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Latest News Links Weekend - Rule Britannia - Famous J Class Royal Yacht back in Cowes . . . Weekend - The future of luxury yachting . . . Weekend - The Art of Carlo Borlinghi . . . Weekend - A look at the Finn under the water . . . Weekend - The way they were - Star battles for Olympic life . . . Weekend - I-14 Killing 3 design video and new Bieker design progress . . . Weekend - The images of Juerg Kaufmann . . . Weekend - I-14 Killing 3 design to challenge the new Paul Bieker B6 . . . Weekend - Bieker B6 International 14 in build . . . Back to latest Sailing News reports here . . . Rule Britannia - Famous J Class Royal Yacht back in Cowes . . . An exact replica of the famous racing J Class Royal Yacht Britannia is back in Cowes . . . the stripped hull arrived on Saturday, 4 February at Southboats Yard in Venture Quays, East Cowes. The original yacht was scuttled following King George V’s death in January 1936. He’d left instructions that she was to ‘follow him to the grave’. Stripped of all her spars and fittings, her hull was towed out from Cowes and sunk off St Catherine’s Deep, somewhere west of Ventnor and south of the Needles, on July 1 1936..  His Majesty’s Yacht “Britannia” was a gaff-rigged cutter built in 1893 for Commodore Albert Edward, Prince of Wales. She served him and his son, King George V, with a long yachting and racing career. In 1931, she was converted to the J-Class with a Bermuda rig and her last race was at Cowes in 1935. During her racing career she had won 231 races and took another 129 flags. In 1994, the only exact replica of the Britannia was commissioned (after due approval by the Queen) and built in Russia, and after many problems and hard negotiations with her Russian shipbuilders, was finally released to her then owner, Mr. Sigurd Coates, who duly shipped her to Norway in 2009. The completion of the project came to a standstill until now.The Britannia and the rebuilding project have been acquired by Minicast Holdings Ltd, Gibraltar, which, upon its completion, will be donating the use of the yacht for a minimum of 10 years, to the Britannia Trust, to be wholly used for charity.  As you might expect, after Artic winters and battered by storms on her way here, the hull looks the worse for wear. The plan: for her completion to commence, and for the Trust that now owns her, to invest in fitting-in new deck ware, restoring her interior, her mast, rigging and sails, back to what they were in the Classic Days of Cowes Yachting. The goal: for her to become a flagship for charity, reaching out to underprivileged children, war veterans and to be used as a fundraising venue for upcoming charities in the UK and across the globe. Head of the Trust, Scott Ward, says “The hull needs a good brush up and tender care, but we hope to introduce her to you all in a few weeks, once she is out of the water and looking her best”.  And to get upto date with all the J Class news Dave Pitman, the class secretary of the magnificent J Class, will be at Lee on Solent SC on 23 February to talk about the history of the J boats and the plans for them sailing in the Solent this summer. This is a rare opportunity to hear how the class has developed since 1996 and see exclusive pictures of these unique craft. Numbers are limited so early booking is recommended. All would be welcome, but please book to avoid disappointment. That is Thursday 23 February starting at 19:00 hrs, bar open at 18:00. Cost: Talk only £3.00 Chilli or Mushroom Stroganoff available by pre booking at £5.00 (available at 18.30). Contact gwkingstonminnis@virginmedia.com to book. Visit the Britannia K1 website for more details on progress in Cowes. Full story at http://britanniatrust.org/ The future of luxury yachting . . . A design for a concept sea-going vessel is claimed by its designers to present a vision of the future of luxury yachting. In a project named Utopia, BMT Nigel Gee and partners Yacht Island Design have designed what is described as an avant-garde island-like yacht that exploits existing technologies to create a new maritime experience.  