com/ehdp3

Here's Hobie's, still maintained, web page on the Trifoiler:
http://www.hobiecat.com/sailing/models_trifoiler.html

Also, just curious about this aspect; has a foiling Moth ever paired-up with a Hobie Trifoiler in conditions that would suit both boats to see which boat can go the fastest? The Trifoler was timed at the 1999 Weymouth Speed Week at 31.6 kts. and un-officially clocked at 38 kts. in winds gusting to 30. Is there a Moth, anywhere, capable of that type of top-end speed? And yes, both boats can be sailed solo.

I've sailed both the Rave and the Trifoiler at Hurricane Gulch in San Pedro, California and "in the right conditions" both of these boats ARE capable of very quick speeds coupled with neck-snapping acceleration and G-forces when turning. Commercial pricing for both of these boats was entirely within the proposed guesstimates of the AeroSkiff and yet.... why are they not still being sold by the manufacturers if they were such wonderful boats in the mind of Joe Public?

Mind you, the Trifoiler and Rave were designed by two very smart guys in the boat business in Ketterman and Bradfield and you'd have to be thinking that you have something better to say about the genre than did they. The designs were coupled with very well supported marketing campaigns by crews of guys hauling foiling boats all over the country to bang the drum of high speed sailing. Many, many thousands of dollars were spent on the effort and it went, essentially, nowhere with the Average Joe, sailing public.

I'm not saying that each of you guys, Doug and Eric, aren't smart dudes. I recognize that both of you have a lot on the ball. I am saying that the Average Joe, boat buying public is going to have to make a quantum leap in acceptance of technology, pricing and usefulness in order to get their collective heads wrapped around the idea of a boat of this type. That process is going to cost many, many tens of thousands of dollars before you sell enough boats to come close to recouping the necessary investment for tooling, R&D, marketing and just plain old seat time answering tedious questions on the Internet.

I'm negative because the day Doug started posting about this issue, the assumption was present, that once he tossed his idea in front of folks on the Forum, that he was ready to hear the good, the bad and the ugly about his concept. Apparently he is not ready in that regard.

It's my opinion that the concept, in it's present state, is principally on the ugly side of the argument. It's too fiddly, too expensive and too esoteric for the so-called marketing scheme of it being a "People's Foiler" that would be snapped-up by the buying public. Get the prices and ambitions down into the realm of $8,000 (retail) for a finished boat with VERY simple, set-it and forget-it controls and you're entering the realm of a doable concept.

Right now, this boat is a serviceable concept for a very small niche market of enthusiasts. If you can build it in vacu-thermoformed skins, injected foam, sandwich interiors, very simple, inexpensive rig and hardware, etc., it may just be possible to bring it down to a manageble, conceptual number for an average guy who might be interested. As it stands, it's going to be properly categorized as a novel technical product and it will likely suffer the same fate as the Rave and Trifoiler.

You don't have to like me for my opinions and you can call me negative if you want. I happen to call it pragmatic from a business perspective. Then again, you may have way more money for these types of exercises than do I, so you don't have to analyze things in the same fashion.

We'd all like to see your success, but this Forum is not the crucible of proof. It's out there...

Chris Ostlind

[Doug Lord]

Carlos, (I guess: who exactly wrote the last post? seems to be from Carlos yet is apparently signed by Chris Ostlund?): I've talked to Greg Ketterman several times but not about the details of this foiler; in addition I spent many hours listening/talking with Dr. Sam Bradfield who inspired me to build the F3 RC foiler which you can check out on www.microsail.com along with a tribute there to Dr.Sam.
I've explained numerous times and in different threads about why I believe the monofoiler will succeed where the multifoiler hasn't. Basically, it comes down to speed-not top end speed but the ability to take off in light wind as demonstrated with the Moth. And the fact that the monofoiler doesn't use the foils to develop RM... And does use the foils to help with lateral resistance.... And only has one wand/ altitude control system..And is more than likely faster than either the Hobie Trifoiler or Rave in winds of 8-15. And the fact that the Rave and Trifoiler require too much assembly time as compared to a proposed monofoiler-ready to fly in less than a quarter of the time based on actual comparisons between a Rave and my 16' monofoiler. And that the multifoilers were too heavy...
As to top end speed the multifoilers have the edge but suffer from the additional weight required to make them strong enough to take the sailing loads imposed by the foils-loads that are not experienced on the Moth or other bi-foil monofoiler.The Moth is now close to 24 kts. and Rohan Veal thinks the top end speed can go much higher. I do too....
But from a marketing standpoint the ability to take off early-- in light air-- is the most important consideration for any Peoples Foiler, in my opinion.
The International Foiler Moth says it all for now in terms of performance, light weight, and even ease of homebuilding- nothing under 20' touches it for "bang for the buck" and it is available NOW!. The new foilers have a golden opportunity-it's an exciting time.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Note to whomever: I love discussing foiler issues with reasonable people-Dr. Bradfield, Eric and I and others can go on for hours, but there are posts in this thread that approach the subject as a Daddy would his unruly teenage son with lots of attitude and comments to me and others like : "stop before you hurt someone","it's ridiculous" or words to that effect and many more such comments. Posts in which uninformed comments such as either the Moth or my boat being "fiddly" ,uninformed comments about pitchpole combined with the aforementioned ugly, aggressive attitude.
Those kinds of comments will go nowhere wth me but I'll try to answer most comments and
questions as best I can.

