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ETNZ AC72 Sailing


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whats interesting is that we can't see the yaw of the catermaran from the photo. the wing sail may well be sheeted perfectly for the true direction it's sailing through the water

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After winning the overall best media award for the Volvo Ocean Race Hamish Hooper has jumped from the red boat to the AC72 and here is his first report. From the EMTNZ facebook page

 

After 50,000 miles I think its time to change tack.

I’ve had enough wind and water to cleanse me 1000 times over, so I feel I’m in need of something a little bit dirtier, a bit more cut throat, a bit more unscrupulous…

So why not give the America’s Cup a go?

 

I am not the only one from the CAMPER team that is finding it’s not just as simple as changing from a red tee shirt to a black one. Among the army of black shirts you every now and then recognize an all to familiar face you have grown used to seeing in red.

As Tony Rae said upon sighting me, “Oh no!.. What the hell are you doing here?”

Joey Allen asked us if we knew each other, I made it clear that I know him about as well as I think I need.”

 

To swing from Volvo to America’s Cup, there is an urgent necessity to adjust to the sheer scale of everything about this new frontier with Emirates Team New Zealand.

Suitably like everything in America it is supersized, its massive; from a supercharged boat, which I question if calling it a boat really does it justice, to the enormous wing sail- bigger than an Emirates A380 wing. And then there is the immensely impressive team of 90 immensely impressive people each bringing their immensely impressive skills together all with the common goal of getting our hands back on a sole piece of mystical silverware.

 

To step into this team and into the campaign now is can be deemed a very late arrival. To count the man hours that have been already invested in getting the first AC72 into the water and to have completed its maiden sail would just take too much time to equate. And time is something that you quickly realize you can never come close to having enough of in an America’s cup.

 

To consider that in just over 13 months time the defender and the challenger will be lining up in the first race of the America’s Cup is almost an inconceivable prospect right now. But then you get a very distinct feeling that despite all of the brains and intelligence in these corrugated walls nobody here knows the meaning on the term ‘inconceivable’.

 

Tomorrow the big cat sails again, the sailors will be doing their best to tame the beast, the designers will be monitoring every minute detail, the shore crew will be nibbling their nails, the spy’s will be spying and I will probably have my jaw resting on the bottom of the chase boat with what my eyes are seeing with Dalts in my ear, “Hey New boy!!! Are you filming this?”

 

HAMISH HOOPER

 

Im stuck at uni tomorrow so if the cat does go out can anyone take some video of it this time? possibly under sail? anyone know how to get onto a Oracle or Luna Rosa spy boat? :lol: :lol: :lol:

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They broke something:

 

We had good 12 knots upwind conditions for a couple of hours today. The boat was performing well, but sailing was halted with a subtle crack which turned out to be a breakage of one of the ribs within the wing.

Nothing major just one of those things which needs to be treated with caution at this stage.

So a premature end to what was to be a full day of sailing for the AC72 today.

As Grant Dalton explains, "Its just going to be like this, these boats are so loaded and so complicated you could break a different part each day initially. Its just part of the process of getting these boats up to speed."

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http://etnzblog.com/#!2012/08/ac72-test ... nor-repair

 

 

Emirates Team New Zealand’s AC72 went sailing for the second time today, taking advantage of a stronger breeze on the Hauraki Gulf.

 

The cat left the dock under tow about 9.30am, headed north towards Tiritiri Matangi Island and the Noises 30km north of Auckland.

 

Testing stopped when minor damage – a broken rib in the front element of the wing – brought the day to a premature end.

 

Grant Dalton: “We had a good two hours of upwind testing in 12 knots of breeze and flat water before the break. The boat is under extreme loads…. we could go out there every day and break something different. It’s just part of the process of getting the boat up to speed.

 

“Today we had to decide if we could continue testing, make a temporary repair on shore and go back out or make a permanent repair.

 

“The engineers made the prudent call to fix the rib permanently so we stayed ashore.”

 

With the wing out of the boat it is a simple repair. Late this afternoon the team was assessing if the weather forecast would allow a return to the Gulf tomorrow.

 

The early stages of the sailing programme is designed to test boat and wing structures under various loads as well as giving the sailing crew valuable boat time.

 

Dalton: “The programme’s purpose is to uncover any stress points while they are only niggles – before they can develop into an issue. That’s why structural engineers and wing designers sail with us as we test in progressively heavier winds.

 

“The designers have the world’s best computer-modeling software tools at their disposal but they are never satisfied until they see a yacht sailing on the real-world test bed of the Hauraki Gulf.”

 

“It won’t be long before the engineers stay on shore and the sailing team is let loose.”

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Obviously I want them to succeed but to a layman's eye like mine it just all looks wrong and feels wrong. Boats need to be forgiving to deal with the pressures of sailing on the ocean and this setup just looks too brittle.

 

Given their wing sail is similar in concept to an aircraft wing, analogies with aeronautics are appropriate. So I wonder if they really are going about this properly, notably the trial and error approach? Somehow I doubt any new aircraft would be allowed to be developed in this way.

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This is a race boat not a cruising passenger plane

 

Think they need to push the boundaries to breaking point and then button it back a bit

 

Fastest boat wins and then throw the boat away

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Take your point that it's not as much a safety issue as an aircraft.

 

So what about F1 development? Do they take the same approach? Totally understand pushing the boundaries but where's the difference between pushing the known boundaries and pushing into the unknown?

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It could be as simple as an accidental knock to the component, to human error in the build. ever had a balsar wood and tissue paper model plane, it dosen't take much to break it.

 

The real guys do destruction testing, the first one is a Dg1000 glider wing and the second boeing passenger plane

 

 

 

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Take your point that it's not as much a safety issue as an aircraft.

 

So what about F1 development? Do they take the same approach? Totally understand pushing the boundaries but where's the difference between pushing the known boundaries and pushing into the unknown?

 

A perfect F1 motor is designed to blow up 1 second after it crosses the finish line. Any longer and it is too heavy.

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A perfect F1 motor is designed to blow up 1 second after it crosses the finish line. Any longer and it is too heavy.

 

Bollocks. That's a tired old quote which of course bares no resemblence to reality. Tell me the last time a winning car blew up as it crossed the line?

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