What BMT has devised is a piece of floating real estate that measures more than 65m above water with four legs that support a 100 x 100m structure spanning 11 decks. James Roy, yacht design director of BMT Nigel Gee said the gross tonnage (as a measure of volume) is around 100,000GRT.Roy told The Engineer that the main global load bearing structure will be steel. Areas that are minor load bearing might be made in aluminium to save weight and local areas with high degrees of compound curvature might be made from Fibre-reinforced plastic (FRP). Keeping a ship stable is vitally important for passenger safety and comfort. The potential to move in six different ways — heave vertically, sway side to side, surge front/back motion, roll, pitch and yaw — can lead to an uncomfortable trip if the motion isn’t minimised. Each leg employs azimuth thrusters to maintain the station keeping of the so-called ‘island’. This system, which uses a propeller encased in a pod that can be rotated, provides greater manoeuvrability than traditional fixed propeller-rudder systems, and should allow Utopia to smoothly redeploy to any desired location at a speed of about seven knots, said Roy. The exact nature of power generation is still under consideration but Roy explained: ‘Perhaps a mix of solar, tidal — using the thrusters as turbines to generate power from currents when moored — and wind. However the mix is likely to be quite heavily skewed towards fossil based fuels.’ The concept design for BMT’s moveable super-island was unveiled at the Monaco Yacht Show in September. Read more: http://www.theengineer.co.uk/sectors/rail-and-marine/news/designers-claim-island-like-vessel-is-future-of-yachting/1010537.article#ixzz1cC8hVD4e The Art of Carlo Borlinghi . . . The Art of Carlo Borlinghi - Photographer to the Sailing World . . .    
Full story at http://www.carloborlenghi.net A look at the Finn under the water . . . In a recent Finn sail development cycle, WB-Sails needed a 3D Finn model, with hull, cockpit, crew and all, to be able to simulate the sail performance more realistically. With the hull model there, they thought why not add a centreboard and a rudder and take a look under the water as well. Mikko Brummer from WB-Sails describes what they discovered.  The model was taken out of Gilbert Lamboley’s and Richard Hart’s work on digitising the original Finn plans, “Body lines definition and control”, from 2003. We inserted a roughly shaped cockpit and centreboard case, with the centreboard exiting from the bottom. The underwater flow model was simplified so that wave-making was ignored, representing the sea as a flat surface, because our aero-code does not support free-surface modelling. Wave-making drag cannot be modelled, but otherwise the free surface is not believed to have a major effect on the flow pattern and pressures over the hull. When sailing at steady speed, the underwater and above water forces and moments must be in balance. Care was taken that the simulated sail forces, drive and heel, and heeling moment match with the corresponding underwater forces, and the righting moment by the sailor hiking. The real righting moment is easy to estimate from sailing photos, considering that from trapezing dinghies we know that the centre of gravity of a human being lies more or less at the height of his navel.  Streamlines coloured with flow speed around the centreboard and the rudder. Note how the flow bends down on the windward side of the centreboard. The simulation was run for medium-heavy conditions of 18 knot true wind. With the sail forces solved, the attitude of the underwater hull was adjusted (leeway and rudder angle at the given boatspeed of 4.9 knots) until the underwater forces matched the sail forces. The sail shape was recorded with a masthead video on Lake Garda, in a steady sea breeze of 18 knots but with rather a nasty chop, hence the GPS recorded boatspeed less than 5 knots – on flat water the Finn can easily exceed 5 knots of speed. A comparison was also made to a Finn VPP (velocity prediction programme) run: All three simulations, aerodynamic above water, hydrodynamic under water and the velocity prediction programme forces agreed surprisingly well. The total drive (equal to the total underwater drag) of the Finn in 18 knots of wind is 20.5 kg force, or roughly 45 pounds – it’s not much, a weight that you easily lift with one hand.  