No Skipper Required, Pilot-less Sailboat

Boston, Wingsails do not need to be reefed just controlled very accurately to feather in high wind conditions. A wing pointed straight into the wind will generate no lift with less drag than a conventional sailboats bare mast and all the rigging. Wingsails have been mounted on freighters and Walker Wingsails trimaran has experienced hurricane conditions and come thru just fine. With wings its all about control. The B52 bomber has 4,000 sq.ft. of wing area and travels at speeds of 600mph to use as a radical example.
Aloha

 

You don't have to get aggressive to deal with a UASV, just run the sucker down. "Whoops, sorry about that guys, but nobody got hurt, eh." Hanging a pirate for dinging your robot is going to get the press and TV guys all over you. But I don't think that is what it's for.

My old firm was working on related stuff including "artificial intelligence" - we didn't have enough of the real thing to know how difficult it would be - and knowledge kernels for example. We did have considerable success in object recognition and collison avoidance though. I agree in spades to keep humans in the loop, then anything that seems suspicious or unclassifiable can be brought to the attention of a flesh and blood controller.

From the description I suspect a diesel generator is just what is planned for the larger version, not just for control power but propulsion as well.

 

Ala: you are correct about a feathered wing sail in a storm from what I have heard from others using them. A properly feathered wing with an efficient profile probably has no more drag than a bare mast and it's standing rigging, provided turbulence doesn't cause it to thrash around. Icing might be a problem though.

 

another plus for this design is that's it's cheap. Solar panels get pricey quit. Those simple sails could be cranked out for little dough, and they could be semi-disposable. The electronics would be the most expensive part, and the cost of those keep coming down.

This is a great idea, and would be useful for science and academics as well as military. Send them out to watch ice shelves melting. Oil companies can use them to find icebergs. They can track ocean temperatures, currents, algae blooms, you name it. Let one follow a whale migration. Hell, someone would buy one for online tourism if it's cheap enough. It won't be long 'till geeks build them in their garage with scrap computers, gps, and webcams for the cost of a used car.

 

being from the east coast icing is always a consideration
chipping ice is a nightmare
specially when you just got on post and first thing got trashed by a wave

I accept the correction that the wing sails have the ability to be luffed sufficiently to be effectively reefed

and Im glad to be wrong on that cause these things seem to have huge potential

you couldn't simple destroy them as the loss could be tracked and the position of the offenders determined thereby

 

There's only one technical issue with the wingsail that in operation may turn out to be a problem. Winds come from every direction because winds are results of circular air mass movements. Winds do not blow in straight line. So with a rigid wing, the wind has little resistance if the wing is pointed straight into it but the winds change their direction very rapidly and to prevent capsizing, the wing must follow wind's direction with the same speed.

To do so it must rotate around the mast.

That would subject the boat and the mast to enormous forces concentrated between the wind's CoG and the deck/roof (wherever the mast is sitting). And rock the boat possibly to the capsizing point.

Or would it not?

Kjell, a member of this forum for those who do not know him, argued some years ago that it would not, and he apparently had built tandem rigid wings for his yacht and used them without a problem.

I am somewhat skeptical to the "all is fine", although I am a fan of wings, because of my 20 years of experience on merchant ships, where I saw cranes being snapped off the deck in hurricanes. And cranes are a bit stronger than a regular mast on a yacht.

One way to reduce the hazard would be to position the mast into the CoG of the wing. To reduce the forces in case the wing starts rotating under a strong wind. Balance...

But if I were a paranoid general, I'd go for solar option. It would be next to invisible with the right paint job, as someone said earlier. In armies, the money is not an issue. It's the functionality for an objective that matters.

Scientists, on the other hand, would likely be happy with a wing. Their budgets are much smaller than military budgets.

 

Alternative Technologies

Haven't revisited this subject thread in quite awhile. Looks like I opened up 'Pandora's box' here.

Just a few general comments:
1) Patents--- In general I must agree that I do believe some of the examinations have gotten lazy, or been directed to issue more patents. It does seem as though there are quite a few issued that are questionable these days. Note, I am not saying that about this product, as I have not looked closely at it.

2) Defense Spending---As president Eisenhower warned us, beware of the military-industrial complex that we birthed for the WWII. It will gain a whole life of its own and grow, and grow, and grow.

