foiling 18

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Great post and welcome , Thomas! What you and your team have done is an historic first-congratulations. First 18 to foil on just two foils, first three person boat to foil on two foils! By proving that this can be done you, your team and John Ilett have advanced foiling technology and -over time-improved sailing for everyone to one degree or another.

 

Thomas

There are 2 18ft skiff clubs that race on Sydney Harbour.

The NSW 18ft Skiff club,the league
The Sydney Flying Squadron,the SFS.

The league traditionally held their races on sundays and the SFS raced on saturdays.These clubs went in different directions around 1990 when Grand Prix sailing was formed and the Grand prix 18's started sailing out of the Woollahra sailing clubs on sundays and still raced at the SFS on saturdays.

The league is strictly one design with no other boats eligible to race.

The SFS allows all previously registered 18ft skiffs to compete and there is a mix of Murray,Bethwaite and the last Ella Bache i think is a Andy Dovall design.I have always preferred the SFS.

The 18ft skiffs have been using asymmetric kites for over 80 years and they were set from a conventional spinnaker pole before the bowsprit pole was adopted around august 1983.Julian Bethwaite's Prime mk2 was the first boat on the water with a fixed bowsprit pole and he registered his boat with the league so that makes the League as the first club to have a boat fly an asymmetric kite from a fixed pole.The #1 and #2 rigs back in those days carried a flat wire luff asymmetric kite similar to what you have used in your photos and a slight change in the courses made them redundant.

The first to use wings on an 18ft skiff was Richard Court from western Australia and they were adopted virtually overnight by the rest of the fleets.

Rob Browns Entrad 18 was the first to use a fibre mast tip and his skiff was i believe registered with the league and that was around 1985.

I believe Sorros Fosters was the first 18 to use a carbon fibre mast and i recall they broke it the first time they used it and cost was around $15000.What surprised me was he had a new one the following week!

Julian Bethwaite claimed a 45kg hull weight for his Prime mk2 so the 18's were much lighter in the past and the minimum hull weight was introduced to give the hulls a much longer competitive life.I definitely preferred the no minimum weight rule as the boats were lighter to carry around.

They tried much narrower hulls back in 1987 and they called them Pencil boats and they proved to be very difficult to sail in comparison to the other more conventional boats.

From around 1977 to 1988 the new boats launched every year would make all the previous boats obsolete and all the top skippers would be building new boats every year so we have gone down that path before at great expense to the sponsors who supported the class.

The 18ft skiffs had 4 complete rigs at one stage and with the 22ft wingspan the big rig was around 44ft in length with #2 around 39ft #3 at 36ft and #4 around 34ft.I know the working sail area was about 520sq ft with the #2.The biggest spinnaker was over 1100 sq ft.

Thomas i have sailed every generation of 18ft skiff from the plwood 18's in the 1970's to the 22ft wingspan wildest form and i have sailed the current one design only once.I am not a fan of the current one design.

I have watched your video and for what appears to be very light winds it appears to be a lot harder to sail and it makes me wonder what it would be like if the wind was blowing over 20 knots and what the wipeouts would be like.I dont think with that crew it would beat any of the top boats unless you stop dipping the wings in the water because that acts like a brake and stops the boat.Sure it may go faster with foils but the time you lose dipping wings would see you behind the non foilers.I think the wider wings make the boat less likely to capsize to windward in the lulls and i know this from experience.

Nosediving was never a problem in lighter winds like in the video and more of a problem when caught out with big rig in 20 knots so when you sail it in stronger winds we will see if it is less of a problem.I have never nosedived bearing away at the top mark so there is a technique to it.

I like your attitude to the rules and your desire to have them relaxed a bit and once upon a time the rules were...18ft long and race starts at 2.30pm.

Thomas in my opinion i think the 2 mast rule is no good as we have lost the big rig for light winds and they are not as good in the stronger winds.I prefer 4 rigs yet feel 3 rigs is a good compromise.

I think we need to go back to wider wings of at least 18ft span and i liked the speed with 22ft span and that would be my choice and remove the one design hull rule.The wingspan was reduced from 22ft when J.McKee had trouble keeping the boat upright and he had an olympic gold medal before he started sailing the 18's.

From what i have seen in the video you have a long way to go in improving your boathandling skills before your foiler will go faster than a conventional hull.The 18's are much easier to sail in lighter winds and i do have some doubts to how it would perform in a gusty sydney westerly or southerly breeze.

Good luck with it and John does appear to be one of the world leaders in desging foils so you have chosen the right person to make it work.

Forget about the league as they probably will not change their rules in the forseeable future.

The SFS is Australia's oldest open boat sailing club and they named it the Sydney Flying Squadron before aeroplanes were invented.I think you will find the SFS will be a lot more supportive of what you are trying to do.

 

Doug
The brass monkey regatta had the 18ft skiff win one race by about 5 minutes beating all the cats and everthing else and if flipper had of been on time for the other starts it may have won them all.

