Fastest Sailboat on the Planet!

Here, here! Nicely put, if I might say so. Hopefully the silly season is now officially over!

 

agreed and I'll go a step farther and mention that the rules might want to be a bit more specific

 

the only record that means something is how many times did you multiply the wind speed?

 

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Thats an excellent point!

 

interesting point Doug

my take on it is the boats all need compete on the same playing field
same water quality and same wind speed sounds like a good compromise

 

Hydroptere-Fastest Sailboat on the Planet!

From the Luderitz site: Winds about 40 knots for new kite record...

"12 Oct 2010 : Tsunami Tuesday – Hydroptere Record Smashed!

It’s official – after today the Hydroptere is no longer the fastest sailing vessel. It’s previous record of 51.36 was broken numerous times today by Kite surfers!
2nd Lagoon Luderitz lived up to all expectations today with many new records being broken.

Scores of competitors dramatically improved on their Personal Best sailing speeds and 5 competitors reached 50 knots and more!
Winds of around 40 were recorded. The new Speed Channel is proving to be a definite winner for competitors. Once again the organizers of the Luderitz Speed Event have produced record breaking conditions for competitors to be recorded in the Speed Sailing Hall of Fame."

 

Well, that would be a different record-category. This one is just about speed.

Establishing a record-category based on wind speed multiple is tricky because the procedure to determine the wind speed has to be defined exactly . NALSA did it recently:
http://www.nalsa.org/DownWind.html

Maximizing the wind speed multiple might also prove not to be very spectacular, if it turns out that it is much simpler in rather low winds with very efficient ultra light vehicles that cruise slowly on calm water.

 

Interesting competition between large and small. Well, at least the kiters view it as a competition: l'Hydroptere's operators seem to have temporarily lost interest and are focussing on deep sea sailing. Quite a contrast between the two web sites incidentally, the kiters trumpeting their triumph over the big guy and the l'H site congratulating them in a quiet and dignified manner; the same sort of thing that tends to happen here! The effect of near ideal/artificial conditions are evident and we can look forward to more record breaking in the near future. Wonder if they will resort to lots of fans on windless days?

I am not sure what all this record breaking is going to do for the man in the street or sailing boat. Will any of this trickle down? Even sub-nuclear particle research is expected to have a payoff, especially in nuclear fusion power generation. Kiting may join wind-surfing and snow-boarding as an Olympic sport - that would be a blast. I doubt there will be hoards of huge super-fast foilers in the marina down the road from millionaire's row (better make that billionaires) however.

 

Maybe this direction will get the odd person more enthusiastic about kites... apparently foiling boards won most of the classes
http://www.tropheesaintclair.com/

 

It has been known by a few people for a long time that the elimination of the monumental spray(drag) from a normal kite board(very low aspect/high drag) would produce more speed. Now it may begin to be proven.....
The "air chair" foils that some windsurfers and kiteboards use probably aren't the best foils for speed but do well in re-entering after spectacular jumps-it will be most interesting to see the direction development takes....

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UPDATE: Thanks for the link Cheesy. I don't speak French but when you look at the spray from a normal board compared to the foilboard-they're both lifting the same-it appears that the foil board has less drag. And the foils are MUCH more refined than the older "air chair" foils-very impressive!

 

The Power and the Majesty: Hydroptere!

Great video of the boat going fast in waves:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wr3F-K9-KsY&feature=player_embedded

still pictures at speed: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuNzD4RP3EA&feature=related

and this record setting video-just awsome: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQ-gdqo35os&NR=1

 

Yes indeed - a fantastic boat. Did you notice that they are sailing in an offshore wind, presumably to get as flat water as possible? Does this take anything away from their achievements? Of course not - its just sensible.

 

Au ravoir L'Hydroptere........Au ravoir!!!!! reposer en paix

3 kiters just demolished Hydroptere's record....... one American kiter "on a slab of foam" beat Hydroptere's record by over 4 knots.....the biggest margin ever in speedsailing!!!!! A one shot knockout to a million dollar project! And the kiters still have a few gears left!!! I love it!!!!!

Still interested to know if Hydroptere's mile record run was even legal.......what was the water depth??.........more than half her overall beam as the WSSRC requires????

 

Bottom line is there is only so much force the human body can transmit from the kite to the board at which point Hydropters mechanical systems will enable it to beat any gains the kiters are making at present

Not to detract from a great achievement but the petty bickering is childish at best and likely to give way to chagrin once the physical limitations of kiting ( which are bound to be fast approaching ) are reached. IE the kiters will have to come up with a bionic suet eventually in order to maintain the present level of advancement whereas teem Hydropter has all the mechanism it needs to attain a clear advantage eventually.

cheers to all and congratulations on a great run

best
B

 

cheaper to build a bionic suit than a new Hydroptere!!!!