involved in the construction of the VO70 Il Mostro and the Verdier/VPLP 100-footer Comanche. For a factory the vacant 30,000m2 ex-Carroll Marine facility on
‘Boatbuilders’ Row’ in Bristol, though in need of some love, looked good for the task. A lease was signed and Chamberlain set to on a major refurbishment; within the old factory’s cavernous spaces the hard-working team had quickly created an immaculate new white-walled facility replete with a suite of large movable ovens.
The Eagle Class 53 Tommy Gonzalez is not a boatbuilder and he is certainly not an engineer. But he has hot-and-cold-running street smarts and knows where and when to look for help. His vision for the EC 53 design work was to create what he aptly
dubbed the Mosaic Design Group –the goal being to put an exclusive consulting group together, finding the best and most practical experts out there in each field. The ‘tiles’ of the Mosaic Group are aero - dynamics, hydrodynamics (foils), naval architecture, structural design, electronics, engineering detail design and drawing, and styling. To start Chamberlain suggested Gonzalez contact Paul Bieker.
The two flew to see Bieker at his Seattle office; after they explained the project he agreed to join the team, which gave the programme significant early credibility and also momentum. With Bieker and Chamberlain’s America’s Cup connections an
impressive group of specialists soon started to come together, which quickly included foil-build expert Manu Armeñanzas, plus Eric Jolley and Will Brooks from Bieker’s office. Eric Goffrier was added to the group as stylist, having worked on other successful projects with the same client. Work on the EC 53 began in earnest. First came the plugs for
Lady Helmsman was not the first C-Class to tack a mainsail on the back of a wing-spar but it was the most successful, winning the Little America’s Cup three times in a row from 1966 to 1968. The Danish winner in 1969-1970 used a similar rig but since 1971 the only winning team to use a soft sail was Alex Kosloff and Robbie Harvey in the super-light air 1976 series (issue 388)
compression it applies to the masthead. The arms of the yolk also need to account for high flexural bending stresses. Despite the scale and amount of carbon used the yolk weight is surprisingly low. Then the yolk must rotate freely against the spar under high
loads, meaning excellent axial and thrust-bearing systems (the ball- race bearing concept will be familiar to anyone who has ever dismantled a large Harken sheave!). A Hall Autolock took care of the main halyard while at the base of the wing there is an opposing simple multi-part tack tensioning system.
The boat Around the same time the Gunboat owner for whom Gonzalez had been working grew fascinated by the foiling America’s Cup cata - marans and was now seriously considering adding foils and a wing to his Gunboat Sunshine. Gonzalez was dubious... The boat was too heavy. Structurally it wasn’t designed for foil and T-rudder mounts, and a completely new deck system to manage the wing would be required. And if it could be done, it was sure to cost several million dollars. Nevertheless the owner was brought into further discussions
with Gonzalez and Randy Smyth; liking what he heard, it took him no time at all to say, ‘So let’s build a new boat. Around 50ft. Light enough to foil. Four staterooms and your Hybrid Wing. Give me a proposal.’ The pair explained the huge amount of effort involved and threw
out some very conservative cost estimates… The hybrid wing wouldn’t be cheap at this scale and a reliable user-friendly foil system would cost a great deal to develop. And, since the boat needed to be light enough to fly, it would have to be built using the highest-tech carbon-honeycomb structure. Any way he cut it, this would a very expensive 50-footer and Gonzalez told the owner so. The answer they got was simple: ‘Let’s go’. Now Gonzalez had to create a facility to build the boat and find
people to build it. His first move was to hire Wolfgang Chamberlain to manage the build programme – a veteran of five America’s Cup campaigns including two victories with Oracle, ‘Wolf’ was also
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the tooling, supplied by respected Bristol tool builder Symmetrix. Once the plugs arrived hull mould work began. As soon as the moulds became available, work on the hull and deck elements immediately got underway. The build is now well-advanced with elements of hull and deck structure already mated. The hull will be completed next month, after which the first full-scale trials will be conducted under power. Once these initial
trials have been completed satisfactorily the Hybrid Wing will be fitted, as will the hydrofoil system. After that testing will continue through the winter.
The foil system Gonzalez’s vision for the Eagle Class 53 is a safe, exhilarating, foiling catamaran accessible to the performance cruising market. We know that the concept has been explored before by others
and when the (soft rig) G4 cat capsized in the Caribbean it prompted the expected chorus from naysayers. But not for nothing does Mark Zuckerburg endlessly repeat his mantra of ‘move fast and break things’. And he’s doing OK. The two factors driving the global performance of a large foiler
like the EC 53 are: l Minimum weight l Shape, efficiency and reliability of the foils To meet minimum weight requirements the EC 53 is being built
to the highest specifications using advanced aerospace materials similar to those used on the last America’s Cup cats, enabling the boat to be foil-borne at impressively low wind speeds. The Eagle’s technical team have, meanwhile, been finessing
new foils and foil-control systems to enable the boat to fly as smoothly as possible and with limited human input. A bonus here is that the EC 53 foil system is unfettered by class
rules and thus can be optimised purely for the application. For instance, T-foils are used where the AC50s were restricted to less efficient L-foils due to rule beam restrictions. Whereas the crew on an America’s Cup cat must ‘hand fly’ the craft with its unforgiving submerged foil system, the EC 53 will have electronics that will act as an ‘autopilot’ assist in its flight mode. These new foils/systems will be discussed in detail in a later article. Bristol may not be building America’s Cup yachts right now but
Fast Forward Composites are working hard to change the yachting game in the town’s finest traditions. Eric Hall, Bristol, RI
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