Kite Board Foiler Design

Foiling

Previous comments by me as applicable here, now, as when I originally made them:
The foiling revolution is making great progress every year with this year being the first time a company has introduced a keelboat foiler designed specifically to be easy to sail (Q 23) but it won't even be in production until 2016. And the first year a cruiser-racer foiler has been introduced-the G4. Up until this year the only choices for foilers were out and out race boats- when it is the easy to sail, smaller boats and cruiser racers that are likely to have a much larger share of the market. Just in the last few weeks a design team from Argentina has proposed(and is building) a dinghy foiler(with movable ballast) inspired by a 57 year old man who wants the thrill of foiling in a more docile boat that can be foiled or sailed normally. It's innovation like this and the many more like it still to come that will allow foiling to continue to grow and reach a much wider market. Another example of a foiler designed specifically to appeal to a wider market is the new Waszp by one of the best builders of the Moth foiler -the fastest boat under 20 or 25 or 30'!
The boat is designed to be much easier to sail than the Moth(although it's legally a Moth as well) and to cost about half as much when in goes into production in 2016. This is the kind of innovation that all the foiling excitement has inspired and these types of boats will be the most significant part of the on-going revolution.
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Another example of a foiler designed to be able to offer comfort to its crew in addition to the joys of foiling is the soon to be produced Exocet 19 trimaran-the very first under 20' trimaran foiler-probably being produced early next year. See the "Small Trimarans Under 20'" thread in the multihulls forum for more.
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The key part of the foiling revolution has not even begun to show what it can do! And that is the new foilers where the focus is fun and comfort rather than just speed-like the Exocet and Fly6. Every foiler produced before June of 2015 has been a racing machine and that is just one of the many facets of foiling fun. The new boats I described earlier ,among many others, will bring the thrill of flying above the water to a much wider audience.
And rather than "hype" the excitement associated with foiling is genuine excitement that is gripping the world now with new boats and new ways to enjoy foiling about to be available to everyone. No more will you have to be an athlete to enjoy foiling-the experience will open up to thousands of new people in boats never thought possible until now.
Yes, it is a revolution.......

 

Re–posting is a waste of bandwidth, a link is preferable (presumably there is one, though you didn't provide it), and you fail to address a single point raised (or even post something on–topic, but I guess it's your thread). It's also a courtesy when referring to other threads to include a link (e.g. Small trimarans under 20' post 562).

Reality continues to defy your rose coloured vision of a ubiquitous foiling future despite having many decades to deliver. It's not some magical experience that can be had for zero extra cost and no added complexity or difficulty.

The Quant 23 is interesting, but the prototype has already been capsized, presumably with a fairly competent crew so not that easy to sail. Without boat speed, foils provide zero lift. The flaw in the Quant 23 is that the keel bulb weight has been reduced in expectation of foil-generated righting moment, so it's more prone to be knocked down when going slow than similar boats with bigger bulbs. So while the scow hull makes it more forgiving, no doubt it will be slower (though easier to sail) than full–on racing boats of similar size and harder to sail (though faster) than non–foiling boats with full–sized bulbs. Performance in rough conditions where it can't foil is also hugely compromised by the lighter bulb.

It remains to be seen whether it will be sufficiently popular to recover the development costs. I hope it succeeds, but it will not revolutionise sailing if it does.

Regarding the G4, it's "unique and niche targeted as none other big Cat out there". The original builder has filed for Chapter 11 protection due, in part, to poor G4 sales so not that popular and not an example of how foiling has come to the masses. The concept has some fairly obvious flaws, not the least being how to keep marine growth off the foils. The Quant 23 has more promise in that regard as they can be completely removed when not in use. A second is that it only foils in a relatively narrow downwind range, so good for the occasional thrill but not a "foil anywhere" cruiser.

The WAZP is the latest attempt at a one–design Moth, albeit one with more promise than the last. It's only "easier to sail" than other production foiling Moths because it has simplified controls and has been designed to be a little forgiving. It will not bring foiling to the masses (though I do hope it sells well).

There is nothing on the Exocet Extreme facebook page to indicate that it has been launched, so maybe 2016?

Your claim of "Every foiler produced before June of 2015 has been a racing machine" is so far wrong as to be laughable. You are well aware of the Williwaw, a cruising, foiling trimaran (which yet again demonstrates that foiling is not practical for cruising boats).

