After receiving an invitation earlier this year to publish and present my findings in the field of performance prediction of planing yacht hulls I now can share the official announcement as well:
The full announcement and information on the event can be found on the RINA Website here.
Ciao!
…till deadline-day of this term. In other words there is only a limited amount of time left to finish an essay, finish a design, finish the sales pitch to go with said design and finish the first draught of the final report for my bachelor project whilst keeping up with all lecture stuff. Challenging? Yes but then again this work-rate has been part of the course since day one so no surprises (or complaints) and there is also plenty of fun stuff to look forward to, most notably the ‘Maritime Society Ball’ in 10 or so days with the great mix of various years of shippies mixed with PhDs and staff but also an afternoon of seatrials. Apart from that it is a case of “getting on with it”.
The project is coming along quite nicely actually but the pressure has been upped with an invitation by the Royal Institution of Naval Architects to publish and present a paper on the subject this summer. Luckily the deadline for that paper is slightly further away and my reports will be well and truly finished by that time.
Anyway I want to be able to enjoy the good bits over the coming two weeks so back to work. Take care all,
Ciao!
After quite a stressful weekend (trying to get my model
finished, refining the test-matrix, following the pre-match antics of the 33rd AC),
come Monday it all started to come together.
Got driven down to the Solent Institute towing tank by a
very kind housemate (thanks Ray), found Dr. Taunton already getting the test
rig ready and had the boat in the water and ballasted within the hour. Checked
the interweb on the phone to see the AC start postponed and then set-up the
model under the carriage. Before 10 o’clock the first run was finished and all
the calibrations seemed to be in order. As a result testing got underway some 4
hours ahead of schedule and because of the light displacement waves were much
less of an issue than assumed in the test-matrix. This all meant that all
upright resistance tests were finished well ahead of schedule and so even one
of the heeled experiments could be conducted and finished ahead of schedule and
before the tank was closed for the day.
So what does this mean? Tuesday I have a lot less tests to
run, so it should be a relaxed day in the tank. And with the AC33 postponed I
also haven’t missed any of this spectacular event. So the rest of the week will
be some more testing, watching some sailing and some enjoyable events planned
for the weekend as well.
But no peak can be enjoyed without enduring the dips, there
are a few: the quality of the model could have been better (the lay-up of the
bottom allows water to sip through, debatable at best), the weather is pretty
miserable in Southampton at the moment. However all this is just nit-picking
and basically life is pretty damn good.
Right, below are some photos and video of the tank testing.
Not visible but greatly appreciated, Grapefruit Graphics has supplied some
branding for the model (will have to get a good shot of that)!
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And from day 2: 
Well, that’s it for now. Ciao!
Late Wednesday the hull came out of the mould and a first coat of paint was sprayed on. During Thursday the hull has been tidied up and faired but a lot has still to be done. For Friday:
– Re-install the transverse frames
– Apply body filler
– Fair the hull
– Colour paint
– Install the tow post heel fitting and flow trip studs
– Apply markings
Plenty to do but this morning (Thursday) the hull looked like this:
Ciao,
Second time around and the resin has gone off, the hull was ready to come out and then…
Very much stuck to the mould. So the only photos to show at the moment are those where I had test-fitted the frames (had to knock them out again) before manhandling the boat out of the mould. Plenty of cuts down the line there is now a layer of paint on the outside of the hull (in some cases the blood is kept as a reminder) and the to-do list is shrinking before tank testing starts together with race 1 of the 33rd America’s Cup.
Here are two shots:
So exams are over and that meant shifting focus to finishing my model for tank testing. Unfortunately miscommunication resulted in the lay-up of the hull happening with old resin and at a later date. Instead of having a finished model the first week of January they (EDMC) were now construction her in the last week…
Anyway, I was fully confident still and kept on making arrangements only to find out on Thursday (with testing starting on Monday…) that the resin hadn’t gone off (quality issue and the fact a security guard uncoupled the vacuum bag didn’t help either) so that my model has now ended up in the bin. Well nothing I could do about it other than trying to find another gap in the busy Solent Institute tank at a later date. With the kind help of the Wolfson Unit and Andy Claughton two days have been picked and all involved are very hopeful we will be able to get everything sorted in time for the rescheduled testing.
Anyway this resulted in some spare time and I have been playing around a little with Maxsurf to learn more about it and hopefully gain some experience with rendering as well as hullshape design. Modified my hull design to include a proper transom area, a cockpit and coachroof even if at the moment it is all a bit rudimentary… Anyway judge for yourself and feel free to comment below…
Perhaps over the weekend I will make it even more realistic by adding better colouring, water, rig and so forth.
Anyway; end of the month, three day weekend, fresh start on Monday and AC33 T-10 (although I will miss race 1 because of tank testing). February is going to be awesome!
Ciao!
Well, busy times at the moment with exams coming up and some issues with the EDMC so required to spend too much time checking up on my model construction progress (anyone with a couple of metres of carbon?). Anyway once all my hard work is over one of the most amazing events is going to take place in Valencia (Spain), the 33rd America’s Cup…
The brilliant thing about it is the two machines racing each other (and the fact the two owners with too much money keep bickering about the details I will ignore…) come February. The most highly optimised racing multihulls will go head to head in what promises to be one of the most amazing matchracing events in the history of sailing from a design and technology standpoint and I’m really looking forward to it. As a taster, here is a video (of the Challenging team) of the launch of their vessel in VLC, the interviewee is Simeon Tienpont with whom I had the pleasure of racing a couple years back and he will be one of three Dutchmen on the boats next month:
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Mould now almost completely finished (Friday, 8 Jan.):
However
as one weather prediction had 2 inches (5cm) of snow forecasted for
Sunday in the Southampton area (didn’t see it on the models I use for
sailing…) it was decided to close Uni on Monday so work has come to a
halt. Sure enough no further snow fell over the course of the weekend
and temperatures have been well above freezing during the days as well
so a lot of the snow and ice has gone and it is probably the safest
conditions in a week for moving about Southampton…
Yes, I’m really impressed with the Healt and Safety the English get their nickers in a twist over…
Can’t even revise in the library, but hey, back at it but now at home…
Ciao,
Just waiting for the bow and then the mould is finished. Great work by the short-staffed EDMC (something to do with the weather).
More photos to follow.
Can’t believe it is almost over, what a year it has been
(again). This time there was definitely less impressive sailing but loads more
interesting stuff to learn and do at uni as well as meeting a large number of
great people (from whom I have been able to learn heaps).
Anyway, from the freezing Flatlands I’d like to wish
everyone the very best for 2010 and the new decade (anyone come up with a name
for it yet?). I look forward to it and I’ll keep boring you with my stories.
Ciao!
