It must have been more than 20 years ago that I met Gerry Downton. He was a famous around the world ocean racer and I was an obscure designer. He bought plans, built the 42 and sailed it. He notes, “Did a 5 year apprenticeship as a boatbuilder. Left Australia at 21 to go sailing for a year, but didn’t return for 36 years. Too many yacht races to do and race boats to move, fix, modify or build to think about stopping a great lifestyle. Ended up sailing about 225,000 miles during that time. Including some long distance races and 1 marathon race. Loved it all. Built “Exit” a Newick 36’ tri and “Gato” a Hughes 42’ for myself and am toying with the plans for a Power cat as my next build. When will this madness stop?!”
in my Automotive Design/Production magazine I read about a new composite being by the University of Portsmouth in UK. They are using a date palm fiber biomass for things like bumpers and liners. The products are reported to have better tensile strength and better low velocity impact strength.
Date palm fiber polycaprolactone PCL bio-composite is completely biodegradable and recyclable…”
While it is obvious all the boat tech things that have gone into the lunar lander dwelling, several ideas from that spaceship have helped my multihull design.
The first is a new view of lighting and interiors. My designs have always leaned toward vehicle and less to habitat. The interiors were flat white and throw in a few lights.
The spaceship has allowed me to take advantage of the new design freedom allowed by all the new LED offerings.
Another is the use of Foamular insulation foam for non structural core. Things like shelves or seats can use a ply/core/ply sandwich with much less cost and much easier edge finishing than the usual Tricel materials.
I read in my auto magazines that electric cars have their batteries punished by resistance electric heaters. Expect auto sized ductless heat pumps in a couple of years. I have been seeing the results firsthand at the spaceship. Energy costs are about a third of resistance heat.
This arrangement is proven as it has sailed for years. I have been told that it can rotate 90 degrees each way from centerline.
John Fanta would prefer Colligo Cheeky Tangs for the shrouds.
I was shown this 52 Mcconaghy trimaran with an interesting hound arrangement. Composite rigging guru John Fanta advises against any hidden composite rigging arrangements.
It also had an oddly large masthead plate and an oddly small and badly chewed up exit for something there in the picture foreground.
My present battery powered LED lights in the bathroom stopped working. I will investigate, but probably the moisture.
So these are the replacements I will try. Waterproof. Battery powered.
Moisture is more of a problem on a boat than a spaceship even.
Chaak recently popped up on the Classical Sailing Multihull page. After she ran hard on the beach, destroying the original amas, I was asked to design new amas and beams for Chaak. ’85 maybe? They have proven to be tough. It did a run to Hawaii and back. It was campaigned harder than most PNW boats at that time. I recall Tim mentioning one time when the route back from Hawaii was by way of Alaska. Tim started to realize that when the shadow parted from the boat every few waves, it meant they were airborne.
USCG aircraft above asked if then needed help. “Nope”.
I recall that there was a Constant Camber 44 designed that was supposed to beat Chaak in racing. In fact it was nicknamed “Chaakduster”. Was not even close.