[Chris Ostlind]

" Those kinds of comments will go nowhere with me but I'll try to answer most comments and questions as best I can."


And therein lies the disclaimer that gives pause to an investor in your scheme. The use of the word "most" is more than telling, Doug. When you get around to the full disclosure mode, you let us all know, will you?

Yes, I posted as Carlos. Why not?... you post as Lorsail. Others post without using their real names. Get over it. When you answer all the questions that have been posed, I'll stop using fake names to get you to answer those that are posed, but never answered.

Number One question on the hit parade that has never been answered....

Why don't you use your own money to build the tools and fab the series of production prototypes to prove you have the goods and not just fluff? It's only too convenient that the hype has exceeded your grasp. Where's the money, Doug? As they say in the film business... ideas are cheap.

That's a suitable question for someone to ask who may be interested in funding your enterpise and you've always dodged the issue. If you can;t fess-up here, when can you get clean?

If you can hype it, you should be able to be very open about it. Otherwise, you're always going to be generating the feeling among the Forum readers that you only believe in the product to the point that someone else will pay for the enterprise. I have a childhood friend like that. He'll hang around the gang of guys as long as we're buying.

Now that's sincerity and commitment at its finest.

This whole thing could have been a fun discussion if you'd been willing to accept constructive criticism. Instead, you try to dodge the issues with regularity because there is a huge hole in your hype and when someone drives through that hole, you ignore the reality in order to continue to blow hype. Dude, that's not effective salesmanship in front of an educated group of listeners. Actually, it's more like the behavior of a politician than a sincere enthusiast with an interesting idea.

I think your skin is too thin to be an effective marketer of a new product. If this style of questioning bothers you, I can't wait to see what you do when you actually get a boat in front of the buying public.

Chris (aka Carlos and whomever)

[Doug Lord]

From Rohan Veal: 2005 Moth Euros
http://youtube.com/watch?v=X5BoxE94VUY
From Scott Babbage:
http://youtube.com/profile?user=foilr
--------------
3/9/06-New Dinghy Forum

http://www.dinghysales.com.au/forum/

[RHough]

... And the fact that the monofoiler doesn't use the foils to develop RM...

Please explain how the Tri-Foiler and Rave use the foils to create RM and the Moth does not. I don't understand.

[Doug Lord]

Gladly. The Rave uses two mainfoils forward and one aft on the rudder; the two mainfoils are symetric but are set at a +2.5° angle of incidence relative to the flight waterline(which is nominaly parallel to the static waterline).Each main foil is equipped with a wand for altitude control and because they are independent of each other they also develop righting moment. In fact, the Rave has a maximum speed because if the speed is exceeded the forward cross can break. In other discussions Tom Speer quotes one of the guru's behind Spitfire(40' surface piercing foiler,ballasted) that the reason he didn't use the foils to generate RM like the Rave, Skat, Eifo, Volantis and the Hobie Trifoiler is because "you only have to lift (ballast) once" whereas with a foil based RM system the faster you(the faster the wind blows) go the more RM must be generated by the foil system.
The foil loading at takeoff on the Rave is greater than that of a Moth and, just guestimating, is about 50% greater or more in a 15k wind. The Trifoiler uses the same idea, different system: the foils are all moving foils(the Rave foils are retractable but locked in position for foiling and they use flaps to change lift) and are attached to long feelers sticking out in front of the boat. The RM is generated effectively in both boats by the sensors' reaction to the boat heeling. On the Rave the wand tension can be varied to increase the downforce on the windward foil and or upforce on the leeward foil.
The Moth on the other hand develops RM by the use of crew weight and crew technique: the boat is heeled to weather and that gets the whole CG further to windward than if the boat were sailed flat like many dinghies(the Moth hydrofoil, when heeled, also contributes to the lateral resistance) . That combination and low foil loading( around170lb.'s per sq.ft.)allows light air takeoffs and excelent performance upwind.As I said earlier the Moth would probably take the Rave and Trifoiler in 8-15knots of wind -at least on a course -due to the superior pointing of the Moth.

