34th America's Cup: multihulls!

Much of the current reliability situation is probably random small things combined with not enough emphasis on things like getting boat maintenance check lists nailed down and not finalizing working part configurations well before actual elimination racing.

For ETNZ, we can probably cut them some amount of slack as they are probably more worried about September racing than getting past the current "going through the motions" elimination of LR.

As long as they do not get behind in points, they probably do not really need to focus on winning every time they go out.

For the one OR event with B1 rudder, it is being blamed on impact damage. All of the boats are subject to foil / rudder / stabilizer damage due to impact damage. Even in other classes, this is an area where the need to be fast has pretty much assured that these components will not be as impact resistant as we would like.

For LR, it is strange how efficiently they dispatched AR, yet can not seem to find any kind of reliability in this round. A good portion of the LR issues are probably an area where one could "blame" a team (lack of shore team focus on check, recheck and just do what ever it takes to make sure all of the parts will be reliable). But then again, this the team that jumped in late, was blown away in the RR and probably is not driving themselves as much given their obvious poor chances.

So, even though the reliability issues are frustrating to the fans, the LR issues are really the only area where I would say things are worse than expected, but this should not really a surprise at this point.

 

Glenn Ashby on the ETNZ nosedive:

http://www.sailracingmagazine.com/e...plains-the-emirates-team-new-zealand-nosedive

 

@Blackburn - "Sailing Weight: For the AC72, 5,700 kg is the minimum. 5,900 kg maximum. The AC72 Rule references "Sailing Weight" and not "Displacement", which is the term more traditionally seen in Rating Rules for race yachts."
http://www.cupinfo.com/en/americas-cup-2013-boats-ac72-ac45.php

"Artemis CEO Paul Cayard says, “The weight limit is a critical part of the equation and therefore quite a challenge. There’s a minimum weight of 1,325 kilos for the wing and an all-up minimum for the hull and rig of 5,700 kilos, with a maximum of 5,900 kilos."

 

The guys are the best, but statistically the AC72s seem to be breaking new grounds for breaking bits. And criticism of AC boats for being fragile is hardly new.

For comparison, the first IACC regatta saw a 92% finish rate. There were also about 3 cases of other damaged gear (genoa track lifting, cracked boom, one I can't recall) over a series involving 9 boats and 4 fleet races, plus match racing. The series was sailed offshore in up to 22 knots, so conditions were probably pretty comparable with this AC so far although average windspeed may have been lower.

After the series, Bill Kock said the boats were "stupid" and the rule was designed by "idiots" because of their fragility. So when a much higher finishing rate in arguably similar conditions lead to savage criticism of the IACC boats, the current talk about AC72s is hardly unparalleled.

It's hard to blame poor maintenance as PFlados does, IMHO; the shore crews should be the best. And if the reliability problems are not related to the basic nature of the AC72s then why are things going wrong for all the teams in this AC when the smaller and poorer teams got it right the last time a new class was introduced?

The earlier boats also got a lot of criticism, as you know; Herreshoff abused his own design Reliance and the Js were criticised for their rigs. The 12s and IACC boats copped a huge amount of flack from people who sailed faster boats. And Coutts himself disparaged existing boats, with his talk of them being like the golf senior tour (which probably outrates the AC) and of a need to change them.

 

A jump into the past - the story of the 1988 AC and the Stars & Stripes US-1 wing-sailed catamaran:
http://chevaliertaglang.blogspot.it/2012/06/americas-cup-1988-stars-stripes.html

Very interesting and educational story, IMO. It shows that historically the America's Cup has never been a regatta like the others, and probably shouldn't be viewed through the lenses of sport events as we know them.

 

Thanks everyone for the good responses.

Corley - I am intrigued by the mention of twist in the wing. I was watching LR when they broke their board and saw the wing twist off a lot. I can see the mainsheet only operates in the horizontal plane so I would love to know how they play with twist with no leech tension from the sheet. How do they control twist?

On the fragility thing - I reckon they could make the boats a lot stronger and more able to race in normal conditions if they reduced the rig size and increased the hull weight next time. The total lack of gennakers to me seems to suggest that the boats are performing at a higher level of efficiency than the 45s which always carried gennakers. Maybe next time. Although that may inhibit foiling somewhat and I like to see the boats foil - the gybes are great as are the bottom turning marks.

I look forward to seeing two races with two boats finishing tomorrow. Go Kiwis! Remember any time a Kiwi does well they become an honourary Aussie. Ashby and Beashel are obviously vital for the crew.

cheers

Phil

 

Great interview! The 'blink of an eye' he speaks of is shown when you see the bow camera footage of that situation. The rudder 'pull-out' that PFlados has written about and the nosedive actually look a little less than a blink of an eye apart.

...

Martin Vanzulli at Catsailingnews.com made a nice sketch of the hulls of ETNZ and Oracle's second boats:




....

Thanks, Bregalad!

 

That AC, like the previous one, was a complete break from previous ACs. It was created basically by a rogue challenge and a courtroom and was one of only 2 out of over 30 ACs that was not created by mutual consent.

For most of its history the AC has been sailed in boats that are simply large (but NOT necessarily the largest and often not the fastest) of the conventional mainstream boats. By "conventional mainstream" I mean the popular ballasted development monohulls of their time.

The first "AC" was between a boat (America) that had been soundly beaten before she left the USA, and a typical fleet of UK boats. The first challenge came from a mainstream cruiser/racer when her owner was cruising the Med. Galatea was another full-on cruiser racer, down to the pot plants in the saloon.

