Built by King Marine and designed by Mark Mills, Roberto Lacorte’s Flying Nikka is a giant step forward in the application of foiling technology to offshore monohulls


T


he most recent America’s Cup cycle demonstrated the pros (and cons) of achieving high performance on a large


monohull with designs and builds focused on specific course types in a specific location and a well-defined context of competition. Advances in smaller sail and power foiling craft are also becoming interesting and relevant in the marketplace. The cutting-edge technologies needed to achieve the performance targets in these projects require the very best in design and boatbuilding fabrication, and King Marine has recently demonstrated its ability to meet this challenge with its four latest projects being foiling boats. For example, the recent launch of


Roberto Lacorte’s Maxi-sized foiling Flying Nikka represents a huge forward step in applying foiling technology to offshore monohull performance. While the Imoca class yachts have demonstrated the application of monohull foiling in the oceanic passage context, until now no boat had been designed and built in this size range to have a wide range of foiling performance in a non-oceanic setting,


such as the Mediterranean. Here in lighter air conditions the boat’s sailplan must have the power to generate the initial speed needed to overcome drag from the hull and foils, activate the lift forces to elevate the boat clear of the water and sustain stable flight. Port and starboardmoveable


appendage arms and foils are needed to achieve and sustain flying performance on both tacks. A T-shaped foiling rudder keeps the boat in proper angle of attack trimfor the foils to lift, as well as to steer the boat in both displacement and flyingmodes. ‘We had nicely clear directions on the concept,’ says principal designer Mark Mills. ‘This boat is more like the mule of the [American] Magic AC team than an AC boat itself. It will enter short offshore races in the Med, not the long offshore races held there and elsewhere. It therefore needed not only to meet the expectations for high performance, but also meet the safety standards in the racing and rating rules.’ On this point the team at ORC are working hard to get


a workable solution for rating the boat, recognising that the VPP has to run in three modes: displacement, transition and flying. Not an easy task, yet one necessary for this and no doubt more foiling big boats racing against more conventional designs in the future. Mills also explains that the goal was


‘Failure is unacceptable and possibly dangerous so the build quality must be of the highest standards’


to have early take-off in light air Med conditions and not try for ultimate top speeds, yet performance expectations are for 30kts VMG upwind and 40kts downwind… exciting indeed. There is a team of six top talent crew aboard. The foils are designed to flex and have auto-adjust features similar to those seen on TF35s. For a boatbuilder


this is an astonishingly complex brief, not just for the complication of building strong component parts of the boat, its appendages and control systems, but also because every kilogram is critical and the physics are simple: every kilogram saved in weight makes the boat take off faster. For example, the overall length of Flying Nikka is 18.75 metres yet its weight is


SEAHORSE 79


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FABIO TACCOLA


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