[RHough]

Thank you Doug.

It seems the reason that negative lift is needed is to remove the requirement to shift ballast.

For a three point foiler to work, the rudder/rear foil must be kept in the water, so shifting ballast to remove the drag caused by the weather foil lift would be a solution.

The Moth numbers look like this:

Crew CG about 4' off centre (Beam limit is 2.25M and no trap or sliding seat)
Mr. Cheeseburger here weighs 200# :mad:
The Boat weighs 70#
total weight of boat + crew = 270#

RM = 4' x 200# = 800 lb/ft

If it takes a 30% SCP to weight ratio to foil that give a SCP requirement of 81lbs

81lbs and 800 lb/ft of RM gives a sail arm of 9.9ft

The sail arm gets longer as the boat foils higher and SCP is reduced. The boat should be fastest at the lowest possible foiling height. Just enough to keep the displacement hull out of the waves.

If the design is scaled to 16 ft. we get:
Crew Arm 6'
Boat 150-200 lbs
Total 350/400 lbs
RM 1200lbs
SCP required 120 @ 400 lbs total
sail arm = 10 ft
SCP @ 350 lbs = 105 lbs
sail arm = 11.4 ft

We have a boat 16ft LOA with a 10ft beam. Look what happens when we free ourselves of the mono-hull rut:

Crew arm 11'
Boat 200 lbs
RM 2200 lb/ft
we use the rig off the 16' mono for a sail arm of 11.4 ft
that gives a SCP of 193 lbs or over 48% of total weight.

The boat would have a Catamaran configuration with Moth type foils in each hull. The rudder foil would be midships and very little (if any) down force would be needed from the weather foil (it has a 10ft arm to work with).

The boat would be inherently stable, would be able to foil at any speed a Moth can and would have a higher top speed. Basic flying height trim to adjust for wave height would be part of the foil control system.

If Hobie can build a bullet-proof 16 at 320lbs, a 200 lb foiling cat could be built using the techniques that yield 70lb Moths. No amount of sliding seat and or trapeze is going to give the narrow minded 16ft mono the advantage, since the same things would be even more effective on the FoilCat(tm) :D

[Doug Lord]

Ah, but you forget:
1) surface penetrations are a good indicator of drag on a foiler and you have 33% more drag(WRONG: 50% MORE DRAG!) than a two foil monofoiler-or thereabouts.
2) To use your 11' arm with the windward foil not doing any work(essentially in neutral) the lee foil would have to lift the weight of 80% of the whole boat. That would mean each foil would have to be around 1.79 sq. ft. or 3.58 sq. feet all up over 1.9 sq. ft more than a 16' monofoiler.Or you would have to accept higher foil loading than a Moth(with the crew at max extension-11')
3) A major, major advantage of a monofoiler is it's ability to heal the boat to weather a technique that allows it to point incredibly well upwind especially when compared to multifoilers.
================
The Moth: 11', 1.04sq.ft. foil area, 169lb.s per sq.ft. foil loading at 80% on main foil, hull 60 lb.s, upper end of ideal crew weight for upwind foiling: 160 lb.s, 81 sq. ft. SA per sq. ft of foil area - mainfoil only.
----------------
16' monofoiler. 1.6 sq.ft. main foil at 169lb.sq.ft. foil loading @ 80%, 180lb. hull, 160 lb crew, 145 sq. ft. SA, 90 sq. ft. SA per sq. ft. foil area-mainfoil only.(not a scaled up Moth)
--------------------
Foil Cat™ --Lets start like this: almost realistic possible all up sailing weight 220 pounds, crew weight 160lb.'s (to keep them all the same). 380 all up. Mainfoil area 3.58 sq.ft.(2 @ 1.79) assuming 11' arm and weather foil unloaded. Lee foil would then be required to lift 80% of the 380lb boat weight
which is 304lb.'s. Foil loading just counting the lee foil would be the same as a Moth and foil loading below the max crew extension would be less than a Moth(but see below: SA per sq.ft. of foil area is much less than Moth or 16' monofoiler-higher drag). This, in essence is a light weight carbon Rave without beam of a Rave. It would probably be faster as a tri rather than having two 16' hulls and more beam would unload the foils better at higher speeds. SA per sq.ft of foil area=51 sq. ft.(mainfoil only). Likely as a tri to be very fast in higher wind ranges while not being able to take Moth around a course in 8-15 due to poor pointing characteristics.This boat can't be heeled to weather like a Moth and that is probably the single greatest advantage of the Moth type.
Hope this helps and hope I got the figures right-I'm tired-so long....
==================================
3/13/06 Rave- 12' foil cl to foil cl, each foil 1.7 sq.ft., SA 195 sq.ft., SA/sq.ft. of foil area-mainfoil(s) only:57.35-this is important: compare with the amount of SA per sq. ft.of foil area for both monofoilers.Foil loading 368+160=528 or nominally 264lb.'s per foil-just to hold her up. However, since the Rave develops RM using the foils and the heeling moment loads the foils the additional loading at take off will be: approx .7lb per sq.ft. pressure at, lets say, 11' up so that HM=136.5 X 11=1501ft. lb.'s. Now, it's convenient to divide the HM by 2 so that it is applied equally to both sides=750.75ft.lb.s per side,divided by the distance from the CL to the foil CL gives the load applied to each foil=750.75divided by 5.5=136.5lb.'s. So leeward foil= 264+ 136.5=400.5lbs divided by 1.7=235lb.'s per sq.ft.Windward foil=264lb.'s MINUS 136.5=127.5lbs for a foil loading of 75lb.'s per sq.ft . The low foil loading of the windward foil helps explain why it works so well at developing RM even though it is set at a 2.5° positive angle of incidence relative to the flight waterline. Actually this fixed angle of incidence is reduced a very small amount by the shroud loading.(the tube twists slightly).
---------
On the Foil Cat™ the crew at maximum extension is NOT a limit on RM because ,assuming the boat has independent wands the thing will do the same thing the Rave does: develop virtually unlimited RM necessitating either a max wind speed limit, boat speed limit or both in combination with reefing. And , because of this the structure will have to be much stronger than a normal cat which probably means that the weight quoted above may be somewhat unrealistic.

