Opposite: Boris Hermann’s Malizia team knew what they wanted from the start, an unbreakable – within reason – Imoca 60 that they could push harder than their competition, particularly through the long Southern Ocean leg 3 of The Ocean Race. They got what they wanted and sure enough the toughest leg of the race was theirs for the taking. As well as adding both structure and laminate to the worst slamming areas, Malizia also features that old big-seas favourite… extra freeboard. Left: maybe a little colour would help? Jérémie Beyou blends in nicely with the all-black operating centre of Charal 2. The jury is currently out on the latest Charal, but with its unwieldy-looking combination elevator/rudder system it may be that the underlying potential of the Sam Manuard design itself has yet to be fully revealed
difference on an eight or nine-tonne yacht. ‘Add just that and you’ll make a quantum
step in terms of toughness. On a fully loaded boat of this size and weight it’s not that significant.’ To conclude on this specific issue, suffice to say that these different start- ing points between Malizia and Charal did not generate vastly different risk profiles, both sitting comfortably in a safe zone. ‘In Jean Le Cam’s and Eric Bellion’s
case, working with their designer David Raison a choice was made early not to foil, but the question of loads around the hull bottom is still critical in a context of increased performance compared with the previous generation of non-foilers. Loads rise roughly to the square of speed, which means a 10 per cent speed increase equals 20 per cent more effort,’ says Poidevin. ‘It’s a simplification but it gives a pretty good idea of what’s at stake.’ Hull design has also evolved steadily
towards scow shapes, with flatter sections around the bow, meaning more and harder slamming. Between the 2016 generation Vendée boats and their 2024 counterparts some loads have gone up 150 per cent. Anticipating what the next generation is
likely to bring is also part of the thinking needed, and something that the Gurit team pays specific attention to. This has a direct implication in terms of design and calcula- tion hours, which keep on creeping up due to a higher number of hypotheses and scenarios being formulated with each new iteration. ‘And this,’ says Manganelli, ‘despite the declared simplification and cost-reduction objectives and the relative maturity of the class…’ The variable that does not seem to
inflate is the time horizon between the deci- sion to build a new boat and its launch – yet design programmes are getting longer as the yachts are getting more and more complex. To resolve that tension, simply adding manpower to bump up design hours is not an option: the sequencing of
work streams (one decision determining specific next steps) requires extremely care- ful project management, with precise week- by-week forward planning. As racing teams grow in numbers and
integrated skills the volume of questions sent Gurit’s way also follows an inflation- ary trend – respecting timelines depends on agreeing with the teams which ones to dig into… and which ones to nip in the bud.
Complex systems and their environment If the new generation of boat does not appear to drastically depart from the previous one in terms of overall design, some key systems are becoming either more innovative or more complex, or both. An illustration of this phenomenon is Charal’s inverted-V steering gear architecture, with its long rudders meeting at the centre of the transom. ‘This was a hefty file to deal with,’ says
Manganelli, ‘as the considerable angling of the rudders introduced efforts we have never seen on previous boats.’ Usually this is a pretty straightforward area of the boat to deal with, but Charal’s solution threw up a lot of new questions. There is a central node of efforts where
the two rudders meet, and all reinforce- ments have therefore to be concentrated around a small area – so much so that everybody was surprised by the actual quantity of material necessary to add to that high load zone. ‘We needed to envis- age a lot of different scenarios,’ continues Nicolas. ‘With such large surfaces due to the rudders’ length, for example, sideways wave impacts on the windward appendage when out of the water need to be consid- ered as a bigger risk factor than with more conventional systems.’ The solution was conceived to stabilise
the boat in flight mode, in the context of class rules banning T-rudders, and this choice (based on preliminary studies) had such an impact on the overall structural
work that it could not be a reversible trial. Once approved, when the team felt confi- dent enough, it created a lock-in, ‘and so far it seems to work very well’, says Paolo. But in any case the boat would not accept a simple switch back to a more traditional set-up without some major work… which would mean months of yard time. Charal 2’s design work started a week
before Jérémie Beyou set off on the 2020 Vendée Globe on the first boat, with the aim to launch in time for the subsequent Route du Rhum which overall led to approximately 45 extra design days com- pared to Charal 1.
Things that go bump (and avoiding ‘crack’) Concerning the keel area, following Hugo Boss’s heavy grounding in the 2019 Transat Jacques Vabre, data was fed back to the class regarding the loads that his boat had been subjected to. ‘It was about twice the magnitude of what we’d seen so far,’ says Manganelli, ‘and that forced everyone back to the drawing board.’ It also prompted a change in build regu-
lations, a new requirement mandating that a boat needs to be able to withstand 6G should it come to an abrupt stop with the bulb colliding with an obstacle. Add to this the fact that the keel bearing needs to be able to cope with a longitudinal force of 100 tonnes, which equates to about 10 times the boat’s weight. ‘Here it’s not just about adding layers to the bottom of the hull,’ notes Stephant, ‘plus the one-design nature of the keel fin and fittings means that structurally your options are already reduced: the longitudinal position of the ram relative to the bearings cannot be a variable parameter, for example.’ All the questions revolving around
dynamic loads have led to more investment in monitoring equipment to try to prevent a cascade of failures due to a non-detected initial weakness. Teams cannot perform regular inspections of all compartments at sea so it is more important to have reliable alarm systems; something that Malizia in particular was keen to push hard on. Boris Hermann’s team adopted a colour-
coded system coupled with sound: orange when loads are getting significant, red
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