Did the IC,cats,49er beat the moth at the brass monkey regatta?

Where did rohan finish at the skandia week regatta and did he admit to being beaten by 420's and OK dinghy's?

The last 3 mixed fleet regatta's down here have not shown your claims about the moth to be anywhere near accurate.

I have paced the jet cat that does the manly run in an 18 ft skiff but i will not claim the 18's can beat the jet cat.The Jet cat replaced the hydrofoil on the manly service!

 

Thomas,
Great work indeed!
As I live in Torino, think I will come up there to see your boat in the flesh, probably in springtime.
Cheers,
Marco.

 

Here the footage of our 3rd testing under sail :
Low wind.... 4 to 7 knots
Tries with crew off 3 than 2
No speed readings : ...sorry
No more rudder flap control problems....

Have fun watching : http://www.jeanpierreziegert.ch/06_video.html

Thomas

 

got to see the new video of the flying with light, sorry very light wind conditions. I'll let your guys talk about the speed and any kind of instability....

http://www.jeanpierreziegert.ch/06_video.html

 

Nice video

I guess there was some editing of video and it was apparent when the wing dipped.Cut to next scene...

Very light conditions and 18's are always very easy in light winds with flat water so i am curious to see how it goes in stronger winds and waves.

Stronger winds expose any shoddy crew work very quickly..

I noticed the powerboat wake caused boat to come off the foils and go a little bow down so i am a little unsure of how it will handle a bit of chop.

Good to see you try 2 up and i have sailed 2 handed back in the 1980's so while not legal certainly more fun in the light stuff.

It appears the centreboard it fitted before launching and does this cause any problems clearing the boom and vang with launch/retrieval or has the light conditions not shown this to be a problem yet?

I saw wheels on the cradle so do you guys wheel it into the water or carry it?

I would prefer to be the guy carrying the bow as one side could get very heavy if main fills and board prevents it from moving slightly past the centreline.

Bring on some fresher conditions with more video...

 

The dive shown when the boat wakes comes close was caused by steering the boat higher to breeze. Doing this reduces the pressure on the foils and lets the boat fly higher. You can steer higher but it must done while keeping the boat heeled to windward a bit.

 

Great! Looking forward to more wind and upwind foiling pix. Keep up the good work!
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Here's some foiling eye candy for inspiration: the first two person bi-foil monofoiler(an I14) being sailed with no wand for altitude control just manual control of the aft foil via the hiking stik:
aus14_2.jpg
Address:http://www.monofoiler.com/images/aus14_2.jpg Changed:6:32 PM on Thursday, July 31, 2003

 

SORRY I AM NOT MAKING THE WEATHER

 

I am very impressed by the learning curve over just three outings. Flying steadily is a major achievement, especially in such marginal conditions. The angle of attack is quite high - the foils are evidently just below stall.

I'm also impressed by the improvement in height control. Not only is the boat flying, but the crew is not flying too high.

 

New pictures of the 18 are available in real wind-very exciting! I tried to post them but can't(because of $%#@&^%!! webtv) so I hope John or Thomas will.....

 

Hy Doug,

Here are the pics of our latest sail

when sailing up wind : wind 15 knots
boatspeed 13
at 52 dergrees over ground
(That's a lot of vmg and apparent wind )


when sailing down wind : wind 12 knots
boatspeed 19
at 140 dergrees over ground

rudder dammage at 21.7 knots....

great sailing

still not enough lift aft.... new rudder gantry will be longer and with 2 degrees more lift into the rudder foil, should be repaaired by mid october (before the ice)

we are lokking for helmets also..

Thomas

 

November outing (brrrrr...)

Hy there again,

Some news from AET

Rudder gantry is repared, longer stronger and with 2 degrees more forward angle.
New rudder flap control system (nuclear bomb proof mecanics) based on dented wheels from gear box of radio controlled race cars....

Outing with 15 to 18 kn of wind : see the video here :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAol7_mcdrI&mode=related&search=


Speeds downwind between 20 and 25 knots !
Max speed only the fishes know.
Gps was lost in one of the splashes at the same time as the port tiller extension ; if you watch carefully you can see the helm sitting in the middle of the boat on port

Major problem to keep constant height in big waves :
Waves acting on wand made us go up and down, control shock-cord too elastic for strong winds we suppose.
Port was easier since almost parallel to waves, starboard perpendicular to wave trains was more of a fun parc ride

But great fun good progress

Next outing soon

Thomas




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAol7_mcdrI&mode=related&search=

 

Thomas
Good video yet the wind does not seem to be 15-18 knots maybe its the youtube video quality but it does not appear to meet beaufort scale criteria for windspeed.

It looks like some waves are causing big problems...lol.

It looks like a pretty soft place where you sail with lighter winds and flat water and i know flipper has some unresolved issues downwind in much bigger waves with his foiling 18 on sydney harbour.

How long does it take you to launch the boat from it touching the water with the cradle till you set off?

Looking forward to some video with good 2nd rig conditions.