[RHough]

Ah, but you forget:
1) surface penetrations are a good indicator of drag on a foiler and you have 33% more drag(WRONG: 50% MORE DRAG!) than a two foil monofoiler-or thereabouts.

Not even close to 50% more drag. The foils produce drag two ways, Profile drag and induced drag. The Lifting area of the foil(s) would be the same for any given weight, no matter if it was 1, 2 or 3 foils. Thus the induced drag would be the same. The vertical strut or foil that connects the lifting foil(s) to the hull has only profile drag. For the same total lifting area the strut(s) would have the same area and the profile drag would be the same. There might be a small increase in drag when comparing 3 vertical struts to 2 or comparing 2 struts to 1, but nothing on the order of 50%, since profile drag is a small percentage of the total (profile + induced).


2) To use your 11' arm with the windward foil not doing any work(essentially in neutral) the lee foil would have to lift the weight of 80% of the whole boat. That would mean each foil would have to be around 1.79 sq. ft. or 3.58 sq. feet all up over 1.9 sq. ft more than a 16' monofoiler. Or you would have to accept higher foil loading than a Moth(with the crew at max extension-11')

Nope, for a given total weight the foils have to produce lift=weight. If a mono-hulled foiler with in-line foils had an 11' crew arm, no extra lift is required of the foil, since lift=weight. It is the same physics as a planing skiff, the hull of a skiff is not thrust down when the crew is on the wings.


3) A major, major advantage of a monofoiler is it's ability to heal the boat to weather a technique that allows it to point incredibly well upwind especially when compared to multifoilers.

I'm not sure how any extra force to resist leeway is created by heeling the boat to weather. The force that prevents leeway comes from the vertical foil, not the horizontal foil. Heeling to weather vectors a tiny bit of the lift to weather, but would also vector some of the side force of the vertical foil downward. The combination of reduced horizontal area and downward thrust from the heeled vertical fin would require higher lift from the horizontal foil and thus increased induced drag from the lifting foil. I don't see a net gain from tilting the whole thing into the wind.

On the Foil Cat™ the crew at maximum extension is NOT a limit on RM because ,assuming the boat has independent wands the thing will do the same thing the Rave does: develop virtually unlimited RM necessitating either a max wind speed limit, boat speed limit or both in combination with reefing. And , because of this the structure will have to be much stronger than a normal cat which probably means that the weight quoted above may be somewhat unrealistic.

