V-44 Albatross World Speed Sailing Contender

Fascinating project, Verney. From an arty farty viewpoint (not scientific) the compromise you have with the balance arms position seems okay - because if they were at the outermost ends of the wings, that would be a horrible mass and windage to swing up and over when tacking, not to mention the drag and turbulence at the wing tip. You never saw flying boats with floats at the wing tip ends - there's too, was a compromise. Have you considered shifting them even further towards the amas... and to compensate for buoyancy being further inboard, having a sweetly designed foil, or end plate or combination, at the wing tips? Just some wanky suggestions. I'm sure you have already thought and discussed these points.

 

The mass balance arms are the four wee booms sticking forward of each wing-sail plank.

:idea:tspeer, you are right about the mass balance arms. They need to put the plank CG on the axis of rotation for linear accelerations, but we also need to get them correctly positioned (further outboard) for rotational accelerations.

I've been a little concerned about the lack of roll damping we'll have since the wing-sails freely rotate. If we place the mass balance arms further outboard than optimum (from a purely balance stand point) they will introduce a degree of roll damping by inducing plank rotation to counter roll accelerations.