canting mast

[usa2]

what is the point of a canting mast? It seems to me, and tests ive done, that canting the mast to leeward depowers the sail, and canting to windward just makes you heel more and slow down? Could someone maybe explain an advantage of canting the rig? It seems pretty redundant, and you can accomplish more with a canting keel rather than rig.

First some of the boats that use this technology: 1)Open 60 (Bernard Nivelt and others will), 2)ORMA multies, 3) Maiden Hong Kong, 4) National 12 and Merlin Rocket Dinghies-uk, 5)F-14 catamaran usa ,6) see "small trimaran " threadthis section for "kinked mast that allows balanced rig.
Now the why: 1) adds power because when boat heels rig stays vertical; on multies relieves depression of leeward hull, 2) positively affects balance esp off the wind, 3)moves CG of rig to weather or prevents it from going to leeward. 4) on rc models gets around no movable ballast class rules to some extent.
See: http://seahorsemagazine.com/9802-feb/tri.htm

[gggGuest]

I'm not sure that the Merlin has ever even touched the water: there's certainly no news of it having raced with any worthwhile results, and the inclined rig on the N12 does not seem to have been a success: I'm sure I've heard Mike has given up on the idea. Also worth noting that Bethwaite did a great many experiments with inclined rigs and abandoned the concept.

In ballasted boats what you're really doing is playing with the angle between rig and ballast. Like canting the keel except that the hull body is at a greater heel angle. If there are limits on how much or indeed whether the keel can be inclined relative to the hull its probably got benefits. On big multis it means that the weight of the rig is moved further to windward of the lee hull which is going to have some effect on performance.

[usa2]

thanks for the article doug

Check this out:
http://www.wingo.com/chriswhite/tiltrig.html