We were doing some MOB practice on a Seawind on the bay last year.. wind
speed about 20kts. As we tacked through, intending to go on an eventual
broad reach, the cat, being a cat, somewhat stalled during the tack and
started to back slightly. As soon as it fell off a bit and completed the
turn, sails filling, it took off so fast that I clearly had the sensation of
my head being snapped back... it was that dramatic. One of the crew had to
grab something or she would have surely fell down. That was fun!

--
"j" ganz @@
www.sailnow.com

"Jeff" wrote in message
. ..
J B wrote:
Ive always liked those , thought they were neat looking boats. How does
it
sail? Dont have much use for one in central Ohio.JB

Its unlike a monohull. When a puff hits, it doesn't heel, it just
accelerates. It won't point too high (45-50 degrees true) but it will go
upwind side by side with any cruising boat. Foot off 5 to 10 degrees, and
it takes off like a bandit. Tacking is tedious, it certainly isn't good
for short tacking out a channel. Light air is another sore point, because
the large wetted surface starts to dominate. However, in 10 knots and
over will do about half the wind speed. It continues to hold this ratio
up to 12 to 15 knots of boat speed, depending on how long you hold off on
reefing.

One aspect of cats is that the lack of a heavy keel means the rig doesn't
have to be large. In moderate to heavy wind we can travel with 45 to 50
footers, but only carry the sail of a 32-35 footer. There was a tall rig
offered for the late models, for the benefit of some light air buyers.
Under power she'll do about 8 knots, motorsailing in light air we're
likely to do 8.5 to 9 knots. For travel planning I figure 7.5 knots
overall, but its not uncommon to do 50 miles in 6 hours. On a
trans-Atlantic a sistership did just under 1000 miles on one 5 day
stretch.

Handling in tight quarters is easy with the two engines, but since she
gets bounced around by the wind you need a firm hand. The only real
problem is that we're often at face docks with other boats fore and aft,
and the cat doesn't do "sideways" very well. We've learned to be creative
with spring lines. Crunches are avoided at the dock because it only
weighs 9000 pounds and responds quickly to the engines.