Finn drag balance sailing upwind in 18 knot of true wind and rather a nasty chop. The largest source of drag is the waves generated by the hull moving through the water (28%, in green). The hull and crew air drag is the smallest at only 4% (in grey). The “Finn drag balance” pie-chart contains most of the resulting information. The largest portion of drag comes from the hull wave-making. Nearly as big is the hull viscous drag, meaning the skin friction caused by water flowing along the hull surface. The centreboard proved to be more efficient than expected – the thin, triangular plate-like board is not what you would call a modern appendage, but it does its job quite well. The simulation shows, too, how sensitive yaw balance is to the traveller position (sheeting angle). The underwater hull also contributes to the side force, to resist leeway – nearly 10% of the total side force is from the hull. Finally, the smallest drag component, hull + crew air drag represents the aerodynamic drag of above water boat hull and the crew hiking, in the direction opposing the motion of the boat. At approximately 0.5 kg force the drag of sailor is twice as big as the drag of the Finn hull itself – Rickard Sarby designed the Finn also very aerodynamic. If you compare the hull air drag of about 250 grams to the total drag of 20,500 grams (20.5 kg), it is nil. Part of the reason for this is that close to the water surface the wind speed is much less, less than 10 knots, and this was allowed for in the aerodynamic simulation. So there is no reason for the sailor to dress in a downhill skier’s skin-tight suit, either. Full story at http://www.finnclass.org The way they were - Star battles for Olympic life . . . The Star class is fighting for its Olympic life, but this is a class that has been around for 100 years and proven to be one of the most popular racing keel boats, with a world-wide popularity, since 1910 when twenty-two Star boats were built by Ike Smith of Port Washington for the Long Island Sound group. Whatever the outcome you can be sure that Star racing will continue at the highest level of sailing competition  The Star was first used in the Olympic Games at the Los Angeles Games of 1932 with seven entries, won by Gilbert Gray of the USA, with Colin Ratsey taking the Silver for Britain. The class continued to be the keel boat choice up to the the present Games, only missing out in 1978 when it was replaced by the Tempest. The Star, a development of an earlier, shorter design, the Bug, was originally drawn up by Francis Sweisguth, as a gaff rigged boat with a long boom. The luff of the mainsail was 24ft 11in as opposed to 30ft 6in now used on the modern rig and the foot of the mainsail was 18ft 4in" as opposed to 14ft 7in. The first development step was to change the rig from a gaff rig to a Marconi rig during the early 1920's. The same mainsail could be used on either rig. After the early medal win of Ratsey, in 1932, nothing was won by a British competitor until the Gold of Mike McIntyre and Bryn Vallel in the 1988 Games at Pusan, South Korea. Then Ian Walker and Mark Covell won Silver at the British breakthrough Games of 2000 in Sydney, Australia, That Games marked the start of Olympic sailing domination by TeamGBR. Then Iain Percy and Andrew Simpson took the Gold in 2008 at Beijing, China.  For a class to have survived so long as a top rate race boat has meant a continous development of the design and equipment. Leading to the development of many fittings and rig controls now taken for granted on present day dinghies and keelboats. Other changes are apparent because of the longevity of the class, the extensive history of the class available highlighting the changes of a sport and a life style . . . This report in Time magazine of the 1941 Star World Championships concludes with . . . At the victory ball, Champion Fleitz, like his 19 predecessors, received a big silver cup, the "Blue Ribbon of the Seven Seas." But this year's rendezvous seemed strange to many an oldtimer. Absent for the first time was the Stars' founder, patron saint and Commodore, George A.' ("Pop") Corry of Port Washington, L.I.  Pop Corry, now crowding 79, is the Grand Old Man of sailing. In his battered Little Dipper, one of the original 22 Stars that were built on Long Island 30 years ago, he competed in New York's Larchmont Regatta this summer (for the 43rd straight year), finished 24th in a field of 33. With a slick new sloop like Wench, the story might have been different. But the Commodore would no sooner part with his Little Dipper than the 480 trophies she won for him. In 1912, the year after the Stars were born, he won 20 firsts and five seconds in 26 races—a feat never since equaled by any Star skipper.When sailing, Pop wears a stiff wing collar, smokes a pipe. "The pipe is my wind gauge," he says. "On a mild day, a change of wind may be barely perceptible but when the smoke changes on the old pipe, I can trim her in and save perhaps 50 feet. To get the benefit