Foiling kite boards are yet another niche market. They look like fantastic fun, and are seriously fast, but have all the drawbacks of other foilers: harder to sail, much more expensive, easy to break and require additional depth when launching. Foiling wake boards (or "towed devices" is perhaps a better term) have been around for 25 years, yet I've never seen one outside a YouTube video.

So pontificate all you like, that doesn't make it so.

 

Foiling

Sorry I confused you: when I said "produced" I probably should have said "manufactured" since I was referring to production foilers-most all of which, so far, have been designed ,built and sold as race boats. Williwaw was not manufactured but was built as a one off.
Williwaw, however, was the FIRST foiler to sail 20,000 miles on the open ocean and ,as such, was a profound accomplishment for the early 70's. The closest to that boat in the modern era are the big tri's Gitana and Macif both equipped with lifting foils designed to fly the whole boat-not just foil assist.
The Quant 23 has had one knockdown in over 6 months of sailing and it was easily righted and sailed on. Trying to disparage the worlds first foiling keelboat on such a ridiculous and uninformed basis is absurd. Hugh Welbourn has repeatedly said( and demonstrated) that the boat is extremely easy to foil for amateurs with no foiling experience.
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The fact is that the type of foilers likely to have the most profound effect on the market are,mostly, not even on the market yet but are on the way. Easy to sail, comfortable boats that fly are the next major wave in the history of foiling -and as much a revolution as the original production foilers were 15 years ago.

PS- the original ,and continuing ,builder of the G4 is Holland Composites in the Netherlands-and they most assuredly have NOT filed Chapter 11........
PS2- One of the critical elements of foilers designed to appeal to a wider swath of the public is the ability to foil in light air. I have been a proponent of that for over 15 years when I designed ,built and produced the worlds first RC sailing foiler that began to fly in a 5mph breeze. Just tonight I found that Quant boats has stated publicly that flying in light air(about 5 kts) is critical to their design philosophy. They are the first fullsize foiler manufacturer ,that I know of, to recognize how important light air foiling is.

 

Which should give you a hint as to where they see the market.

The vast majority of those miles were not foiling. Don't misunderstand me, I think Williwaw as a great achievement, but it did not herald in a new era of foiling cruising boats despite Hydrofoil Voyager: WILLIWAW providing detailed instructions for converting cruising multihulls to foilers and the author (David A. Keiper) creating and offering for sale hdrofoil conversion kits.

Which are highly specialised craft sailed by trained and skilled crews, absolutely not cruising boats. A much closer example is the G4.

I am not disparaging the boat at all, I'm trying to temper your over the top enthusiasm for a boat that has yet to prove itself.

It is an example that the boat requires a reasonable amount of skill and attention to operate. I've done thousands of hours racing in trailerable cruiser/racer monohulls with weighted centreboards similar in size to the Quant 23 and only been knocked down once, in +20kn while gybing a spinnaker when the rudder broke. Broaches, while racing, occur occasionally, but that's expected if you're going 10 tenths in strong winds.

You are of course entitled to your opinion, but it is just that: opinion, not fact.

I was referring (as you are well aware) to Gunboat, who built the first G4, Timbalero 3. The Holland Composites web site also called it "the Gunboat G4". I am not fully aware of the relationship between Gunboat and Holland Composites, but it seems reasonable to say the design was a collaboration and that Gunboat is the original builder (since they built the first one), and that Holland Composites are continuing to build G4s.

You might also note that Holland Composites have added hydraulics to control the foils and added safety systems to respond when things start to go wrong, claiming the second G4 will be "The first computer assisted foiling boat available". So there's life in the project yet.

 

You're right on that one Doug, I am in awe of guys like that who can make it look so easy. We need one of those to tow behind the sea doo rib.

Steve.

 

From The Foiling Week: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_sxGYLJ0o0

 

Here is the foil and board I just finished building , works great.

 

Couple more pics

 

Way to go! Whats the purpose of the little yellow fin-a skeg?

 

a touch of 'kitefoil n chill'? <cough>

amazing skill and pictures.

 

Seemed to me that this guy had something really interesting going on with this proof of concept:

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/bo...ter-become-fastest-sail-craft-ever-47462.html



Wonder if he has developed it any?

 

So, erm, no buoyancy, and no footstraps. How does he start this?

 

See about 2:49 where he starts sitting down. All he's got is dynamic lift and kite lift......

 

No other purpose but to bolt the rear wing to ,Its removable and has adjustable pitch . the skeg is G10 and has 1/4 threads tapped into it , it was that or epoxy in some nuts or use sex bolts.


Jay.

 

Thanks,Jay!