Obviously this project would not go forward without funding from the defense industry. We have some many other pressing issues to deal with that some of this defense spending needs to be seriously reviewed. We are spending a lot on UAV's, and Defense Secretary Gates just submitted a budget to greatly increase the spending on these items. A wise decision I think. There is such a great variety of these craft (big, small, miniature), and they have great capabilities for relatively small bucks. Why duplicate their 'eye-in-the-sky' capabilities for a ground level view.

Defense Secretary Gates has also wisely sought to cut multi-zillion dollar expenditures on more F-22's, that are so sophisticated and expense that they afraid to send them into battle, least one get shot down by a ground crew and raise to many questions about the cost of these planes. Instead he suggest we put the money into less sophisticated joint fighter F-35, and more UAV's. He suggest a lot of changes that really make good sense. Regrettably many Congressmen will all try to protect their individual PORK projects and not do what is best for the USA as a whole.
http://www.defenselink.mil/speeches/speech.aspx?speechid=1341


What I would like to see is some of this brain power and money spent on questionable technologies like these, and other multiplicity of weapons, and put those energies into subjects like energy storage, modern electrical grids, alternative fuel cars, etc, etc. These technologies could really benefit our balance of payments with respect to the world's fuel supplies, and could be some technologies we could sell around the world.

(It almost appears as though we are becoming the world's source of weapons to kill fellow man. We spend so much on it, that we then fell the need to sell it off to other countries. Is that what we want to be known for??)

Lets invent some really useful technologies with all that brain power and expenditure !!!!!

 

Right on point, the heart of the control issue with wings is engineering the ability to deal with wind shear, disturbed or dirty air, and just to much wind in general. There are two ways you can go about this, the first is just design a wing underpowered enough in respect to the righting moments of the vessel it is stuck on so as not to be able to accidently generate enough lift putting the platform in danger. Freighters or a hybrid trawler would fall under this catagory by nature of the overall mass of the vessel. The second direction is much more difficult to engineer, that being a powerful wingsail that needs to be controlled precisely in most conditions so as to not put the yacht in danger. I use the caviet most conditions because in extreme weather the ocean can put any vessel man makes in danger. We all try very hard to not be there when all hell is breaking loose but sometimes get caught. The Harbor Wing engineers are on to this by their plans to break up the leading edge span of the wing at mid height allowing the top section independent freedom of rotation. This will allow the wing to reef or turn off the upper section reducing the overturning moment and have an ability to rapidly adjust for wind shear or disturbed air.

You are correct about the inertial and aerodynamic forces being concentrated on the mast, or in this design it's more like a stub axle, where it is attached to the vessel. The axle must be FEA engineered as large of a diameter as possible, bury as far as possible into the vessels structure, be buttressed or boxed into the vessels structure and be built out of the strongest possible material. This means lots of carbon fiber and autoclave construction techniques. This is very doable but not easy with today's state of the art composite technology.

Your extreme weather observations are well taken and temps me to think a safety valve could be built into the axle to allow it to shear away or break off in a severe wind condition, for argument say 100 mph wind. If you found yourself caught out in these conditions maybe it would be a blessing to see the wingsail go away? On a recreational design I can visualize a desperate owner breathing a sigh of relief when it falls off the deck.

The wingsail is balanced about its CG on the axle, that's the reason for the forward projecting arms at the bottom of each section. This allows for a rapid response rate to shifts in wind direction and for the tails to be smaller by being more effective. The hight of the wingsails CG is also critical to keep as low as possible to reduce the inertial forces created from pitching in a heavy sea.

Bottom line is nature can destroy any thing we make and you are bringing up a good point, failure to the point of destruction should be considered when engineering new designs like this one.
Aloha

 

There are several threads on wingsails and related issues in the forum, such as splitting the leading edge into segments and extending the trailing edge with a fabric sail. There are options for reducing heeling forces such as biplane or triplane configurtions that have not been explored much yet, also wings canted from the vertical to generate forces that reduce or cancel the heeling moment and asymmetrical profiles. Ice- and land sailers employ slotted wings and for racing where acceleration out of a turn is as important as straight line speed, manual control of wing alpha and slot is usual (i.e., no control airfoil).

Generally wingsails with control airfoil(s) behave quietly and smoothly. However, some experimenters have had problems with wings that get hung up in an unstable configuration followed by a sudden swing to one side as the wing seeks a new balance position. This is may be due to friction or suboptimal control airfoil size or mounting. As in an aircraft, it is important to avoid stalling the control airfoil. Some designs work better than others in this regard.