Just as a mono-track foiler is limited by crew induced RM, a FoilCat(tm) could be limited by crew induced RM. The foils could be limited to zero lift or a very small amount. The weather hull/foil could fly before the rig was overstressed. The top of the mast could be tuned so that it would de-power as the design limit was reached to help control the boat. Therefore the rig could be built only as heavy as a mono with the same RM. The neat thing about the FoilCat(tm) or "EffCee" as they would be nicknamed (Frigging Cool) :) is that you could haul your playmate around in style, she wouldn't be huddled in terror under the boom ... :D

My point is, that foiler Moths have evolved as they have because they are not allowed to have a multi-hull configuration. The Hobie Tri-Foiler and the Windrider Rave evolved from a requirement to not move the crew and a desire for high speed.

If the paper is clean, and there are no rules other than sail power. It has not been proved that a single track foiler is the optimum solution for a foiling craft.

[Doug Lord]

1) Three foil fuly submerged multifoiler systems DO NOT lift the same weight as an equivalent sized monofoiler.To go from a two-foil monofoiler to a three foil multifoiler, with wand atitude control(or feeler altitude control), drag will increase at least 50% because the multifoiler will have(NEED) more foil area to function properly even with a crew because ,among other reasons, the RM produced by the crew will be less than 1/3 that produced by the altitude controlled foil system automatically in max conditions. You could experiment with a multifoiler that had a single wand controlling both mainfoils but the thing would probably be unsailable because as the crew moves to weather the lee foil would not be able to develop the extra lift required and the lee side would sink.It's the same exact princible demonstrated on any cat that fly's a hull: the displacement on the lee hull approximately doubles when the boat flys the windward hull.There is no 11' arm unless there is buoyancy or dynamic lift on the lee hull; the dynamic lift on the LEE hull MUST increase as the heeling moment increases.
A multifoiler, with fully submerged foils, MUST use a dual altitude control system or be flown manually.
--------
2) The 'heeling to weather technique" has been PROVEN in actual conditions on the Moths-it is not theory but fact.
------------
3) You said: " The foils could be limited to zero lift.." Huh? Hard for a boat to fly with zero lift! The fact is that you need an altitude control system: wands, feelers or manually controlled joystick- all of which have worked; without one of these a fully submerged foiler will not fly.
4) the multifoilers evolved with the crew in the center because of a desire to keep weight low and a realization that on a boat with two independent fully submerged foils the RM generated by the foils would be far greater than that generated by a crew considering the extra weight of a place for the crew to sit and for the dual side to side control systems required.In fact the thing that allows the high top speed on the Rave and Trifoiler is the virtually unlimited RM developed by the foils.
5) A three foil surface penetrating foiler could be sailed just using ballast because the foils adjust automatically for the load at any given speed . It would also be able to be built very lighty compared to the fully submerged altitude controlled foiler.And it would always sail at minimum wetted surface(for a three foil system).
But it has a -perhaps- fatal flaw: ease of ventillation caused by the proximity of the high lift area of the foil to the surface. In the Moth class this "multifoiler" configuration was tried
and did not perform -upwind or downwind -as well as a two foil monofoiler.
Your Foil Cat™ -assuming you realize it needs independent altitude control systems and you realize the foils most certainly must lift- would be a fun little boat -and with any luck maybe a little faster top end than the Rave with earlier take off. But a monofoiler would take it around a course in 8-15 more than likely...

[Nobody]

.... In the Moth class this "multifoiler" configuration was tried
and did not perform -upwind or downwind -as well as a two foil monofoiler.


It did perform but was outlawed as a multihull. At the time is was quite successful and faster than the non-foiling moth. Look here for some pictures. http://www.moth.asn.au/pictures.html It would be interesting to know if the two have been raced aginst one another.

Nobody

[Doug Lord]

Brett Burvills surface piercing Moth foiler was the first Moth foiler to win a race but sufferd down wind because it had very poor roll stability among other reasons. I'm not sure the two types of foiler ever raced each other but the comparison of both to a seahugger Moth demonstrates clearly the superiority of the bi foil Moth foiler configuration configuration.

[Nobody]

I'm not sure the two types of foiler ever raced each other but the comparison of both to a seahugger Moth demonstrates clearly the superiority of the bi foil Moth foiler configuration configuration.

Doug,

Wasn't that RHough's point. That in the absence of the rules the current moth configuration is not the best. It is the way it is to meet the mono-hull rule. If the rule didn't exist then it would be better to seperate the foils to provide some stability/lateral damping.

Nobody

[John ilett]

I have sailed both of the foiling moth designs.

The bi foil moth and the surface piercing designs have not raced each other to any extent. In 2003 we had the prototype hydrofoil Prowler sailed by my brother Garth sail against Brett Burvill on his tri foil design. It was not a race day and I can not remember anything significant of that day. The tri foil boat was then put into the West Australian Maritime museum along side 12 metre Australia II in Fremantle.

