Tim,
I agree that ugly, fast, and high-pointing is better than ugly, slow,
and slow to windward. If I used a junk-based rig, I'd personally go
with a higher-aspect wing-shaped rig, not the shape that Fercot is
using. It works for him, especially with the biplane mast setup, but
my goal would be to have a single, taller mast.
You've got a point about the journey, especially with a soft wing
sail. No one has come up with the ideal soft wing yet. Everything is
either really expensive, difficult to reef, too complex to operate, or
all three. Fercot is the closest I've seen, and after many good points
made by others on this forum, I'm convinced it's the best yet.
But best yet doesn't mean perfect for any given use. In my opinion,
boats cost too much to put up with a homely rig. Perhaps Fercot's rig
can be modified to be even simpler and/or prettier.
I look forward to seeing what you come up with.
- Mike
On 6/25/2010 6:24 AM, kimberlydreaming wrote:
Builder was Multihull tecnologies group they were always getting written up in Australian multihull magazine so seemed like a safe stable option, Yeah right ! Id actuall been looking at Jonh the harriet builder in china but baulked at the potential risk. After it all went pear shaped Rob even commented that at the time he thought i was being too cautious getting the build in Oz .
Mike thanks for the link id come across only one poor photo of that rig before. I supposed at the end of the day it will come down to there only being so many practical ways to do a soft wing sail, of course we all think our idea is one of those ways. Beautifully finished Wharram though to be honest i think the rig is actually quite ugly although ugly, fast and high pointing is infinitely better than ugly slow and poor to windward .Its good to see the execution of the frames though and its given me a few things to pursue. Im by nature a bit of a mad scientist so its as much the journey as the destination.
Hi Robert i just hope you can jet some use out of the bits although calling them hulls is a bit of a stretch .
Cheers Tim