34th America's Cup: multihulls!

Yes you used a very bad comparison to not make any valid point that I could see. Compare a 1972 MG (Sports Car for the masses) to a 2013 F1 car. Still no point was made.

You are correct. The wing could safely sail in winds higher than the reefed soft rig. The wing sail has no need to reef. The power of the sail can be reduced to zero. The CE can be very low to provide the required amount of heeling force and the area above used to provide extra RM. This is a level of safety and control a flogging soft sail cannot match. The only reason to reef a soft sail is because it cannot be de-powered without flogging itself to death. If you want to learn something about light multihulls with tall rigs, you should look closely at the wing trim. In breeze over 15 the top of the wing has reversed camber. It is NOT adding to heel nor is it trying to pitch pole the boat. The top 1/3 to 1/2 of the wing is adding to RM.

You are saying that all the challengers and all their designers sat down with Oracle and agreed to a set of rules that produced a "patently dangerous" boat? Really?

You implied that a life was lost because the boats are unsafe. If the reason they are unsafe is as stated above, you are claiming that this is the reason for the capsizes and the death. Yet not one other person has even hinted at that. Oracle had an oops that happened so quickly the ability to feather the wing would not have made any difference. Artemis had a structural beam failure that was not related to the ability to feather the wing. You are trying to tie unrelated things to somehow convince yourself that you are right and the teams that designed the boats are wrong.

Not a chance in any breeze that allows foiling. If you would take the time to read what the designers of the boats have to say you would know that you are not even close.

You don't like LE, I get that. I don't like him either. But I stop short of making things up and comparing 40 year old production boats to current design to make some point. The AC has never had much of a reputation for good sportsmanship. LE, Oracle, and GGYC are no different than those that have gone before.

Compare Alinghi's A5 Cat with an AC72 and see if the new design is all that radical.

What happened was that the design concept was for semi-displacement (partial foiling) boats. That configuration would have limited speeds to well under 40 knots and the boats could have sailed in higher breeze. Once they could sail 100% on foils the drag was so far reduced that they became 45+ knot boats.

Oracle has stated that one of the problems they had to solve was cavitation of the rudder T foil ... this leads to loss of control. (Daiquiri came to that conclusion here weeks ago).

The lower wind speed limit was not due to any limitation of the wing or that the wing was too large. The boats were simply too fast to control reliably.

 

Why then would you dredge up a 162 year old mistake by a race committee and imply cheating? If you want to turn this into an unsupported accusation thread we can do that.

There are so many TNZ supporters that are doing their best to excuse the result and hint/accuse Oracle of cheating that I may have mistakenly painted you with the same brush. I'm sorry if that is the case.

Randy

 

Hint accuse cheating by oracle. That's pretty strong and un lateral thinking.

The protest was withdrawn diplomatically. I wonder why.

Have you ever heard of a protest being withdrawn diplomatically. They are always and I'm prepared to be corrected fail, succeed or are dismissed.

I pondered for a moment that he was only given the incorrect chart to go the wrong way in order that he would founder on a brick or what ever the light danger was warning thus the English would win the race. However the yanks always and being the first race, thus the poms would not know, employed a pilot to navigate for them. The poms wouldn't perhaps known that when they gave him a chart with the incorrect course on it, it being the first race. The yanks in that case would cry blue murder and threaten a lawsuit if not war but as the article states a story was or reason was established for diplomatic reasons and convinced the pom protester to withdraw it and perhaps shook hands.

I lodged it to see if any other fellow members had or knew of a correct version interpretation or another lateral thinking interpretation.

I certainly was not meaning to convey the yanks where cheating. oh no no no.

and I was implying from the beginning there has never been a incident free law suit free protest free race / or series in the Americas cup.


OC

 

Hi Sharpie - The AC72 was never an inherently unsafe design and the Deed of Gift cannot be revised as it is a legal instrument. Plus this race had nothing to do with the Deed of Goft as it was a Mutual Consent race. Cheers

 

I beg to have a different opinion here. I believe that had the hydrodynamic shape of the bow been different ( more like a classic bow ), it would had "pushed" the hull upwards - so those fine needle-like reversed bows would nt keep burying themselves in the water for so long...The bows were designed before people had realized that the boats will be flying most of the time, and there would be an accumulated danger of a sudden fall during most of the course. This mistake has nothing to do with the wing, of course, but it shows that the designers had not anticipated all the dangers of the increased speed. I hope they would had learned their lesson now. I believe it would be a simple thing to design a bow that, once it starts burying itself underneath the surface, would pop out before the whole craft becomes a submarine...

 

Xarax - Both ETNZ and OUSA have both buried their bows many times and safely recovered. Whether the bow was vertical or reversed doesn't change the volume much when its buried to the main beam! Both boats bow knuckle were designed to be clear of the water when in correct trim. The AC72 rule has a minimum fwd volume requirement that has shown to be satisfactory unless driver error occurs. Cheers peter s

 

http://au.sports.yahoo.com/news/art...ors-learned-flying-for-americas-cup-comeback/
The system might have helped Oracle perfect the intricate movements of daggerboards, sails and rudders that were needed to keep the boat sailing at top speed - although it was far from being any sort of computerized control system.

Was it far from being any sort of automatic control system ? THAT is the question ( which is systematically avoided, of course, because naïve fans believe a positive answer will steal their glory ! )
The general public does not understand that, theoretically, anything that can be accomplished by the use of an electronic digital computer, can be accomplished by a mechanical analogue computer as well. A complex enough mechanical device that incorporates input from the moving parts of the boat and "processes" it through a series of servos and relays, is NOT very far from being an automatic control system.

