V Twin

Originally posted by oldarn .... I'm sure SHC could solve the inversion problem from his wide experience and ability, but my point is that I believe the problem to be solved in preventing inversion. Inversion when everything else is sorted will be rare.

Inversion can still happen with almost any design if you tip it in at speed in waves. The forces of rig on water at 15 knots are bigger than the righting forces of a little buoyancy here and there. You can make inversion rarer and rarer, but I don't think you can claim it's been designed out if you are going to sail in the sea in all reasonable weathers.

Tubes .... 

Steve C is right that you want the tubes to flood and drain easily.  We learnt this years ago with Blaze and now only have a cap on the front end of the 'outboard' tubes and keep them totally open at the back.  The 'extending' tubes that come out from the hull are also detailed to allow water to enter easily and drain away in an instant.  The Blaze is particularly 'easy' to deal with when capsized and widely recognised as such - yet it still self-drains.

Wide boats give you lots of leverage but the penalty of excessively 'flared' topside boats can be even more stable inverted and have a greater tendancy to get there in the first place as they have inherently have a load of buoyancy in exactly the wrong place.  So to my mind if you want lots of leverage you have to either go for a trapeze .. or get that width from wings that can flood / drain. 

GRF has wings AND a wide hull by the looks of it ... The wings probably flood but if they don't some improvement can be won by adapting them to do so.    The concept might also benefit from slimming down the 'hull' form (or is that 'hulls') or making the hulls partially flood as some have suggested but that is radical surgery.   I cannot see the buoyancy easily being put in the ends as this will not help in what is essentially a multihull shape - it would still be fairly 'outboard' !

BTW I'd not worry too much about winged boats blowing away either - it is possible but the immersed wings (hopefully with flooding tubes) tend to (sea) anchor it.

Mike L.


Edited by blaze720 - 27 Apr 12 at 12:02pm

ouch, but sadly very true Andy!  

Edited by rogue - 27 Apr 12 at 11:06am

Originally posted by johnreekie1980 In the case of the V twin it is higher as it cannot be sailed back to shore should any minor slip result in a capsize. A fantastic piece of design.

Edited by rogue - 27 Apr 12 at 9:56am

If you stand up there is a falling down hazard. I am off to lay down just in case. So to clarify you are stating the obvious that dinghy sailing has a number of hazards that could be considered manageable by the average Joe. This is supported by the relatively low death serious accident or minor accident figures related to sailing.