Wingbar Bend / Hull Twist

The structure of a modern skinny Moth has quite a lot to do. The rig is trying to twist the hull one way, and the rear wingbars are loaded with the hull weight trying to take it the other way. Stiff hulls and wings feel nice to sail with, but can we measure it in any way?

I'd seen lots of photos recently of various boats with what looked like big deflections, and was interested to try and put some numbers to it to allow for some comparisons.

So during another week of gales in Weymouth I put the boat in the workshop. The boat was supported on two supports under the shroud attachment points on the front wingbars, and under the transom. Then a 30kg weight (calibrated bucket with bricks and weights!) was hung from the rear wingbar corner, with the diagonally opposite corner being supported to prevent the boat tipping over.

The corner deflection from the unloaded to the loaded state was: 30mm

With the loaded outer wingbar angle change of: 1.2deg down

It would be interesting to see how other boats compare? At least with a vague method (and a few ideas on how to get hull vs bar bend next time) it starts up a basic library of data.

Certainly my Mistress 1 was probably one of the worst I'd seem for rear bar bend! Don't worry Toby - new bars went on before I sold it on!

Moths in Miami?

I'm off out to Miami coaching in the New Year, for all of Jan, and was wondering if there are any Foiling moths in the Miami region? Would be great to meet up with some American Mothies, and try and squeeze a sail in. Will sure beat sitting in the coach boat.

Old Piles of Photos

During a recent trip home I collected a huge pile of old photos and its been very funny to sort through them all. Here are a few Moth ish relevant ones:

Doug Culnane and me sailing our Int 14 many years ago! Check out Doug's insulating tape headband!


The 1993 International Moth Worlds. Check out my Magnum 5!

Andy Paterson getting carried away at a dinghy show several years back!

Merry Christmas

I hope everyone had a good Christmas. I had the family over in Weymouth, as Mum and Dad's place is having a new kitchen fitted, so not so useful for Turkey cooking.

It was nice to be Weymouth based as I got a sail in on Christmas Eve and on Boxing day.

Christmas Card from ISAF

As Moth World Secretary I get all the correspondence from ISAF, and the class has just got a Christmas card from Goran Petersson and Arve Sundheim. It is a cartoon commisioned by the Japanese Sailing Federation by the artist, Mr Tadami Takahashi.

I wouldn't mentioned it, but it does feature a foiling Moth blasting in from the right hand side. We are in better shape than many other classes! We've got the Tornado, and the big trimaran. Looks like a close miss with the dolphins though! Not to sure about the 49er leading round the windward mark, and the Oppie in 2nd! We'd get them downwind!

Hydrofoil Surfing

Check out the hydrofoil surfboard at the end of this YouTube clip that has normal wings as well as a hydrofoil underwater!

60ft Tri Video

The 60ft trimarans are truly impressive. Even with rules limiting their foil area they are almost foilborne in flat water.

Featured at the end of this clip is the ~30m IDEC which Francis Joyon is sailing singlehanded around the world at the moment at impressive pace. Pulling out 616nm in 24 hours the other day! Singlehanded in the Southern Ocean!.....

Latest Seahorse Issue

Easily the best sailing magazine around - Seahorse has a Bladerider Moth on the front cover, and a little Moth snippet inside: '3.8kg..... the completed structure of the new foiling Moth now being finished by John Ilett for restive former World Champion Simon Payne... who wants his title back come Weymouth 2008'

Now I'm guessing that is the hull weight.. But I had heard Simon was going light on this boat......

My boat is in the workshop at the moment having a little tidy up, and she's shed some weight so I'll do a full weigh before she ventures back out into the wet and cold.

Garda seemed to be an event of control mechanisms, is Weymouth shaping up to be light and boat weight will be important, or will the sea breeze hold true?

Yachts and Yachting

Andy Rice called recently to quiz me on an article he was writing for Y & Y. I got a little mention saying something about tuning, but I was pleased to see a cool pic from the Tornado days included, taken by Peter Bentley in Palma.

Barcelona World Race

I'd been meaning to do a post about the Barcelona race as we've got two moth sailors taking part, Seb Josse, and Jonathan McKee. Unfortunately before I got round to mentioning it they have both encountered problems. PRB lost the top of their rig, and have retired, and Estrella Damm are heading for land to repair a rudder.

Simon Payne caught up with Seb before the start and he plans to be in Weymouth for the Worlds in his Bladerider.

Best of luck to Brit Alex Thomson for the rest of the race. It is cold enough in my workshop at the moment - god knows what it must be like in the Southern ocean!

50 Knots?

Check out: http://www.k-63.com/news/2007/week_49/index.html

and http://www.gps-speedsurfing.com/gps.asp?mnu=user&val=25527&uid=77

The windsurfers are getting quicker! 50.4 knots over 100m was achieved by a Dutchman in Southend over the weekend. The 50k over 500m barrier is likely to fall this winter.... Exciting times.

Latest Sailrocket Video

More Moth Gadgets

http://www.atc2k.com/

Only a few days ago I got a new little waterproof video camera, that is perfect for some action Moth shots, and some coaching footage. I then check out Rohan's site today, and he's just got one as well!

We've used some high spec ones coaching in the past, but I thought this would be a great simple version, and it will be fascinating to see what footage we get from it. It hasn't got a great field of view, but with the right mounting I'm sure we can get some good stuff.

Fingers crossed for a nice weekend to play with it!

Canting Moth Rudders

I was going through some old photos the other day in an attempt to tidy up an overflowing hard drive and came across some foil photos from Weymouth.

I realised that it was Weymouth 04 that actually saw one of the first canting Hydrofoil Moth rudders. Graham Vials' boat from Full Force was finished just in time for the event and was done with no rudder flap, and huge foils! While it all worked okay in the lighter stuff, Graham had a few control issues in the breeze and needed a way of changing his rudder angle on the water easily.

Overnight a slot was cut in the tiller so the rudder pin had a range of movement, and a purchase system was rigged up along the tiller. Although you couldn't adjust it by twisting the tiller. you could pull a rope to change it. All quite crude, but an interesting blast from the past that is quite interesting given the current crop of canting rudders out there.

Mike Cooke Launches New Boat

The latest Aardvark Moth hit the water yesterday. Mike has done a slightly more conventional version of his last boat, with a normal deck and bolt on wingbars.

After a few twists of the tiller to get into the ballpark rudder trim wise, he was soon off foiling across Bristol Corinthian. Standard first sail in a new boat issues such as line lengths and things prevented ideal sail trim, but it ticked all the boxes for the initial sea (lake!)trials.

It is gusting over 50 knots here in Weymouth today, and it doesn't look much better elsewhere around the country, so I doubt Mike has got out again today.

It was good to see 4 boats out on the water though on a cold winter day. Tom Whicher's old modified Axeman is up there now, with newly tweaked wingbars, and its looking good.