'Beautiful Catamaran' - An Oxymoron?

[sailingaway221]

I have a 43' cat....it is old....it is a little ratty, but to me it is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen........Luckilly for me .....in many ways .......no one has to like the same thing you do.......! I can find beauty in any boat im sitting on....really, but I would never suggest your boat wasn't beautiful because I didn't like it. I

That sig is a beautiful boat.

[Canibul]

when I first saw the vertical Lagoon windows I thought they looked a little bizarre. Then, when I started thinking about it, it occurred to me that if you had one of those and needed to replace those windows, you could get flat safety glass or plexi cut and fitted at any hardware store in the world, fast, and cheap. Curtains would be easy to fit. Headroom is maximized. The view from inside would be great. People would not stand on them with sandy feet. Water would fall straight off due to gravity and not sit around beaded up collecting dust, etc.

Not so with a special curved piece of plexi or glass that had to come from the other side of the world to fit.

As for windage and aerodynamics...oh come on. We are talking maybe 10 kts of wind resistance here. This is not exactly something that requires extensive flat plate equivalent calculations like a jet aircraft or even a performance automobile. It's negligable.

[TrevC]

When it comes to the "dark side" of sailing, this is my favourite, along with any of the other Gunboat designs:

[clockwork orange]

Agree on those Gunboats Trev,after getting past the fact that they are way too high tech(read expensive)for my tastes what i like about them is that they are really simple in their styling. I like that they have fairly flat decks without the overly large deckedge radiuses so common these days,there are no big flares or bulges or steps in the hulls,just nice clean lines,no protrusions between the hulls,much more vertical cabin sides with distinct transitions into the top and the decks rather than the way on some cats the transitions just kind of ooze into one another with large radiuses.They are,stylingwise rather old fashioned.
Steve.

[TrevC]

clockwork orange: It certainly looks like they put a lot of thought in to the whole design process. The center helm station looks really fun.

I wonder how well these high-tech composite hulls would stand up to the test of time... 20 years? 30? I don't have any detailed knowledge of them, just curious.

[fastcat435]

I think she is beautiful and I am not biased so !!!

Gideon

[Octopus]

Originally Posted by hugoleb

I think that the SIG45 is quite a beautiful catamaran, but then I am biased. What do you think based on this video?

I think I agree! This is why I started the thread. I've finally found a catamaran that merits the description beautiful.

And I think I know why. It's those twin hulls, their size shape and colour, they conjure up the image of a pair of dolphins swimming alongside each other, surely there is no more beautiful sight in the world.

There's something about those forward portholes too, it's the proportions of them in relation to the hulls, they capture the melancholia of the eyes of big sea mammals, the loneliness of the vast oceans and the ancient wisdom of a dying breed of giants.

Chris

[TrevC]

The SIG45 looks really fun. Elegance and speed. The videos are hypnotising to watch.

[sneuman]

I agree, she's pretty and avoids that "wedding cake" look that most cruising cats suffer from.

My concern would be how the fine entry on those bows nearly buries her nose (nostrils?!) in what looks to be ideal conditions. In a bit of real chop, let alone anything approaching heavy weather, that could result in an undesireable situation, I would think.

Or am I completely off base?

[hugoleb]

Thank you very much for the positive comments.
Hello Sneuman. The bows are indeed very fine. They are designed to cut through waves, rather than go over them. Because the bows are so slender, and do not flare very much, the increase in bouyancy as the hull becomes submerged is linear (rather than exponential on v shaped bows) which mean two things - firstly, there is a gradual rather than sudden increase in vertical moment as the bows go through a wave. This reduces pitching. The other result is that there is virtually no deceleration as the bows go through a wave. It is sudden deceleration that makes buring bows dangerous - not the fact of the bow being temporarily submerged. The combined result is a very smooth (and safe) ride.
The design is based on the latest VPLP racing boats. There is a more detailed article from Seahorse magazine on multihull bow designs in the press section of our website if you would like to read more about this.
All the best.
Hugo

[Canibul]

Thanks for that. It actually does make sense to me. I have never yet seen a dolphin with a stepped hull or chine.

[sneuman]

Originally Posted by hugoleb

It is sudden deceleration that makes buring bows dangerous

Unless you happen to be on the foredecks, I suppose.

I know on racing cats that burying the leeward hull can lead to pitchpoling. How is that problem addressed?

[hugoleb]

All multihulls will bury the leeward bow if you push them hard enough. The key to preventing a pitchpole is to keep the centre of effort aft (the mast on the SIG45 is very far back relative to most cats), to have lots of reserve bouyancy (the SIG45's bows are well over 6ft high, and very long) and to keep the bows very fine so that they do not cause rapid deceleration when the bows are submerged.

[Eleven]

I agree with that set back mast, it gives the driving sail, the genoa, a lot of lift as well as drive. My old rear mast Prout squats as she picks up speed, then squanders the speed in spraying water wide as the bows squidge waves apart. There is a balance though, trial and error, or experience will show if penetrating regularly is a good habit.
But then, as the boat slows the apparent moves aft the genoa lift increases, pulling the bows up out of the salty stuff. I do wonder about what happens to the air when close hauled. The tunnel, and the entry to the tunnel, must generate a high speed air flow beneath the boat. Increased air speed means lower pressure. I have a lot of deck area, is this why the boat squats. Any designers out there made an assessment of this?

[Abaco]

hugoleb,

Congratulations on your purchase of a SIG45. Very cool boat. Will that be hull # 2?