Sailing: New America's Cup yachts can fly like the wind, says sailor
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[November 03, 2020]
By Greg Stutchbury
WELLINGTON (Reuters) - With design
teams drawing on aeronautics and aerodynamics expertise of Airbus
and the McLaren Formula One team, the new superfast America's Cup
boats are harnessing the power of the wind like never before, a
former professional sailor told Reuters.
Team New Zealand will defend the America's Cup next March off the
coast of Auckland, with teams from Italy, Britain and the United
States battling in a challenger series through January and February
for the right to face them.
The regatta will be sailed in new AC75 foiling monohulls that are
capable of speeds of more than 50 knots (92 kph) as they glide above
the surface of the water.
"I have seen them come past me and it's pretty impressive," former
Team New Zealand member Mark Orams told Reuters of watching the
yachts as they were put through their paces at Auckland's Waitemata
Harbour.
"We have machines that are flying with the invisible power of the
wind. They're flowing at not twice the speed of the invisible power
but three times.
"Its like a lot of things, you don't realise how fast things are
going until they go past you," he added.
Like the foiling catamarans of the two previous America's Cup
regattas, the AC75 boats are designed to be lifted out of the water
by their massive double-skinned wingsails and kept stable above it
by hydrofoils.
Both draw heavily on design attributes from
aeronautical engineering, Orams said, with the goal to reduce wind drag
so strong that people could not stand up in the face of it.
"It's no accident that Airbus designers are working with the American
team," said Orams, who is now the director of graduate research at
Auckland University of Technology.
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"It's no accident the McLaren Formula One team and their
aerodynamics team, which is dozens strong, have been working with
the British.
"The faster the yacht goes, the more important aerodynamics become.
"It has very much changed the game and the traditional yacht design
you're pretty much just throwing out the window."
Orams added that the foils could be the defining factor in deciding
the winner of the world's oldest sporting trophy.
Teams have been restricted to just one set of foils for the entire
regatta and can not change them depending on weather and sea
conditions.
"You have to have a lot of thought into how you adjust to the
variety of conditions," he added.
"Boats could go out in a race and it could be five knots or 25
knots. Those are vastly different.
"So you have to have to a really good all-round set of foils and the
ability to adjust them in the way you sail the boat."
(Editing by Peter Rutherford)
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