Chris White has a new rig proposal for his Atlantic 47 called the MastFoil™, wondering what others thought of it.

The new Atlantic 47 Catamaran design continues to build on the Atlantic Cat series’ innovative history with an exciting and entirely new sailing rig. The design goal was to develop the easiest to handle and safest sail plan possible for short handed cruising without sacrificing performance. That goal has been met.

The Chris White Designs MastFoil™ (patent pending) is a unique combination of modern rigid airfoil technology with proven soft sails. The basic concept is not new and you can see examples of large rigid wings and soft sails in the current America’s Cup catamarans.

However the MastFoil has some critical differences. The main difference is that the MastFoil is a small part of the overall sail plan and can rotate 360 degrees around the load bearing mast which allows it to be feathered on any point of sail and in any wind velocity. Left alone, the foil will continuously feather if the control is set in that mode. Without this critical ability to feather on any heading, a rigid airfoil would typically not be suitable for use on a cruising boat. Another important difference is that the foil does not carry any of the mast compression loads. This enables the foil to be lightweight, structurally simple and rotate easily around the mast.

Also… This isn’t specifically about proas so it’s technically off topic, but it’s an interesting rig that might have other applications. Should we lump this kind of topic in with General, or should we have another forum called something like “Not Proas But Interesting”?

This is essentially an aft-mast design, which has been around on multihulls since the ‘70s. The difference here is that they’ve replaced the tiny mainsail with an airfoil wrapped around the mast and set it up in a schooner or ketch configuration.

It doesn’t seem like a bad idea for a 57’ cruising cat.