White Rabbit and Trimaran Yachts

I have also been offshore in heavy seas, and it helps a little when designing yachts...

Dive into this page and have a look at the sea and how it can play around with the ships... http://tv-antenna.com/heavy-seas/3/

I rest my case. What would you rather be cruising on... a monohull... or White Rabbit?

The link from Lars tells the real story...

AMG
Thanks for the link.
I've been in 7metre+ seas off the east coast of Canada. That may be why I appear to be obsessive about the construction of the yachts. I look at the photos of yachts at yachtforums and the first questions that always comes to mind are: What would this vessel perform like off the Grand Banks on a blustery day? Would I trust the lives of my children to this vessel?

That is one of the reasons that I brought up Lexan.

Good one Lars
Kelly

great link.
just goes to show the force of mother nature. Doesn't really matter how big the yacht or ship is, in storms like that.

Hope that this is not too off-colour.
When I was first learning to sail, one old skipper gave me words of wisdom that I'll never forget. "It's not called Father Nature, you want to know why? It's called Mother Nature and there's a reason for that. Mother Nature is female. Anybody that can bleed seven days straight and not die deserves your respect. Don't ever forget to respect her or she'll take you down without missing a breath"

Apparently some of the larger commercial boat builders are starting to think that the trimarans (or the monohull with stabilisers are the way to go nowadays. This was delivered to a South African company recently and was taken around the southern tip of South Africa in huge seas with great success.

Lots of beam there

But not much draft!! Check it out! I found these running shots on Austals media site. I had to stop and do a double-take...

It's reasonable to assume these shots were taken without a load, i.e., no passengers or cargo. But still... given the sheer weight and size of this monster, I would expected much more draft considering the extremely narrow cross section of the center hull, coupled with very little submerged area on the sponsons.

Here is a static shot... if you look closely, you'll notice the boat is listing to port. (more bottom paint showing to starboard), so the sponsons are not quiet as exposed as this picture appears...

Here it is seen on-plane. Notice how dry the sponsons are running, evident by the lack of spray being dispersed by each of them. It appears the center hull is carrying the bulk of the weight... but the math doesn't add up!

The final picture tells the real story. Look closely at the foil located just aft of the bulb... that's how they're generating so much lift!

As an old rule the multi-hulls that work best are light weight. I'll bet there isn't a lot of steel in this ship.

Kelly

wow wow.........(speechless)

Fred Olsen is a Norwegian company though.

bet she burns 5 tons an hour.

not aluminium? those fast ferrys are really funny if you jump up and down on the forward deck and feel it flex. not good to leave them in layup, not much room for corrosion.

There will be when it's loaded down with cars!

I didn't get any specs when I was on the site, but I did get one more image that was equally as mind-boggling. Check out that bridge!

reply foil

I don't get it; if it's that simple, why doesnt everybody?

One at the front, one at the back (we don't want a Nelson-halfglider),
preferably both with controlable pitch to adjust to given speed and you'd be able to override most of your hull-restraints..

Thinking about it; you'd be halfway to a wingboat (sorry, the real english term escapes me)

i think the australians are really making a name for themselves in the innovation of fast ferries, you can see that by the amount of austal and incat designs in Piraeus, Greece. Fast is the name of the game as 8 hours trip to an island is BS but 4 is ok. no matter if they keep to schedule in heavy weather and mess up a few cars heh!

this is not a new thing though; i went to indonesia and singapore for about 15 years or more ago and every fast interisland transport already was done then by fast australian catamarans.
in the topic "dutch harbours" you'll see some fast ferries, also really originating from australia.

The yacht that this thread is really about ( ) is also made by a company that builds fast multihull ferries first, and yachts second.

Back to the first pic of this ferry in the water, it can't be the foil producing lift that is reducing it's draft, it's almost stopped.

From memory, the vessel is over 400ft long, over 100ft wide and tops out at over 35knots (or was it 42?).

From this angle she is really impressive. The spray is from the two steerable waterjets which with over 10.000 hp each is causing quite a lot of jacuzzi-bubbles even at idling. The third centerjet has another two 10.000 hp..., which is needed to get the largest aluminium boat in the world to reach over 40 knots. She is 127 m long and 30 meter wide!

You can read all about her here; http://www.austal.com/news/article.cfm?news_id=123

I hope she is able to turn quick and sharp, otherwise I would be scared to be in the car...