The later cutters (Reliance, Columbia etc) were designed to the standard rating rules of their day and despite what press releases say, they were more conservative than the smaller boats to the same rule. See for example the Mystic Seaport letters where Nat Herreshoff wrote about his rejection of Iselin's request for Reliance to be modelled off the Seawanhaka Cup scows. Herreshoff's rejection of his own creation Reliance, and his creation of the Universal Rule that created more seaworthy and conventional boats, is an example of the strength of feeling in most quarters against extreme boats in the AC.

The Universal Rule, like the preceding L x SA rule, was used for hundreds of small boats down to the 25 foot Raters and S Class that sailed typical weekend races at typical little clubs. As legends of the time like Uffa Fox and Vanderbilt noted, the smaller boats lead the AC boats in terms of major design development. The AC boats were NOT the biggest racing boats of their time despite the PR BS; for example Satanita and Lulworth (two British Big Class cutters of the 1893-1920s period) were too long on the LWL to be allowed to race in the AC, and many schooners were much bigger and often faster.

The same pattern continued later. The Universal Rule was modified (to the extent of outlawing all previous boats) to require hulls to be made stronger when the Js arrived. The J rule was then changed to require stronger rigs, at the expense of destroying earlier Js. The same rule was being used in California and the East Coast and Lakes for club racing. The J Class rule was used for standard regatta racing in the UK and USA. About 50% of the boats rated in the class never raced for the AC.

When the 12s arrived, the Metre Rule was still the major inshore development rule. Twelves were NOT extreme, they were racing as a class in Norway and revived as a regatta-racing class in the UK and to a lesser extent in the USA. Smaller Metre boats were active mainstream club/regatta racers in the USA, Europe, UK and Australia. The 12s' reign as the fastest boats, if it ever existed, was gone by about '74 and yet they stayed for 13 more years.

Similarly, the IACC boats were originally intended to be big and slender versions of the emerging "sportboat" mainstream in the manner of Asso 99s, Toucans, Adams 10s, 11 M ODs etc. They ended up in the other corner of the box, though.

So historically, the AC has in many ways been a regatta just like many, many others. It has normally used the same rating rule, normally followed (not lead) the same trends, required largely the same techniques and skills, and basically been the major regatta of the mainstream racing classes of the time, with a gradual movement more and more to inshore racing.

The current AC represents a vast switch away from that history. There has been only one other foiling wingsailed course-racing cat in history, IIRC, and I don't know if it ever raced. That is a huge change from the days that created the legend of the AC, when the boats were big versions of the craft that hundreds, nay thousands, of weekend sailors raced in normal regattas.

It seems significant that from the '50s to the '80s, the AC was sailed in boats that were the smallest and slowest it was ever raced in. In the early days of the 12 Metre era, the boats were often criticised on the grounds that they were too big, too esoteric and not mainstream enough.

In that very same era, sailing went through the biggest boomtime that it has ever been. Interesting that when the sport's marquee event was sailed in the least elitist and smallest and slowest boats ever, the sport had its greatest growth spurt. To me, those things seem connected.

 

The Universal Rule was also used in model yachting in the 1920's, so it can be said that the rule was workable for boats down to three feet LOA.

The big problem for the rule was that it required a tank to measure LWL. A measuring tank can still be seen in the San Francisco Model Yacht Club clubhouse at Spreckles Lake. In 1932 the Marblehead Class box rule exploded in popularity, in large part because boats could be measured "dry."

Cheers,

Earl

 

Thanks God !
We have still the option to change things, to live in the present, and to get a glimpse of the future.
Of course, any future has risks, and in any turn of history there are always people who prefer to conserve what they already had gained in the past, out of a deep fear that, in any future reshuffling of things, they will give more that they will take.
We are blessed to be witnesses of a turn of history here - I suggest we should not concentrate on the pains of the birth, but be happy with the new life that sees the light if the day.

 

...

Two boats just finished without stopping for repairs in an AC72 race.

We're making progress! I hope all you inveterate pessimists take note.

lol

The italians blew the start when they had a chance to run the Kiwis into the committee boat; but what are you expecting, perfection already?

 

34th AC-2nd race UPWIND FOILING-both boats!

Wow-the best race yet-upwind foiling by both boats-incredible!

 

...

Interesting to see how all that chrome finish on Prada has the effect of lighting up the video of the crew as if they were on a movie set.

...a somewhat imperfect lighting, but better nonetheless!


....


A few minutes later...


That's 2 races completed with 2 boats!

... May be contagious?

 

Interesting how boat handling is such an issue with these boats.

At the first mark race 2 today ETNZ was just keeping its wind clear when LR let the windward hull touch and they lost a tad of speed - so ETNZ wasn't rolled.

As the apparent is so far forward it is strange to see that the dominant position does not switch to the trailing boat on the downwinds. This seems to make it hard for the boat behind to get aggressive as they can't use windshadow to reduce the gap. As the boats round the first mark and bear away the inside boat gets an advantage that doesn't get nullified by the trailing boat's windshadow. Is the best position off the start going to be the leeward position so you get ahead on the bearaway?

Then LR don't pop the wing properly and they lose heaps but almost get it back with a nice approach to the leeward mark. If they had done a good gybe at the top mark they may have got in front. Windward foiling only when in low and fast mode - interesting.

Very nice to hear Nathan Outteridge on how to sail the boats and Ken Read's input too.

cheers

Phil

 

====================
Another thing I heard mentioned today was something I think I understand: to foil with less leeway they cant the top of the foil inboard but apparently go faster with it canted outboard though leeway is much greater when the inboard portion of the "V" is neutalized by leeway.

Rough Sketches,L to R, 1) shows TNZ foil as of 9/12-now adopted to a large extent by all boats(top drawn wrong), 2) Illustrates foil cant with comments as I understood them today-not sure I agree with them-still thinking about it. Note the approximate difference in wetted surface:
click----