Winged Keels

[jzaraschi]

Have read all the posts and technical jargon about the performance aspects of the "wing keel".
But from a practical perspective, all those American Cup boats, never had to sit at anchor...........over the years have heard many sad stories of anchor rodes fouled on a wing keel.
Grounding into the mud, well I am yet to meet the perfect sailor who has never been aground. Wings are just big suction cups in mud, and with those outboard appendages at a torsional force on the keel, especially if the grounding is into a rock, rock pile, or something hard.


And then ask your self one last question, who are building wing keels these days on cruising boats, the bulbous or skeel (spelling?) keel is far more practical at getting ballast as low as possible while maintaining a moderate draft.

[Adelie]

Scheel keel, named for the developer.

[MJH]

Originally Posted by CptCrunchie

My next question is one I have been mulling over for the past 2 months. The boat we are looking at has a HUGE winged keel. This would be my first experience with one.

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I spent last night reading the winged keel thread on SailingAnarchy.com. Oh my! Those guys cremated a number of my very best grey-matter cells. Wow! But while there were a few who sail with one, most were steeped in a highly technical debate. I read about the pressure dynamics, and about how those dynamics differ from the convention. I've seen all the various designs of them, and read opinions galore about which one would do better ...as compared to others of similar design.

I understand the comments about the issues of grounding a winged keel, that it could be major undertaking if stuck a mud bottom. And while I understand that could happen, I'm of the vewpoint that sailing or motoring into a mud bottom has more to do with seamanship than 'it's eventually going to happen'.

I also read all about Australia II, and how the Morgan, Catalina and other boat manufacturers jumped on that band wagon.

But in all my reading, I still have one question: What does it do when underway in various sea states?

Please understanding that I am not a yacht designer, nor do I have any experience with winged keels beyond reading about them. Please keep that in mind.

Here's my thoughts:

The old line that 'Waterline Rules', as in, the longer your waterline, the longer the wave you can sit in, the faster you can go. To me, a winged keel would hold - and possibly lower - the boat into the water, thereby increasing/maintaining a longer waterline. That would mean the boat would actually become slightly faster. Thoughts?

Then there's what happens heading into big seas. My thinking is that the wing would hold the bow up over the crest, and only once the keel neared the crest would the bow come down. Then, once that happened, the wing would hold the bow down to push it through the next crest .....versus the bow riding over it.

Anyone have experience with winged keels?

My opinion is that the only value of a wing keel on a yacht is to reduce the draft...period. There are always tradeoffs so don't forget the additional weight always added to the wing keel over the deep keel versions.

Keep it simple.

~ ~ _/) ~ ~ MJH

[Dave9111]

I once got a 29 foot Ericson with a narrow fin keel stuck in mud returning to port - right in the middle of the channel. The water dropped while we were out and the channel needed to be dredged. The keel was stuck in about 6" of muddy clay. No rocks. It took a towboat with 2 (two) 250 hp Honda outboards pulling via two lines to the boat to get it to move. The towboat had a really hard time getting it to move. The engines were WOT for a while. To get it to move, the towboat had to tip the boat so the keel would rise out of the mud. Now picture your big giant winged keel buried in mud. What kind of towboat will you need to get freed? Tipping the boat would further bury the keel! Or would you need a barge and a crane? More likely you would wait and pray for the water to rise... which could be a while! I would avoid shallow water, which ironically is why the keel is winged!

[replusted]

Originally Posted by Dave9111

I once got a 29 foot Ericson with a narrow fin keel stuck in mud returning to port - right in the middle of the channel. The water dropped while we were out and the channel needed to be dredged. The keel was stuck in about 6" of muddy clay. No rocks. It took a towboat with 2 (two) 250 hp Honda outboards pulling via two lines to the boat to get it to move. The towboat had a really hard time getting it to move. The engines were WOT for a while. To get it to move, the towboat had to tip the boat so the keel would rise out of the mud. Now picture your big giant winged keel buried in mud. What kind of towboat will you need to get freed? Tipping the boat would further bury the keel! Or would you need a barge and a crane? More likely you would wait and pray for the water to rise... which could be a while! I would avoid shallow water, which ironically is why the keel is winged!

But if you had a shoal draft wing keel you wouldn't have been stuck in the first place. Your point is valid but a prudent skipper with either type of keel would have paid attention to the tides especially one having local knowledge of a channel in need of dredging. Of course things happen to us all occasionally.

[Dave9111]

You are thinking of people who have a normal level of "luck".... that's not me! :-) The mud rises to meet me! I was literally dead center in the channel and was really stuck!

[hamburking]

I owned a Hunter Legend 35.5 with a winged bulb keel.

I read a lot about this keel. I can't say how much of it is true.

The 35.5 was available with the winged bulb (4.5 feet) or the deeper fin keel (6 feet, I think). Hunter match raced two boats against each other (one of each keel, otherwise identical boats). They swapped crews and raced over several days in different conditions. They came to the conclusion that there was no difference in performance at all. None. So they stopped offering the deep fin on that model (all Legend models? I dunno).

Thats what I read.

My personal experience was that it was an excellent keel. My local cruising ground has plenty of thin water, and I appreciated the shallow draft. My boat pointed very well upwind, and flew on a reach. Yes, I put it on a rock one day, but was able to easily winch it off with a line from shore using one of the primaries.

My only complaint was that in dead calm conditions at anchor, the anchor line would sometimes get caught up on the keel. Then in the morning I had a mess to undo. I could have fixed this if I had more chain, or used a killick on the rode.

[geoffschultz]

I own a Freedom 40/40 with a 5.5' draft and a 6' wide wing keel. I have over 50,000 miles on it. BlueJacket beats much larger boats sailing down wind, but loses them go up wind. But, I try to minimize my up-wind sailing as the admiral doesn't enjoy that point of sail.


