America’s Cup Trickle Down
GALLERY | Click images to enlarge
The new WindRider Rave V hydrofoil trimaran
WindRider has announced that it is re-entering the sailing hydrofoil market with a new 17’ design that is aimed at overcoming some of the chief limitations of the type, such as being a pain in the ass to trailer, rig, beach and sail.
WindRider and their design partners developed the original concept of bringing foiling or “flying on the water” to the everyday sailor back in 1998, well before foiling became popular. It took the exceptional media coverage of America’s Cup races in 2013 for people to fully appreciate the excitement of sailing on foils. And since then more foiling boats have come to market – but all are either expensive, complicated, require exceptional agility and skill, or all of the above. - WindRider
What they have come up with is pretty interesting. Yes, it is a trimaran like the old Rave, but that’s where the similarity ends. Instead of a standard multihull sloop rig, it is opting for an A-frame bipod - with two canted mains! Below the water it is equally unconventional, forgoing the wave sensor apparatus of the original Sam Bradfield design, as well as the J or S foils of hydrofoiling cats as seen in the AC. Reaching way back in hydrofoil evolution, the three foils form a deep V configuration, but with the addition of something called a “sonic tube” at the antapex of the V.
How all this force vectoring works out in the testing phase is anybody’s guess, but we give them full marks for creativity and guts. Larry Knauer is Lead Designer on the Rave V project, who is literally a rocket scientist from Lockhead Martin and Pratt & Whitney. He is fielding questions about the new design here.
Give their crowd funding project some love.
