Anonymous wrote:

Well, you have got to decide what you want in a boat. The Miss Cindy voyage, and Roger Taylor, and many other micro-cruisers have demonstrated that you do not need a lot of boat to have a significant adventure. The Miss Cindy story inspired my own choice of the catamaran I am currently building - the Eco 6. As I now have the hulls joined together and have begun work on the cabin structure, I am beginning to appreciate how roomy the boat is for 6 meters, and also how small it is compared to the boats I am used to. I am also very conscious of how little weight I have to play with, which is making me very careful about how much weight I build into the boat. But overall I have come to realise that this will be a 'backpacking' kind of boat compared to the ocean going holiday 'cottages' I have been used to in the past. This will dictate my choice of interior fit-out including a backpacking technology approach for the galley, except I am going to have an electric fridge to keep the tonic water and white wine chilled!

This boat may not be right for me long term, but I am prepared to give it a try. 

 I strongly agree about deciding what you want............ My interests and those of many others are quite different.  I'm looking at along term onboard lifestyle, not brief or extended "adventure" with interludes of "normal" life.   More on the  order of wandering the world's more remote areas in a leisurely low key ongoing "adventure" of a number of years with no specific goal or timetable such as circumnavigation.   Probably solo most of the time.   With that in mind, a junk rigged multihull is pretty much a no-brainer.   The fly in the soup is payload naturally.   How many months supplies can I carry, and in addition I want significant maintenance ability so that I'm rarely dependent on shoreside services.  That all adds up to weight, especially the latter.  The challenge  is not only choosing the right boat, but outfitting it with  the necessary items so I can maintain it and repair it, without simply piling on weight.   I've found over the years that I can do a LOT with minimal stuff, but choosing the right set of tools to be capable but light is a real challenge.

      To get what I really want, I would need to build it.......... But clearly at least for me, the build would consume too much time when I'd rather be sailing, and at my age, there is a fair chance that it would end up being another "white elephant" for sale partially done..... If I'm realistic about things.

                                                                     H.W.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:His Aero Rig or Ballestron rig is IMHO absurd......  A  heavy mast on bearings just doesn't make sense to me, and I've often wished someone would build one with a junk rig.

I know of two larger junk rigged proas, you might be interested in Terho Halme's Ping Pong (which is a "Harry") and then there's a Swedish tacking proa.

Thanks!   I hadn't seen Ping Pong before.   Note the huge difference between the basic design.  The Swedish proa  has the masts on the main hull (windward) where most of the weight is, and very little to prevent capsize should the wind switch suddenly to the opposite side, while Ping Pong has the masts on the leeward hull.  Technically the Swedish boat is an Atlantic Proa, and Ping Pong is a Pacific Proa.   Ping Pong does not appear to be a Harry Proa, as the HPs are designed with a considerably longer leeward hull, and the main hull is short and fat which  is a configuration that has several advantages.

A pacific proa has the outrigger to windward, and an Atlantic to Leeward.  The first trying to fly the outrigger using it's weight to counter sail thrust / rolling moment, the second using it's flotation to counter sail thrust / rolling moment.  They are completely opposite.

                                                                   H.W.

This discussion  has produced some interesting stuff...... I'm currently about half way through Travels With Miss Cindy.....suggested by an early poster, and enjoyed reading the piece on stepped planing hulls.    What has always been a problem for myself and others is priorities.   Designers design with a set of priorities for a broad market, of which the vast majority are weekenders and thrill seekers.  Performance tends to trump (sorry about  using that word ;-)....all other parameters.  For example when I look at small catamarans in the size range that  interests me, payloads tend to be 900kg or less.   As payload includes EVERYTHING but the bare hulls and bridge deck & cabin, what on the face of it might sound like a lot of capacity evaporates rapidly........It seems that many folks are math challenged ;-)... everything in the head and galley, all the safety equipment, dinghy, human cargo and their personal items and clothing, and the food and water for them, fuel and tanks or containers, for cooking and propulsion, engines, electronics and batteries, ground tackle, books and charts.... it all adds up very rapidly if you look at things honestly. And they don't tolerate overloading well.

     The ECO 7.5 that was discussed earlier seems to me one of the best choices for a fairly minimal but not too minimal small cat for short distance cruising.   It's 634 kg payload is a figure someone can work within.  At only 42% of the empty weight of the KD 860, it has 53% of the payload.  It's rather amazing that with only 15% more length, the weight increases 42%, but it increases in all dimensions, with another meter of beam.  

      I don't see proas as practical cruisers until you get pretty large.  I rather like Rob Denny's Harry Proa series for it's innovations.   When the sizes are small, the interior spaces are pretty poor, but the deck spaces are generous.......so they are really adapted to places where outdoor living is the norm, or for folks that sail only in nice weather.  His Aero Rig or Ballestron rig is IMHO absurd......  A  heavy mast on bearings just doesn't make sense to me, and I've often wished someone would build one with a junk rig.  I also like his fore and aft retractable kick up rudders mounted inboard.   It seems to me that this could whip helm balance issues, using the forward rudder in a fixed trimmed position in lieu of a dagger board.  

     I'm not getting any younger, and comfort means more to me than it once did.  I want to be able to retreat to a safe dry space where I can see, and possibly even con the boat if need be, like Roger Taylor's Ming Ming II.   The large amount of deck space on a cat appeals to me, as does the virtual lack of heel, and elimination of the metronomic rolling that gets so tiresome on a long downwind leg, or at anchor.   I don't see a good reason in this day and age to live on you ear or put up with unnecessary motion in addition to the natural motion of the wind and waves.

     I'm long past the age of proving myself to people...... "real sailors" it seems must revel in discomfort   ;-)

                                                                  H.W.

Happened to stumble upon this article today: https://www.proboat.com/2019/12/take-a-free-copy/

"Along with the sailboarders, we reached back and forth to enjoy the thrill of speed, and sailed as fast as the best of the boards, both of us at about 30 mph, twice as fast as I’d ever gone under sail."

Whoa.

"Indeed, I’ve written this article to urge folks to “steal” and further develop this design of a stepped-hull sailing catamaran, which will easily out-sail anything but a hydrofoil boat and is cheap and easy to sail."

I think I would actually prefer to try to design a stayed (junk) rig for a proa, to keep everything as light as possible. Makes sense to have stays go out to the ama, sharing some of the load with the crossbeams. Also, having the mast positioned slightly to weather (like Russ Brown's designs) you have enough space to put a stay to both ends of the vaka, acting as safeguards for if/when caught aback. This shouldn't interfere too much with the sail's operation, like it would on a monohull.

Just my two cents and nothing from an engineering perspective aside from armchair speculation.