of every little breeze on a mild day, I smoke until my throat is sore." Last week, while fellow sailors breezed around Los Angeles, Commodore Corry was at home, not because he was too feeble but because his wife was ailing. For a septuagenarian, Pop Corry is unusually spry, still walks four or five miles a day, just as he has for the past 50 years, selling petticoats to Manhattan stores. His spryness he attributes to his daily practice of standing on his head for five minutes before breakfast. "Keeps me limber," says he . . . A technique I am sure not normally practiced by Percy and Simpson. The next Olympic classes event for the Star will be the ISAF World Cup event at Mallorca, where the Star will race with the other Olympic classes. The European Championships will take place at the Royal St. George Yacht Club, Dublin, Ireland, 2 to 9 September and the 2011 ISAF Combined World Championship in Perth, 3-18 December 2011. The Centennial Celebration (North America) takes place at the Larchmont Yacht Club, New York USA, with racing for Woodies/Classics 14-15 September and Modern-above 7299 16-18 September. The excellent Star class history of the class on their website was the source of information used here. - GN. Full story at http://www.starclass.org I-14 Killing 3 design video and new Bieker design progress . . . Another new International 14 is the Killing 3 from Steve Killing building in Toronto, Canada. This new design is also targeted to be sailing for the 2011 season and will be produced in volume. Also just about to hit the water is the new Paul Bieker design update of his International 14. Bieker lists his goals for the new B6 design as follows: 1. to increase pointing ability by reducing drag, both above and below the water and 2. to reduce cost. The boat is being called the B6-H2 and it is built by Kris Henderson. The project is intended to result in a boat which is easier to sail than the B5, equally as fast or faster, highly durable and more affordable than new boats currently available. Joe Bersch got the boat on the water in March but it is now back in the shop for some rework On the I-14 Forum Joe Bersch - There are firm quotes available from Kris Henderson. Contact him at ballardyc@aol.com. He and Kim will be happy to help you. The following prices are to the best of my knowledge and subject to their confirmation. A bare hull with racks is $18,500, including designer royalty to Paul Bieker. It is ala carte from there with an all up boat, less sails around $27,500 F.O.B. Seattle, I believe. The new mast is getting an upgrade of new carbon spreaders, up higher on the mast,lowers attached up higher, (in the g-nav zone.) and ajusted further aft on the hull... My report on the hull after spending the weekend on pro photo girl, Rene'e Speak's photo boat, I got to see the boat from the best view you can imagine. The new hull is truly amazing! To watch it go through the water with master sailors like Joe B. and Derick V. at the reins was amazing, with the bow profile and min rocker the boat would knife through the wave like it wasn't even there. The fullness aft made the boat faster of the wind and easer to control in the tack and jibe. all in all a great debut. 1184 is nearly finished, then it is on to Hull numbers 2 and 3. I expect there will be more orders soon. Reserve your spot now. Full story at http://killing3.blogspot.com The images of Juerg Kaufmann . . .  Juerg Kaufmann Born in Switzerland in 1968, Juerg Kaufmann has been engaged in photography for more than 10 years. His focus is yacht racing and outdoor photography. He covered from the Olympic Games, America’s Cup, offshore races such as Volvo Ocean Race, Barcelona World Race, Ishares Cup, Louis Vuitton Series and many other world class events.Beyond shooting, Juerg is also engaged in international sailing regattas as a sailor and as a match race umpire, where the ability to anticipate the maneuvers of the boat is a key element. This skill helps him capture intense sailing moments with his lens. Sailing magazines, sailing teams, race organizers, private corporations and the Swiss Air Force are only a few of his clients. Traveling and shooting for many years in Asia and the South America was the start of the passion for outdoor photography.  To see more photos from Juerg Kaufmann see the online archive go4image.com 