Brett did win races at the 2000 worlds by the same margins of around 20minutes as did the first winning Bi foil design in 2004 relative to the top non foiling boats.

I think that the main benefits of the bi foiler in comparison would be earlier foiling in low wind and overall ease of handling. The tri foil may have had a higher top speed but was tricky to handle due to the foils passing through waves and especially when gybing. The foil loads would basically reverse as the sail/power changed sides. If you did not have your body in the correct place then the lift would flip the boat pretty quick.

[RHough]

1) Three foil fuly submerged multifoiler systems DO NOT lift the same weight as an equivalent sized monofoiler.

Yes they do, the weight of the boat. If they lifted more than the weight of the boat it would be an airplane. If they lifted less than the weight of the boat it wouldn't foil.


To go from a two-foil monofoiler to a three foil multifoiler, with wand atitude control(or feeler altitude control), drag will increase at least 50% because the multifoiler will have(NEED) more foil area to function properly even with a crew because ,among other reasons, the RM produced by the crew will be less than 1/3 that produced by the altitude controlled foil system automatically in max conditions.

No, All the foils are doing is lifting the weight of the boat out of the water. No increase in area needed. If a Moth can foil with 100% of the RM coming from the crew, so could any other configuration. There is no need for any RM from foils.



It's the same exact princible demonstrated on any cat that fly's a hull: the displacement on the lee hull approximately doubles when the boat flys the windward hull.There is no 11' arm unless there is buoyancy or dynamic lift on the lee hull; the dynamic lift on the LEE hull MUST increase as the heeling moment increases. A multifoiler, with fully submerged foils, MUST use a dual altitude control system or be flown manually.

The total displacement of the boat doesn't change, just shifts from one hull to the other. In Minimum foiling speed operation all three foils would lift. As speed and heeling moment increases more load is shifted to the leeward foil, it doesn't have to be any bigger to support the higher percentage, the lift goes up as the square of speed. Of course it would have to have independent control of the foils.


2) The 'heeling to weather technique" has been PROVEN in actual conditions on the Moths-it is not theory but fact.

What forces are involved? Where is the proof? There is no way that the hull and sail can develop a windward directed vector from heel into the wind, if tilting the rig was the key, windsurfers would have good upwind performance. Some angles and speeds? Some data? If there is proof, lets see it.


3) You said: " The foils could be limited to zero lift.." Huh? Hard for a boat to fly with zero lift! The fact is that you need an altitude control system: wands, feelers or manually controlled joystick- all of which have worked; without one of these a fully submerged foiler will not fly.

Don't be dense. In order to limit the RM induced by the weather foil, the foils would not be allowed to generate negative lift. The lower limit would be zero.

[John ilett]

What forces are involved? Where is the proof? There is no way that the hull and sail can develop a windward directed vector from heel into the wind, if tilting the rig was the key, windsurfers would have good upwind performance. Some angles and speeds? Some data? If there is proof, lets see it.

Is there not a windward vector/lift from the lifting foil when heeled to windward? Doug did not imply that any windward vector came from the hull or rig just that heeling the boat to windward helps which it does. 14 knots up wind is pretty quick.

[dimitarp]

You can see that. http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/showthread.php?t=2447&page=32&highlight=foil

[CT 249]

"if tilting the rig was the key, windsurfers would have good upwind performance."

Well, I rarely jump in to bolster the case of certain people, but I have to say that windsurfers and foiler Moths in 8 knots+ DO have very good upwind performance. A Div 2 board (the round-bottomed machines designed for triangle racing in the winds we get, rather than the winds we dream of) can best be compared to a non-foiler Moth. The board is 1'9" longer but carries over .7m2 less sail and is of similar all-up weight and greater beam (due to class rules). In light airs, a Div 2 board is basically identical in speed to a non-foiler Moth (ie Mark & Les T.) which IIRC means it would beat a Contender, International Canoe or most other (much longer) singlehanders.

In my experience, above about 7-8 knots, the board starts to move faster upwind and down, and gets to be faster than an International Canoe (probably the fastest upwind non-foiling singlehanded dinghy) with similar or superior height. I think the D2 is always about as fast as a Canoe upwind and normally/often faster, despite being much smaller in hull and rig. That's quick. From 16+ knots a Mistral board is also quicker than a Canoe or (IIRC) Moth or Contender etc upwind.

A modern Formula board is arguably 49er pace+ upwind in a breeze (but is Opti meat in 5 knots) with good height. Even a modern slalom board points like a dinghy in a good breeze and goes VERY well. Finally, even the ancient original Windsurfer (in '80s Mk2 guise) is as fast as a dinghy of similar age but more sail and length (ie Laser) upwind in a breeze.

