Re: sailing upwind?

[John Mallinckrodt <ajmallinckro@CSUPOMONA.EDU>]

On Fri, 31 Dec 1999, Ludwik Kowalski wrote:

> Thanks for the description, John, it was a real New Year gift.
> I hope your message will lead to other working models and to
> descriptions of them on our list. In particular I would like to
> hear about a boat floating directly into the wind. Was it ever
> patented? Was it ever tried? If it is possible in principle then
> why not in practice? ...
>
> Rolling friction can be reduced (without introducing slippage)
> more effectively than water resistance. I am still skeptical about
> the working aquatic version. But not as skeptical as before. ...

FWIW, an excerpt from "AUTOGIRO BOATS - History 1980-1995" at
http://www.webstrand.org/yachts/auto/hist4.htm .  If true, the claim
that the boat speed was about the same in *any* wind direction would
appear to require that the boat and wind turbine system extracted power
from the wind with virtually no aerodynamic drag.

"... Then, around 1984, there was Jim Wilkinson, who also teamed up with
 Neil Bose to put an 24' diameter wind turbine on his 26' Sirrocco
 catamaran, REVELATION. They did a lot of tests on this boat -
 measuring the boat speed in all different wind speeds and directions.
 It seems to do about the same speed in any wind direction. This was an
 ideal cruising boat, requiring very little work from the crew, but it
 did not go very fast - going fast was not really the point - it was
 meant to be a low-effort fun boat. ..."

John Mallinckrodt      mailto:ajm@csupomona.edu
Cal Poly Pomona          http://www.csupomona.edu/~ajm