Full story at http://www.go4image.com I-14 Killing 3 design to challenge the new Paul Bieker B6 . . . Tremendous activity in the International 14 design world and particularly in North America. As well as the Paul Bieker new B6 design now in build, another new International is the Killing 3 from Steve Killing building in Toronto, Canada. This new design is also targeted to be sailing for the 2011 season and will be produced in volume.  Goals for the K3 were simple: faster and more affordable. Some of its key features include: * New hull shape for superior performance * Advanced design for simple, clean rigging * Hull built around CST tubes for simple, accurate production * Designed in collaboration Alexander Sails and CST * Built by Clear Air, builder of championship C-Class Catamarans We're looking forward to May 2011 for the launch of the K3. Steve Killing's degree is in Civil Engineering, but his profession has always been yacht design. In 1973, fresh out of university, he joined the C&C Yachts design group in Oakville, Ontario. After seven enjoyable years at C&C he ventured off to start Steve Killing Yacht Design initially to design only sailboats but eventually to include classic mahogany powerboats, canoes, kayaks and racing sailboats. The latest project was the series of 4 C-Class catamarans for Fred Eaton that won the International C-Class Championships in two consective challenges. The International 14 is the most challenging small boat I have ever designed. There are two quite separate tasks in the project - the first is to shape a hull that will permit the crew to push it harder and therefore achieve maximum speed a greater percentage of the time. The second is to create hull deck and foredeck shapes that provide an efficient working platform, allow for variation in deck layout and most important, have a minimum number of parts for efficient manufacturing. We have designed the 3D shapes to permit exacting milling of master plugs for perfect fits and will add extra detailed, which is often still more efficent by hand. Once the masters are complete, molds will be fabricated for production. I look forward to working with the team throughout the project and on past the launch. - Steve Killing  See the Paul Bieker new B6 design here Full story at http://killing3.blogspot.com Bieker B6 International 14 in build . . . Paul Bieker has recently introduced an updated design of his International 14. Bieker lists his goals for the new B6 design as follows: 1. to increase pointing ability by reducing drag, both above and below the water and 2. to reduce cost, which he puts at around $50k USD (£30,000 GBR).  Paul Bieker: I've attempted to increase pointing ability by trying to reduce drag wherever possible. Under the water, I have reduced the width of the hull to what is basically the practical minimum allowed by the rule. This should reduce the windage and added resistance in waves. Although removing it would reduce the cost of the boat, I have kept the jibing centerboard design since it improves the efficiency of the daggerboard (by allowing it to be smaller) and it reduces the added resistance from the hull due to leeway (more important in this design because of its deep forefoot). Above the water, I have increased the height of the forestay to improve the effective aspect ratio of the rig and removed the upper spreaders and upper shrouds to reduce windage. This has the added advantage of significantly reducing the rig weight (which is unmeasured weight in the 14 rule). In order to keep the jib size reasonable (i.e. not make the main too small), I have reduced the J measurement. This should allow us to achieve better headstay tensions for a given amount of shroud tension, further improving rig efficiency. Since the hull is too narrow to provide a reasonable shroud base, I have moved the shrouds out onto stiff but relatively low windage rack supports. Go to the forum at the international14.org website to see more images of the build process taking place. The boat is being called the B6-H2 and it is built by Kris Henderson. The project is intended to result in a boat which is easier to sail than the B5, equally as fast or faster, highly durable and more affordable than new boats currently available. Joe Bersch is hoping to sail the new boat at the San Diego NOOD the third weekend in March!  The I-14 Worlds will be at Weymouth in September over a two week period and including team racing and the POW (Prince of Wales Race – UK Nationals in one race). The link for the worlds website is i14worlds.com Full story at http://www.biekerboats.com/Bieker_Boats/Home.html |
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