Speed Dream 27 Prototype

This concept has been announced couple of years ago and I didn't see much progress excerpt press-releases. Those speed records are good subject for discussion by sailing snobs (weighting achievements and important designs), but what is real outcome? All those speedsailing records look like another cow-pat throwing contest. It is often just pure technical interest without any economical or social benefit; and battle field of saling snobs (real and virtual ones).

On other side, I really wish good luck to authors of this concept, and we should all wait passionately to see the result before making the conclusions. I know Vlad is a doer, but sometimes we need to market our ideas somehow to make them happen.

 

I understand your points. I was talking in generalizations.

Where a boat is reasonable in cost and not a pain to sail, fast can be popular.

Where a boat is just plain fun or rewarding without a lot of speed, it can be a success.

It is pretty obvious that there are a ton of attributes that go into what makes one boat popular compare to others.

On the flip side, "popular" does not necessarily mean good for bringing new people to sailing, or keeping more sailors active. Fun, inexpensive, easy to learn, easy to deal with off of the water, and other such things are probably attributes that make a bigger difference in terms of "good for sailing".

For me, it is probably obvious that my personal desire for more speed in a one handed boat that is home build-able, cheap, and easy to manhandle at the nearby death trap of a public boat ramp all influence my opinions and writings.

As for Vlad, I understand that some amount of "hype" is needed for marketing, but I am skeptical of just about any claims of super performance (I am not from Missouri, but I like their "show me" motto for these things). On the other hand, I try to be an optimist and hope he can pull it off just for the sake of showing up all those who have said "no way".

Just do not push things to the point of being unsafe.

 

Who gives a rat's flatulence about all this popularity stuff, boat number figures, mass taste and madding crowd acceptance ... on BOAT DESIGN.net ... repeat BOAT DESIGN.net ... some here are a stuck needle on an old 78, boringly repeating the same old sounds.
Vlad is REFRESHING and pioneering something radical ... and definitely not mainstream (although he may have delusions about mainstream sales).

 

What, and saying "we need to go faster, we need to go faster, we need to go faster, we only need one dimension, more than one dimension is a waste, who cares about reality, anything that claims to be faster is by definition perfect and can have no downside" is so much more interesting?

And Gary, do you actually know how to post without using personal insults?

 

Repetition of false quotations is part of your operating mode, CT249??; I could counter with "mass taste rules, mass taste rules, mass taste rules" .... but I won't.

 

Thank you Gary, and let me reassure you I don't have any illusions about mainstream sales. We are not after them.
To continue analogy with the automotive industry, there's market for Toyota and there's market for Ferrari.
SD-27 is a prototype for super fast record-setting boat, and, naturally, a one design class derived from it, tough more moderate, still will be challenging and expensive. We don't expect her becoming next J-24, neither we want this.
Whether SpeedDream and other high performance boats bring much benefit to mainstream sailing - I certainly believe so.
If you compare unstable and uncontrollable boats of 1970-80, influenced by the old IOR with the modern generation of yachts - much easier to control, much faster and more fun to sail, it's easy to see that development for the most part was pushed by desire of racing sailors to go faster and faster.
To think of it, entire human progress is based on our need for speed...

 

Hi Mal,
Thank you for your opinion, even though I don't share most of your assumptions.

First, on the SD vs. multihull comparison.
While flying a keel, SD essentially is a catamaran with the volume and weight of its windward hull concentrated in a compact bulb. As such, she can use the same means "...to back off the pressure quickly and revert to a stable platform without significant loss of speed..."
But in extreme situation when all this fails, catamaran would just flip over, while SD has a huge benefit of letting her keel to drop down gradually, maintaining max RM.
As a hybrid between multihull with its high initial stability and monohull with its high ultimate stability, SD has significantly smaller risk of capsizing, which would allow to push her harder and achieve higher speeds.

Secondly, I agree that my design don't have any advantage in max RM, but because it's a planing hull, SD has significantly smaller wetted surface than multihull with its leeward hull pressed deep into water. Yes, one could use lifting foils on catamaran, but I can use them too, always keeping ahead in this game.

And finally, proa comparison.
If I understand it correctly - and I have to admit, I don't know much about them - a proa is half of a trimaran or a catamaran that sails on a single tack, and therefore has nothing in common with the SpeedDream concept.
Yes, you can design such a boat to reach very high speed - SailRocket is a perfect example, but what could be practical application of such a design in real offshore conditions? But then again, I don't know, maybe you've already figured it out...
Regardless, I'm not interested in designing another SailRocket, at least, for now...
Cheers,
Vlad

 

Sorry, Gary, I was obviously too subtle for you. So here's a quiet word - that was rhetoric and I didn't think anyone would think that was a falsification of a real quote. Nor did anyone say that mass taste rules; it's just that some of us pointed out that concentrating on high speed may not do much for the wider sport. Sorry if you hate bringing up the reality of the issue.

But I'm logging off BDF - too many personal insults thrown by you (including whether or not Vlad suffers from "delusions") and not enough discussion of reality.


Vlad - thank you for your time. I can't see how all human 'progress' - from Lascaux (sp?) cave art through to Proust, from leeches to heart replacements, from hitting two sticks together to Bach and the Sex Pistols, from sleeping on a dirty cave floor to sleeping in a soft bed in air conditioned comfort - is due to a need for speed.

