Multi 50 Design Rule: no vertical lift!

Multi 50

=====================
Corley, even if they adopt curved lifting foils the boat would still be in a class of its own: much less expensive than a Mod 70 or any larger multi. But they will be faster and easier to handle and more fun and safer to race.
Does a skipper have to risk his job to point out the obvious weaknesses in this class?

 

I cant agree with your take on it Doug. They are a small group of people and the boats are very safe, how many fatalaties have been recorded on Ocean Racing Multihulls in the last 20 years? Also the guys who administer the class are all skilled ocean racers themselves and would not place their fellow sailors at unnecessary risk, Frank Yves Escoffier was on Cardinal Fenetre for the recent Transat Quebec St Malo race he is obviously not concerned about the safety of the boats. I'd be interested to compare the capsize rate from pitchpole between overpowered ORMA60's and Multi50's I'd be almost certain that the Multi50's would have a better record. Nearly all of the ORMA60's have capsized some more than once that says something about overpowering rigs and the lack of safety they introduce. These are racing boats not something that you jump on for a nice cruise and if your not pushing hard enough to have a possibility of capsize your not in the race.

 

Multi 50 only 2 of 6 finish

Would foils have helped? Less than one year ago......

November 28, 2011
Transat Carnage Puts Multihulls in Questionby Bruce Gain http://www.sailingworld.com/blogs/racing/transat-carnage-puts-multihulls-in-question

This year’s Transat Jacques Vabre was often more about survival than it was about racing. Fortunately, there were no tragedies. But the crews and boats certainly took a beating, especially in the Multi 50 class. Only two of the six Multi 50 entries that set out from Le Havre, France, made it to the finishing poles off Puerto Limon, Costa Rica.

The fact is that curved lifting foils would have been a tremendous asset in these conditions.....

 

The withdrawls from the Transat Jacques Vabre speak more to the budget constraints the bulk of the fleet operate under. One of the top boats withdrew after one of the crew was thrown awkwardly against a winch how would foils have stopped that happening? Some sort of magic carpet ride tied to the use of curved foils? The boats that withdrew suffered mechanical or structural failures of some sort and some crew injury (no capsizes though).

 

==================

Thats it exactly! Good for you....

 

The cost concern is probably not the raw hardware.

When you open up the allowance to go "curved", you typically are letting people try all sorts of "S", "C", "L" shapes and so on. A lot of money can get spent just exploring options. Again, this is the 300% increase in cost for the 0.5% increase in performance type of thing.


My previous post suggested angled but not curved. This gets some lift and pitch stability enhancement with a simple mechanical adjustment feature. Another choice would be to pick a "typical" radius of curvature for a "C" pattern foil and allow either straight or this one curve with angle adjustment allowances. Again, your cost escalation for the curved foil and angle adjustment mechanism is a minimal one time investment. As Doug noted, you may have an offset with less need for float volume.

Not allowing people to do much with foils makes them focus elsewhere. The intent may be to push fleet focus in desired directions.

As a "technology" nut, I do not like rules from preventing teams from using "smart" design features when the cost is reasonable. However, I know that others want more focus on skill, tactics or other such things. I respect this.

A class should make their choices as they see fit. It does seem better when the options are openly any fairly discussed and then the basis clearly communicated when the choice is made.

 

I have to agree with P Flados,
The cost is not in the development but refinement of an object or components.
Whats going to happen when the market place recovers, and money gets thrown into a class ( it could be any class in the future mono hull or multihull).
Will there be the arms race again for performance.

 

Plenty of curved foil assisted trimarans have capsized over the years most recently the G class IDEC II and Groupama3 after suffering a structural failure there have also been plenty of close calls and pitchpoles some caught on film like Sodebo's heavy nosedive near to the start at Lorient, does that mean they are unsafe or poorly conceived racing boats? Of course not and neither are the Multi50's whether they spec curved foils as part of the rules or not.