Oracle says it achieved the turnaround the old-fashioned way: continual adjustments to the intricate boats, experimentation with sailing tactics, and relentless hard work by the sailors and the shore crew.

Yes, Sir Coots and TSpeer and the article s title say the same thing... The fans wish so desperately to believe in this, that makes me laugh ! Perhaps they were shocked by the previous incidence of some members cheating in the AC45 boats ( they should be ! ), and now they are panicked in the thought the use of more or less automatic devices might be considered as cheating ! IMHO, there is no relation whatsoever between the issue of the extend of automation US Oracle ( or, for that matter, TNZ, too ) had used, with cheating or something illegal under the present AC72 rules, or with the sad AC45 case ! Also, this issue has nothing to do with "stored energy", "computerized boat" ( as far as people understand what a "computer is ), "Frankestein boat", etc.

the focus shifted from performance with the wind to sailing into it, which required stabilizing the boat on its foils
Kramers on Saturday denied any use of computer-automated controls to manage the foils and stabilize the yacht. "Negative. No," he said.
The yacht had a stabilization system but it was operated by humans, Kramers said.
Small electronic switches were used to open and close the hydraulic valves clutches. Theses were commercially available, not customized, according to Kramers.
The measurement committee gave Oracle permission in August to use an "electro-mechanical actuator" to move a valve.
Small electronic switches were used to open and close the hydraulic valves clutches. Theses were commercially available, not customized, according to Kramers.
"Most items we used in there are literally servos from your kid's remote-control airplane," Kramers said. "It's exactly as simple as that. It gets bolted to a valve and that is what operates things."

Poor guys, they are admitting everything, but they call it with a different name ! No "automatic foil control system"...because its parts were small electronic switches and servos, most of them commercially available and not customized !
However, I notice that at least they do not go as far as to attempt to declare the whole system "manual"...

The question remains : Should such more or less automatic, but certainly not-manual systems be allowed in the next Cup ?

 

Read my lips ! I had said nothing about the volume of the bow ! I mentioned the hydrodynamic shape, not the hydrostatic shape, for Larry Ellisson s sake !

The way the whole hull of the Oracle boat was "inserted" into the water after the bow has been buried just a little bid under the surface, should have been telling to you. It reminded me of a reversed needle - any part of the bow s surface that could had pushed the bow upwards, was pushing it downwards, contributing to the submarinization of the boat !

 

A nice demonstration of what an operated through a simple push/pull wane can do :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVIFRscJY4A

As the mechanisms get more complex, the tasks even a completely "dumb" puppet-trimmer / button pusher can achieve, have no limits.
I wonder if one could define something like "direct real-time manual control of the foils" ( in a way similar to the way a power-assisted rudder turns), and if the implementation of a relevant rule could be inspected easily, without any room of "interpretations" by the measurers of what consists an automatic control device and what does not...

 

...

Have you guys seen what Matt Sheahan wrote on the topic of the alleged SAS (from the same article linked to above by Doug)? It sounds rather primitive compared to some of your wonderful speculations. Has Sheahan been conned?

What Sheahan wrote about the Oracle rudders was also something I'd not read earlier:

 

It was my understanding that the race committee found that more than one boat was given the same instructions as America. As if they printed two versions and forgot to destroy the incorrect ones. I can't find a reference for that so I can't cite a source.

The way it should have gone (under today's rules):
Yacht B protests Yacht A for not sailing the proper course.
Yacht A shows she sailed the course per the instructions she was given.
Protest is denied.
Yacht B files a request for redress
The redress is granted.

I am not familiar with the racing rules of 1851 to have an idea of how such a situation would be handled. But America cheating in 1851 implies she knew she was violating a rule. That does not seem to be the case.

I 100% agree that every AC cycle has more than its share of lawyers, sea lawyers, drama and acts that many would consider poor sportsmanship. These things are part and parcel of rich guy challenge events.

The pre-match strategy and tactics are every bit as much fun as the sailing!

 

First Foiling AC

---------------
Thanks Blackburn I had read it-sanity from a Brit? Still I am reserving judgement on all "this is how it really was" stories until it is backed up in the words of the Team.

 

...

Here's a glimpse of the inhumane working conditions to which America's Cup photographers are now subject.

Click on HD to see the video on this page in full resolution:

What it takes to photograph an AC72

Gilles Martin Raget and Guilan Grenier are not the first photographers to tether themselves in a fast-moving boat.

I recall a cameraman who worked for the Professional Boardsailing Assn. - on Lake Garda in '93 or '94 - he was tethered (like above) to the bow of a zodiak doing up to 35 knots while he stood leaning back, filming - the video was amazingly good.

 

having ??? after the question then means nothing to you then.

I thought I was asking a question for an opinion not making accusations.

And for your understanding that incorrect charts where given then surely your memory understanding would be that they found every boat had been given incorrect charts. Yes. or are you implying only the boats they did not want to win. My understanding is that the american entry was the only boat that took the short cut route displayed on the chart that was given which leeds one to summise they where the only boat with an incorrect chart. There was about 40 boats in the race.

Summise = = To make a guess or conjecture

OC

 

I'm not going to worry about it. You said you were not accusing America of cheating in 1851. I believe you. I am sorry I made the wrong assumption.

Cheers,

Randy