I got into the thread because the Speed Dream blurb says that the project may "change the way we look at boats and their relationship to speed" and therefore the impact of speed on the sport is obviously relevant. As mentioned, you can put up a very logical and fact-based argument that increasing concentration on speed can bring problems to the sport. After all, evidence-based examination of popular leisure pastimes show that they are mainly slow ones and often ones in which various restrictions reduce speed. Several areas of the sport show a distinct decline in popularity when they increase in speed.

However, given that some people (not you) can't discuss issues on the facts, it's not something to discuss further here.

 

Now that is an enormous debate.

Myself, I'm interested in the engineering aspect of a design and with exotic designs you get to see some interesting engineering.

With a commercial boat, you have a list of "real" requirements which the engineering fulfills. With racing, the requirements are artificial... made up by the governance of the race. I don't know where to begin thinking about what's best for the wider sport, accessibility, maximum participation, low entry cost, showing off difficult skills, maximum spectator appeal, speeds, conditions, size...

 

Regardless of the desire to bring in stuff that is total off the subject of this thread, it is obvious that a lot of people that very much do like to see how far one can push a given technology.

Even if some reversible tack version of a weird specialty boat (say Sailrocket version XXII) eventually does 100 knots while crossing open water, there is still something compelling about an effort to push a mono beyond current limits.

In general boating, it is not all about speed (even though faster is a plus quite often).

Given that Vlad's target has nothing to do with general purpose boating, we really ought to focus the issues at hand.

A fast mono is all about a single clean hull in the water. Multi hull boats go fastest with only one hull in the water but they have to work at keeping it up there and there is a LOT of areo penalty to hulls, cross beams and netting up in the air. One hull should be an advantage over more hulls provided enough power is available.

Having a single mast firmly attached to a main hull is a structural advantage of a tri over a cat. However, a tri pays typically pays a penalty in more overall hull volume than it really needs. Vlad's concept builds in the advantage of the mast on a substantial hull without any excess hull volume required.

Power comes from good sails and righting moment. Hanging lead on a pole to the windward gives plenty. Rotating a keel to get it out of the water is great for speed, but getting it right could be tough. Stability issues, tacking issues, and drag associated with the slot on the bottom of the boat are all just challenges. Again getting it right is possible, but only with the right amount of creativity, good engineering, determination and most likely plenty of $$$$.

The concept has merit, but only time will tell if Vlad can make it work.

 

I'm surprised how emotional this discussion gets! Come on guys, calm down, this supposed to be fun...
Naturally, I meant that it's technical progress that's inspired by speed, not art or entertainment - wait, let me take it back.
Come think of it, it's only art that's seems to be immune from speed.
As for entertainment - it's getting more and more digitized, and data delivery is unthinkable without speed.
Computers, TV, telephone, Internet - they are all about speed.
Now think about about steamships, trains, cars, planes - they are all answers to our desire to get faster from A to B.
Think about commerce and trade, where speed of development, production and delivery means difference between making profit and losing business... Etc...
Speed is not everything - and not for everyone - but let's give it credit it deserves!
Cheers,
Vlad

 

I think a number of you gentlemen (and I use the term rather loosely) need to go back to page one of this thread and have a little read through what you have written. There is just one post (questioning amongst other things, the difficulty of engineering such an extreme canting keel) that is of a remotely technical nature. Everything else is just insult cast upon insult. 4 pages of complete and utter drivel.
There's absolutley no doubt that Vlad's project will be a difficult one to bring to succesful fruition. All the more reason for us to encourage him. But no... instead of offers of support, all you lot can manage is a tirade of abuse - much of it as a result of the fact that it was DL who brought the project to our attention.
It's petty. It's childish. You all ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
Best of luck to you Vlad... it will be an awesome spectacle if you can pull it off.

 

Vlad,

Thanks for your response.

Both SD and a multihull can capsize to leeward with equal veracity. A multihull however will not capsize to windward. Lead bulbs generally don't float, so the chance of SD capsizing to windward is probably similar to that of it capsizing to leeward. I presume you are using hydraulics to move the keel? With such a long keel keel canted to 90 degrees, will the actuating system be able to react fast enough to counter a backward capsize. There must be a weight penalty for such a system? Will you be using an automated control system to monitor and adjust the keel cant angle?

You mention that the planing hull will have lower wetted surface. Granted this may be true when the boat is actually planing and the keel is out of the water. At lower speeds though, there will more likely be a wetted surface deficit. To achieve records you will need to be able to maintain high average speeds, and to do that you need to be able to maintain good speed in less than favourable conditions. Peak speeds are not necessarily the most important consideration.

Proas such as sailrocket, as used in various speed sailing attempts, are often single tack boats. However the majority of proas, including those from antiquity, have double ended hulls and are designed to shunt (reverse direction) in order to sail on both tacks. Those of us who are familiar with proas recognise the proa like attributes of SD. To me it seems obvious that a proa could be designed with the same attributes of low wetted surface and small streamlined mass to windward for righting moment (water ballast which can be dumped when not required), that could be lighter overall and free of the complication of the canting keel. Granted though, it would not be as interesting an engineering challenge as SD.

Cheers,
Mal.

 

Hi Mal,
As I see, my arguments haven't convinced you, and likewise, yours fail to convince me.
I suggest it's best we postpone this conversation until SpeedDream prototype is built and tested .
Hasta la vista...

 

Vlad,

It would be a bit dissapointing for many if I had convinced you. I look forward to seeing SpeedDreem on the water.

Cheers,
Mal.