Mr Smith's Amazing Sailboats |
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The Monomarans |
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Monomaran I The Monomaran solved somewhat the problems experienced with the
Aerohydrofoil. Draft was just 18 inches for a 3 person crew, low wind performance
was improved, though at the cost of high wind performance, as the physics of displacement
hull drag just couldn't be avoided. |
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Monomaran II To tack, the hull was steered across the eye of the wind,
the sail on the rig would then billow inwards (ie towards the hull). Aerodynamic
pressure would then cause the sailrig to swivel around the front of the hull, till it
reached the other side of the hull. A restraining line was attached from the bow to
the sailrig to ensure it didn't swivel around too far! |
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Monomaran III These two hydrofoils did the steering and control for the Monomaran. A system of cables connecting the foils to a single control lever allowed for the foils to turn either in same direction or in opposite directions as required. Moving the foils in unison altered the orientation of the sail in relation to the hull. Moving the foils differentially steered the craft. Note that all of the power and control for the Monomaran were in the sail and the two foils attached to tetrahedral framework - the monohull (actually a double-ended canoe) simply had a load-carrying role for the crew and was "towed" behind by the sailrig. This final Monomaran was a major improvement on the
previous designs and it could reach 20 knots in just 20 knots of wind. It was
a tidy design with a nice synthesis of components. Velocity however was a factor
with the control system, as speed was needed to allow the foils to be effective.
Another aspect to the Monomaran III was that the sails and foils had to be
effective in both directions, and thus were compromised in their performance. |
Early Work | Aerohydrofoils | Monomarans |
Fliptackers | Sailloons | Mini-Fliptackers |
This page last modified 16 October, 2000