So boards CAN go upwind. So do foiler Moths, once they are on the foil - and they do it heeled to windward. I don't think any singlehanded dinghy could beat a good foiler Moth upwind when the Moth is foiling and heeled to windward, so it does seem to pay. This comes from seeing a guy who was top 7 or so in the worlds in Canoes against the world Moth champ. It must be said the Canoe sailor was VERY out of practise but still the Moth, when foiling, was much faster.....no comparison.

Exactly how much the windward-raking rig plays a part in this is a very hot topic - guys like real-life rocket scientist Jim Drake (inventor of the Windsurfer and developer of the modern FW board) reckon raking the rig about 15 degrees improves speed, Olympic medallists in D2s and World champs in IMCOs reckon the upright rig is faster, the world FW champ can be seen trying to keep the rig vertical, and in old Windsurfer One Designs the former world champ is as fast as all hell upwind with the rig raked right to windward.

All of which seems to show that (1) boards ARE fast upwind and (2) the effect of windward rake seems very complicated and may vary considerably from class to class. There are also some very smart people who are very good sailors (Wardie etc) who reckon windward raking helps Moths and it certainly seems to in practise. Even before foilers came in, 18s and Moths used windward heel; so do Lasers at times.

[Doug Lord]

Randy, you could do what you want if you devised a system to disconnect or limit the wand on the windward foil only on a three foil fully submerged system. But even monofoilers need to be able to develop negative lift to control the dynamic response of the boat in waves. So you couldn't eliminate that function on the lee foil
and you would have to have a way to set the limit tack to tack and gybe to gybe.But you're still nailed with three surface penetrations and with the inabilty to heel the boat to weather. You could mount the vertical fins so that they angle outboard so as to mitigate some of the negative effects of boat heel-and maybe benefit a bit from the angled attitude of the lee foil-assuming the windward foil was unloaded. Which it would not be until the crew was at max extension.
But you're much more complicated than a Moth foiler and without the ultimate power of a Rave with a long way for the crew to go side to side with a heavy workload ,while not benefitting from the 'heel to weather ' technique until max RM if then.
I still say the Moth would take it in 8-15 around a course.

[RHough]

To restate the question:

What forces make a windward tilted Moth faster upwind?

Not faster than a canoe, not faster than a non-foiling Moth, that is obvious.

If two identical Moths are sailed unwind, both on foils, one is heeled into the wind, the other is not. Is the claim that the heel to windward makes the heeled boat faster?

What is different?

We are not talking about extreme 15 degree to windward heel as seen on windsurfers, Moth foilers heel more like 5 degrees to windward.

The amount of force driving the boat to leeward remains constant, it is a function of the height of the sail plan (the Sail Arm) and the RM (Crew weight x distance off centre).

The leeward force must be balanced by the underwater foil(s). To improve the windward performance something must change.

Since the force remains constant the only way the windward performance could be increased is if the drag is reduced. Does the drag of the foil system decrease with a change in angle?

Work it out.

Vertical lift must = total boat and crew weight.
Horizontal lift (to weather) must = Horizontal force (to leeward) of sail plan.

How does it work?

[RHough]

Is there not a windward vector/lift from the lifting foil when heeled to windward? Doug did not imply that any windward vector came from the hull or rig just that heeling the boat to windward helps which it does. 14 knots up wind is pretty quick.

14 knots boat speed? or 14 knots VMG?

Side by side, the Moth that heels to windward is faster than a Moth sailed at zero heel? What windward heel angle gives the best result?

[tspeer]

...I'm not sure how any extra force to resist leeway is created by heeling the boat to weather. ...I don't see a net gain from tilting the whole thing into the wind....

Vertical lift from foil and strut = weight - lift from sail
Side force from struat and foil = side force from sail

The leeway angle and foil angle of attack may change as the boat is heeled, but the total forces have to be nearly constant. So the question really should be, "What heel angle produces the least drag?"

I can see two sources of drag reduction from windward heel. The first is lift from the sail rig, which has a much larger span than the foil, so it may be more efficient to offload part of the weight to the rig.

The second source would be an increase in depth to handle the side force. The T foil will have its greatest vertical span when a line conecting the surface chord to the foil tip is vertical. This is especially important when the boat is flying high and there's not much strut in the water. Heeling puts the windward tip of the foil much deeper, signficantly increasing the vertical span. Since drag due to sideforce is inversely proportional to the square of the depth, this is a major factor.

