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Capt. JG
 
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Default Why do people buy cruising catamarans ?

"Jeff" wrote in message
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Evan Gatehouse wrote:
...



Incidences of cruising cats are pretty infrequent. I only know of the
following;

- PDQ 32 capsizing while entering a cut in the Bahamas while a "rage" was
blowing. Pitchpoled in very shallow water in the huge breakers


I talked at length to the owner of this boat shortly after the episode.
Apparently, the charterer was singlehanding, on autopilot, and down below.
He was carrying full sail (one report said one turn on the jib) in 25+
knots, sheeted in tight, while on a beam reach. He was not entering, but
passing by a notoriously windy cut in the Abacos (by Whale Cay?) and got
hit by an estimated 45 knot gust and 6 foot wave beam on. The boat did
not pitchpole, but slowly went on its side, and stayed there for several
hours while the owner (who came from Marsh Harbor?) and others tried to
right it. Finally, a stay broke and it capsized. It was towed back to
Marsh Harbor where the deck was trashed by efforts to lift it inverted
with slings. I saw the boat in Toronto awaiting a deck rebuild.

One design factor considered by cat builders is how much wind could a boat
handle in such a worst case of a gust on the beam with full sail sheeted
in. The figure used for the PDQ 32 is 45 knots. The assumption is that
in almost all cases where 45 knots is possible, you would shorten sail -
even a single reef makes a huge difference in this situation. Also, in
most cases someone would be on deck to release a sheet. A significant
lesson is that whenever full sail is sheeted in during a blow, someone
must be on deck!

Two other factors apply he First, this particular boat was sailing
"light." That is, it was stripped out and not carrying cruising gear. If
it were loaded, it probably would not have gone over. The second is that
this design has a rather narrow beam, coupled with a tall profile. This
is one of the issues with smaller cats, since the temptation by designers
is to make them narrow enough for a slip. Also, since the bridge deck
clearance and overhead boom height have practical minimums, smaller cats
have proportionally taller rigs. The combination of narrow beam and tall
rig makes this sort of incident inevitable. For this reason, I've usually
said that the minimum size for an offshore capable cat is about 35 feet,
unless it has a very conservative rig.

This situation also applies to the Gemini (14 foot beam), and a recent
case of an Iroquois (which only has a 13 foot beam!). The Heaven Twins is
another such case, with a beam under 14 feet.




- a Gemini capsizing in Texas; sailed over due to too much sail

- a Fountaine Pajot 35 capsized in the Caribbean; sailed over with a
charter group aboard

- a Catana in the Med; capsized due to a sudden squall hitting with the
chute up at night.

- a Heavenly Twins 26 or 27 capsizing in Force 10+ north of the British
Isles during a rare summer severe storm.

I have also heard of the F-P Maldives 32 being pretty susceptible to
capsize but that's more innuendo that actual facts and the Iriquois but I
don't know if they were capsized during racing or while cruising.

Most of the above are smaller, narrower beam cats by the way of fairly
old design; the exceptions being the FP 35 and the Catana.

When the Wolfson Unit of Southhampton University did a study of trying to
capsize cruising cat models the only way they could do it was a beam on
breaking wave beam of the boat (similar to a monohull by the way)

"MODEL TESTS TO STUDY CAPSIZE AND STABILITY OF SAILING MULTIHULLS"
Deakin B.
The 15th Chesapeake Sailing Yacht Symposium, January 2001

Evan Gatehouse


I had an interesting experience sailing a Seawind 1000 on the SF bay a few
years ago. It started out as a fairly typical day of 20 kts air. We were
cruising along at about 12 kts, not really paying that much attention to the
wind speed. Finally, I noticed that our speed had increased to about 14 kts,
with large rooster tails off the back. Amazing stuff. Then, I realized that
the wind speed had increased to 33 kts. Yikes... time to reef! .. which we
did immediately.

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