Catalyst Catster Catamaran:
Electric Motor Sailor
- length of deck: 27 meters/ 89 feet
- length over all: 31.5 meters/103.3 feet
- length at water line: 22 meters/ 72 feet
- twin marine electric 45 KW/60 hp motors - massive imbedded SS tanks for hydrogen: fuel cell energy storage Charter and research versions sleep 28 plus in 14 double cabins, while Inter-Island version sleeps 60 adults in Crawlee Lodge alone!
The Catalyst Catster Catamaran is actually a 89 foot boat… if it had the “staircase sterns” and “blunt nose bows” currently popular. BUT with its huge prows aft to support the 6 freestanding, symmetrical air-foils while retracted and the huge prows forward to leverage those air-foils while being retracted, she has an actual over all length of 103.3 feet or 31.5 meters and just 27 meters, or 89 feet of overall deck length. However, her spacious accommodations make her feel like at least a 140 footer !
A bit of history: I once played music regularly on a 110 foot “Whale Watching” catamaran off Lahina, Maui. I thought/felt the space could be used MUCH MORE efficiently…to create more of an “open-space” feeling, while improving its function-ability TREMEMDOUSLY!!
“Form follows function” here! I needed to go with a boat long enough to accommodate the “Crawlee-Lodge” concept! Three meters to the power of 3, or 27 meters of deck length does that without being “space greedy” on the fore and aft decks. The CCC still has 7 meters of netting in the bow and 3 in the stern, while having 12 private double “half-height” cabins below the main salon. Despite the slight discomfort of having to crawl in and out of your cabin, the functionality is virtually the same, as most of ones time in a cabin is spent lying down anyway! Utilizing this understanding allows for a much smaller boat to provide the accommodations of a MUCH LARGER one!
Continuing along the same train of thought, I’ve taken the kitchen outside aft on a huge stern deck. I’ve taken the 7 fresh-water, grey-water and sewage-water tanks and hung them under the salon. I’ve taken the entire control cockpit and placed it up on a flying bridge “Master Control Center”. I’ve taken the navigation station and half-submerged it (it’s walkway) down into the Crawlee Lodge, to allow for a standing/walking navigation ROOM whose equipment (including all computer and electronic components) are on the main salon level in a humidity controlled compartment whose top acts as a large table inside the salon’s aft section (walkway is colored black in the top view). Digital displays are on both the flying bridge and in the navigation room itself.
Since the main salon doesn’t have to house the kitchen, navigation station, or cockpit it becomes a HUGE open space likened to a dormitory’s family room! This design also frees up the hulls from cabins and allows them to house two large laboratories forward, ( biological and communications), in the “research vessel” model, as well as two massive “Master’s Quarters” in the sterns, for senior crew and their families!
In an “inter-island transport” version of the CCC, the entire Crawlee Lodge can be left undivided and open, other than oval triangulation structural support and could easily sleep up to 60 adults in it’s 11 by 10 meter area and still have ample crawl-ways for convenient mobility.
This vessel has approximately 266 square meters of canopy surface to provide shade from the tropical sun while providing a platform for it’s massive 30 kw photovoltaic solar energy collection system. (outlined in the top view drawing) The twin 45 KW/60HP Marine Electric Motors consume much less space that traditional fossil fuel engines and produce near ZERO POLLUTION. Many hundreds of “motor-hours” worth of running capacity is stored in CCC’s huge SS “keel embedded” hydrogen fuel cell storage tanks. (shown in red in the side view)
Additional energy harvesting will take the form of two 400 watt marine wind turbines in the tops of each of the two tallest “airfoil-masts”. And the electric power train includes an adjustable propeller that transforms from power-thrust, to a neutral drag position, to a “hydro-electric” generation position while under sail. The entire vessel is cooled naturally using cold “deep-sea water” that is pumped thru stainless steel tubing suspended throughout all ceilings; thus providing a continuous supply of cooled air without having to close all windows and doors OR run noisy generators!
The innovative retractable “V” shaped “dagger-board” includes a hydraulic power steering/rudder component for “finger-tip” control equal to a MUCH smaller vessel and the ability to point to at least 38 degrees windward, like a deep keeled mono-hull! While it’s “V” dagger-board is retracted, she will have a VERY shallow draft for a vessel of its length!
The free-standing carbon fiber air-foil masts ( that also have a neutral or “luff” gear), will allow for a “no-lines” sailing experience that when interfaced with today’s computing power….will make the Catalyst Catster Catamaran the world’s first “throttle controlled” sailboat!!!
The CCC is a true fusion of ancient Nordic and Polynesian mariner form, beauty and function… AND “cutting-edge” mariner technology of the early 21st century! This dynamic combination will provide comfortable, spacious cruising at 12 to 18 knots in all kinds of conditions!
by: Darrell Ernest Rolstone, Chief Designer and CCO of <www.Energy-Synergy.com> Intra-Global ,<globalance@hotmail.com>