Technology
Just the job Harken AirWinch 180: Born out a long love affair with the RC44 class
The RC44 class has always had a particularly strong collaboration with Harken. ‘Back when the boat was launched, the RC44 came with the best winch gear that was on the market at the time’, says Mark Wiss, director of global grand-prix and custom yacht sales at Harken. The RC44 class has been up and running since 2007 – it might be surprising to many, but that’s more than 15 years already! Back then, the one design class
was conceived by Russell Coutts as a high-performance owner-driver keelboat with a professional crew and an international circuit. Today, the 2023 edition shows that the 44Cup is very much alive, with 11 active boats and on top of that, two new boats just being built. Several factors have made this possible. The intense, short course racing takes place in beautiful sailing locations – this year in Oman on the Arabian peninsula, Sweden’s Marstrand, Cowes in England, Alcaidesa in the south of Spain and finally Calero in Lanzarote. The
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boats are professionally maintained between races and efficient logistics is a key part of the design concept: the boat is built to fit into a standard flat rack 40-foot shipping container, something that is obtained – among other things – by a removable transom and a two-part mast. ‘In 2007, Harken installed two
B530 TCR UD pedestal-driven primary winches and a single B55.3STR pedestal-driven mainsheet winch,’ says Wiss. ‘This system has done a tremendous job over 15 seasons. But the guys are sailing the boat harder and harder every year and it’s starting to get worn. In addition, the system in itself is 15 years old and the fact is we make better winches now. So last year Bertrand Favre (class president) talked to everyone involved and the decision was made to replace the entire winch system on all the boats. Which is not a small thing on a racing machine like that. This involves the structure of the boat, sheeting systems, pedestals, gear transmissions – a lot of things
Above: to replace the existing primary winches on a fleet of one- design grand prix racing keelboats like the RC44 is a complex procedure. You have to change the structure of the boat, the sheeting system, gear transmissions and
numerous other small detail
have to be considered. In the new setup all three AirWinch 180s continue to be driven by the existing Harken pedestals but the interior mechanicals are upgraded from the original belt driven system to Harken’s much newer MX chain- driven system.’ The class has always attracted
a bunch of good pro sailors and enthusiastic owners have found that there is no other class where you can get more bang for the buck. ‘But it’s crucial to keep the boats up to date’, explains Favre. ‘Over the years we have been through several rounds of upgrades. Since this a one design class, we have to do all the boats in one go to make sure they stay completely equal at all times.’
An open slot in the AirWinch 180 programme ‘At Harken we had already been contemplating a smaller model in our AirWinch programme for some time’, says Wiss. ‘So now with 13 raceboats needing a complete new winch setup, we realised that this
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