There may be an increase in righting moment, too. It seems feasible to me that the vertical lift on the foil will reduce the leeway until the strut is unloaded. Then you basically have an inclined foil to leeward, like the daggerboard on a trimaran. There's a horizontal separation between the vertical lift of the foil and the hull at the center, much like there is with a trimaran, which would increase the righting moment. Or decrease the heeling moment, depending on how you bookkeep the forces and moments.

[John ilett]

They do sail heeled to windward about 15 degrees. maybe more.

[RHough]

The leeway angle and foil angle of attack may change as the boat is heeled, but the total forces have to be nearly constant. So the question really should be, "What heel angle produces the least drag?"



Hi Tom. It would have been to easy to ask that question directly. :)

The forces being nearly constant part is the point I was trying to make. No magic in heeling to windward.

Although the video and images that I've seen don't show a 15 degree windward heel, John has sailed foiler Moths and I have no reason to doubt him.

The lifting foil is 800-900mm span and the strut has about the same span.

It should be easy to plug some numbers in and see what the drag bucket looks like at zero and at 15 degrees of heel.

Total force has to equal the sum of foil supported weight and windward force. My guesses are that the side loading is about 80 pounds and the vertical loading is perhaps 220 pounds, the foil must create 300 pounds of force.

Note that the maximum force from the sail is limited by RM and sail arm. In a typical Moth that might be 80 pounds of force acting through the AC of the sail. Tilt the rig to windward and figure out what percentage of that 80 pounds of force is up. Subtract say 10% - 8 pounds, now the total load on the foils is 292 pounds instead of 300 ... 2% So the induced drag of the foil system is reduced by 2%

If the induced drag is 50% of the drag total the gain is 1%.

Sorry, I'm not buying.

This is the Australian Champ, Rohan Veal ... Not even close to 15 degrees of windward heel, more like 0 ... :?:

[John ilett]

The picture shown is Moth class world Secretary Mark Robinson sailing a Prowler. The boats only use the windward heel when sailing upwind. This photo shows Mark reaching.

If the rig carries weight then the foils carry less so the sectional shapes may improve with less positve flap.

Below Rohan and Mark sailing upwind.

[dimitarp]

What is the question in this discussion. Everyone write everything that find annywhere?

[RHough]

The picture shown is Moth class world Secretary Mark Robinson sailing a Prowler. The boats only use the windward heel when sailing upwind. This photo shows Mark reaching.

If the rig carries weight then the foils carry less so the sectional shapes may improve with less positve flap.

Below Rohan and Mark sailing upwind.

Good point John, I missed that he was on a reach. I was just happy to find a photo that was head on enough to look at the angle. My mistake.

Most of the photos I've seen show the boats heeled to weather in lower range of wind speeds (judging from the water state), I haven't stumbled across a photo that shows the angle when the boats are sailing upwind in a breeze.

[Doug Lord]

Scroll down to the picture just above the beautiful woman:
International Moth- UK Homepage
http://www.int-moth.org.uk/

[RHough]

For what it's worth, I think I can explain the improved performance from heeling to windward.

When on the foils the boat heels around the vertical centre of pressure of the foils, some distance under the water.

A non-foiling boat heels around the centre of buoyancy.

The distance between the crew's CG and the pivot point is much greater on the foiling boat. With the angle of the racks, the crew might be 45deg above a horizontal line through the pivot on a foiler and only 15 deg above on a non-foiler.

Maximum RM gives higher sail carrying power. Maximum RM comes when the crew cg is on the horizontal line from the pivot.

If the angle to the pivot is 15, you could gain 3.5% in crew arm by heeling 15 deg to windward. For a non-foiler that would be about 23ft/lbs of RM for 165lb crew.

If the angle from the crew cg to the pivot is 45, heeling to windward reduced the angle to 30 and increases the arm by over 16% and would add about 108ft/lbs of RM for a 165lb crew.

On a Moth rack the crew arm is about 4ft, giving a RM of about 660ft/lb

The windward heeled foiling Moth could have 768ft/lb of RM (the 16% gain).

On a 10ft sail arm the SCP goes from 66 to 76.8. For a 220lb boat and crew that moves the power/weight ratio from 30% to almost 35%

There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that a 5% gain in SCP to weight would increase upwind performance.

It's the ratio of rack width to foiling height that makes it work. :cool:

As the racks get wider, the gains from windward heel become smaller.

[Doug Lord]

Check this out if you're interested in the Moth:
Mon Moth à moi....
http://moth-pour-tous.over-blog.net/

[Doug Lord]

Check this out:
International Foiler Moth - Bladerider
Address:http://www.kasail.com/sailing/bladerider.html Changed:3:02 AM on Thursday, May 4, 2006