So basically, it comes down to optiising the design for the application. Lots of area and high alpha for racing, when you can change rigs to suit the day's conditions, more conservative design for something that has to stay out there in a wide range of conditions. There's a lot to bo learned still.

 

someone mentioned giving up the wing for solar
seems like the simple solution if money is no issue

gotta admit the vertical wind turbines are very efficient and would make up for the lack of sunshine from time to time as well

could be the magic combination

 

I think energy scavenging Unmanned Surface Vessel technology is in its infancy right now and we will see numerous engineering variations just like what happened in the UAV market. It is logical to anticipate a similar developmental path. We already have 3 or 4 different model/makes of power boat AUSV's mostly based on RHIB's of different lengths. Each will have its strengths and weaknesses. This is exactly why the UAV market has grown into an industry. Some of the strengths of a wingsailed AUSV will be the ability to move silently thru the water without powering a propeller or using mechanical machinery and by its ability to cover large areas of ocean very efficiently when there is wind. Probably at a top speed of 20kts. or so. I think a solar/vertical wind turbine idea has merit as well.
Aloha

 

Robot Sailboat Project

Sailor Students build robot yacht to sail the Atlantic

Eight young Swiss sailors - who are also mechanical engineering students - have taken on something big: in the context of their focus project, they are designing a sailing boat to sail autonomously across the Atlantic. They are determined that their creation will be ready to enter the International Microtransat Challenge, which is the first Atlantic crossing race for unmanned yachts, later this year.

Since last September the students from ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology) have been working on the project constantly, and hope to have the boat set off across the Atlantic from Ireland to the Caribbean by November, a journey they believe will take about three months. So far, so good. They have now launched the boat, which measures 4 metres and weighs 500 kilos.

Big challenges await the boat, named Avalon. Storms, high seas, intense sunlight and corrosive seawater – all of these are being taken into account by the students in their planning, design and implementation. The sailing boat is going to be a very high-tech product.

The Caribbean is still a long way off. But at least Avalon has already had a taste of the water on Lake Zurich. Admittedly, the first run ended on a sandbank, but that – and everyone agrees – can happen to any sailor.

As yet no robot sailing boat has successfully crossed the Atlantic. The International Microtransat Challenge 2009 is therefore a chance to really make some waves. 'We are in with a real shot of setting a world record', says Gion-Andri Büsser, one of the team. 'That’s a real incentive.'

The eight students designed Avalon using state-of-the-art techniques and, to a great extent, built it themselves during the winter. The only requirement stipulated by the Challenge organisers was the length of the boat, which should not exceed 4 metres.

Tests are to be carried out in more and more testing conditions, and the small yacht will participate in the World Robotic Sailing Championship in Portugal in the summer.

...and then finally, the challenge:

The organisers of the Microtransat Challenge expect that it will take somewhere between two to three months for the boats to reach the tropical waters on the Atlantic crossing and that they will be subjected to enormous strain: an acid test for Avalon itself, and maybe even more so for the nerves of its creators and various sponsors, without whom the project would never have left port.

Avalon is a prime example of what persuasive ETH Zurich students and dedicated industrial partners can achieve together: the project budget will be covered almost entirely by industrial sponsors.

For more information on the Microtransat Challenge, go to their website .



by Science Daily/Sail-World Cruising 11:38 PM Sun 19 Apr 2009

 

For those interested Harbor Wing Technologies has added a FAQ page to their website
http://www.harborwingtech.com/faq.htm

 

I was playing with the idea too some 6 months ago. My concept idea was solar powered self righting mono. Onboard camera and satellite link could send me few photos every day and some other basic data (speed, route,wind, water and air temp etc. logs) and I could upload my latest route requests that the boat would try to follow to its best ability.

Shouldn't be too tricky - 100w output would give some speed to 3-4 meter boat. few knots would be fine as it would have all the time in the world, enough batteries that if it hits bad weather it could shut down non essential stuff to minimum (like wait with the data transmit until there is more juice available).

I think the concept is great - just rendezvous once a year for bottom cleaning and maintenance until the boat gets ran over...

Big question is liability - if my boat bumps into some fancy yacht - who is liable? Coast guards around the world would seize the boat on sight as they would suspect smuggling.