 

Really the Multi50 class was meant to be an "access class" in ocean racing multihulls towards the Orma 60, just like (or a bit like), the class40 towards the IMOCA.
Canting keels and mast are forbidden in the class 40, curved foils (or lifting apart from Archimede foils) and canting masts are forbidden in the multi50, makes sense, and clearly for a reducing cost objective (both R&D and construction).
Of course you could say the "panorama" has changed with the demise of the Orma in 2006 2007, and it indeed has. Plus with the move to Mod70 monotype, there isn't really any more an "open development" class for ocean racing multihulls. Which is true, and could happen to monos as well if Imoca moves monotype ... (leaving the mini prototype as the only true open development class more or less).
Note : about the mod70, I don't know why they created a specific transatlantic, seems to me the best strategy would be to have few of them multi class, and have the mod70 compete in the established ones, I doubt many people heard about the "krys ocean race".
But overall current economic crisis (far from over with deep fundamental reasons) is for sure a tough context.

Also about foils and cost, the prime aspect is for sure R&D, especially when talking Ocean races, that is "getting them right" is tough, much more critical than a daggerboard (just look at the development time for the hydroptere, or the fact that Sodebo moved the whole amas forward to move them a bit for instance).

For a true "open development" multihull class, what is needed is something much smaller perhaps (around 40' or even less).

 

The MOD70's competed in the Fastnet Race along with other multihulls and monohulls. I agree I cant see the necessity for them having their own transat and it probably reduces the linked exposure they could get if they competed as part of another race. Maybe they were just trying to build their profile and they felt the tie in with the festival in Brest would give them enough exposure to make it worthwhile.

I'm definetely looking forward to the MOD70 world tour and will be going up to Sydney to have a look at them.

 

So how about you tell us why you think the class is still alive without lifting foils?

if your opinions are correct wouldn't they just make a new class that includes foils?

Or change the rule?

 

Yes hope it will truly "gain ground", having them not "cape Horn capable" (in principle) was also a key decision I guess, otherwise a "joint ocean tour" with the VOR could also have been something.
About races, a key point is that they now are also sponsored in their very definitions (and names), would prefer a set of established races (like the fastnet), and sponsorship for the boats.
Also about the Mod70, a challenge is probably to avoid having them too "French centric", or even "Britanny centric" (the class logo being a stylized Britanny flag, might not help there )

 

How many true Multi 50's (not counting altered early designs) are there? Four, five, hardly a popular, thriving class - and even if they delude themselves they are a safe boat without foils; that too is nonsense because they've had a very bad early history of breakages and failures. Crepes Whahoo smashed her main beam, limped home, luckily holding together ... and that beam broke without the excuse of extra power developed from foils.
Am only saying this to reveal points uttered by posters who appear to be attempting to rewrite history. Because the 50's are beautifully proportioned yachts; have nothing against them and hope they continue in their restricted development class.
Agreed, R&D of differing foil designs would definitely boost expense ... but an accepted, say, one design, class foil, would be no more costly than other usual Multi 50 appendages.
Okay, starting to repeat myself. I'm out of here. Salut.

 

But if a one design class, then clearly not a "development class" anymore ..., and a "development class" clearly brings new things, I find it very characteristic for instance that the Mod70 is defined on the official class site as a "delta" from the last Ormas :

http://www.multionedesign.com/en/the-boat.html

I agree that the multi50 isn't a very successful class, and if you look at the boat list :
http://www.class-multi50.org/bateaux-multi50.html

You have for instance "le rayon vert", which has been built in two years by amateurs (a couple in their 50ies) initially for a fast cruising program.

But one also notice only French boats except a Swiss one ! Maybe if more boats from other countries would be different ...

I find "open development" classes a great thing and it would be great if a multi one still existed (you could consider the G class the current one, but so few boats ...).

But really a matter of budget in the end, and there has been this period were sailing projects happened to be a quite common "communication vector" in France (even or particularly for quite small companies, with some fiscal advantages as well) which helped a lot in these development classes, especially when linked to "iconic races" (and summaries at the evening TV news). Current time is quite different on many aspects (like evening news not being watched that much anymore for instance, and less coverage/move to the internet for specialists, etc), still true for the VG though.

Seems to me a few "iconic ocean races" on the major ocean passages, common to all classes, would help there, but either they exist or not...

 

Multi 50

It's hard to see the Multi 50 as a "development" class when the most profound development taking place in multihulls is with appendages-and that avenue is shut off. Same with canting rigs. So where is the "development" and what is it for?