The biggest issues that I've had have been with going aground as the keel acts like a anchor and you can't heel the boat to reduce the draft. BlueJacket is now in the Rio Dulce of Guatemala and there's about a 1/4 mile wide bar that you have to go over. We've never had problem until this year when we bumped hard going out and had to be pulled in.



I've had the boat hauled all over, and sometimes a travel lift isn't an option. For example, in La Paz, Mexico, it was hauled on a flatbed with hydraulic arms. Getting it positioned and secured was a very long process. I've also had the boat shipped from Milwaukee to San Diego, and not having a fin keel added a fair amount of height. If you ever spend a lot of time navigating in coral head rich areas (which I do), the width of the wing keel increases the degree of difficulty quite a bit.


However, if these things aren't of worry to you, buy the boat if it fits your other needs!


-- Geoff

[SaltyMetals]

I shared a Beneteau Oceanis 400 for almost 15 years with a friend. The boat had a winged bulb. Never any problems apart from getting off mud. Now if you think Cap Crunchie's pic shows a large wing take a look at this pic which i took of a boat in the Bari (S. Italy) marina where i am. The new owner told me it is 67ft and i believe he said the designer was Vallicelli. Name is "Kidan" if you ever come across her.
(Not sure if i got the addition of the pic right but hope it works)
Andrew

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by SaltyMetals

I shared a Beneteau Oceanis 400 for almost 15 years with a friend. The boat had a winged bulb. Never any problems apart from getting off mud. Now if you think Cap Crunchie's pic shows a large wing take a look at this pic which i took of a boat in the Bari (S. Italy) marina where i am. The new owner told me it is 67ft and i believe he said the designer was Vallicelli. Name is "Kidan" if you ever come across her.
(Not sure if i got the addition of the pic right but hope it works)
Andrew

I shudder to think of the torque applied to the fairly small keel root when one would strike a rock with the tip of that wing! OWWW...

Jim

[CptCrunchie]

Originally Posted by SaltyMetals

....if you think Cap Crunchie's pic shows a large wing take a look at this pic which i took of a boat in the Bari (S. Italy) marina where i am. The new owner told me it is 67ft and i believe he said the designer was Vallicelli. Name is "Kidan" if you ever come across her.

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...6&d=1546903467

Andrew

Wow! That would be ...."Next!"

Especially not a fan of how the bottom of the leading edge is forward of its hull mounting. Don't know about weeds in the South Pacific, but the bull kelp around the PNW would grab onto that and kill all forward motion.

[dneve]

My Sigma 41 came with a 7ft draft which the original owner found did not work in the shallow water on the west coast of Florida so he hired a naval architect who designed a new keel/centerboard with a 5ft draft board up and up to 9 ft board down. The keel looks very similar to a Scheel keel. Here in Miami and the Bahamas this rig works well allowing me to anchor in 6ft of water but in deeper water drop the board for windward legs and to reduce weather helm.
The PO in Ft Meyers was very successful racing and even traded wins with a deep keeled Scandanavian boat! This keel configuration works for me.

[eianm]

I have a Hunter passage 1991 42- this has a winged keel.
Observations over 10 years of ownership;
1) great shallow draft, but still very stable
2) I have "raced" with a mate in a Jeanneau 42 DS and I can handle much higher wind before my helm begins to round up than he can.
reversing takes some getting used to- but once you have learned the technique it is as easy as any boat.


All in all, couldn't be happier- i have much less stress over grounding than my mate in his 42DS with a 6' + keel!

[MarAzul]

Tandam fins supporting a non lifting beaver tail board ballast.
Yes it is designed to get the weight down lower while holding the draft
to 6'3"

The ballast is 6" thick, 23" wide at just about at the leading edge of the aft fin. 16.5 ' feet long weighing 7200#.

[rognvald]

All these people running aground! What have we been doing wrong all of these years? Perhaps we are too conservative in our navigation, perhaps we purposely avoid a bull's rush into uncharted waters, or maybe we're just lucky. In the last 20K miles sailed on our winged keel from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the lower Caribbean, we ran aground once . . . and it was my fault. We were heading for a familiar mangrove anchorage in the more remote(read: never saw another boat), untrammeled Florida Keys where we had anchored many times previously that provided excellent protection from the strong Westerlies of approaching cold fronts. We usually approached from a fairly deep channel past the anchorage and then rounded up for our final approach in a safe "U" pattern to an area of good holding sand/gravel. However, I was feeling brilliant that day and decided that this was an extra, unnecessary step and decided to take a short cut in ample water that, however, showed an old spoil area off the main channel. We were at mid-high tide and we had easily 2 plus feet under our keel. So, off we went and in a minute we were aground in the spoil area. Contrary to some above of the reports, although we grounded fairly hard, we were able to winch off the shoal at high water and sailed to our anchorage with our tail between our legs. The lessons: 1) if you take an unreasoned chance, your odds for failure increase, 2.) although the chart showed good water over the spoil area: NEVER SAIL ACROSS SPOIL AREAS and 3.) whenever navigating: ERR TO THE CONSERVATIVE. This was a great lesson for us and we have never made this mistake again. Good luck and safe sailing . . . Rognvald P.S. There is one real liability with a wing keel at anchor: wrapping the keel with the anchor rode. We carry 40 feet of 3/8" chain and 250 feet of nylon rode and have wrapped our keel numerous times in tidal anchorages, shifting winds and dead calm conditions where the boat drifts on the hook. I have yet to find a solution to this problem and is, in my opinion, the real liability of this keel configuration--not the inherent sailing abilities.