self-levelling V-configuration that is more stable passing through the water. This phenomenon the PhDs handily refer to as ‘ride height-leeway coupling’. The helmsman can also slowly add cant
via a third foot switch marked ‘cant bleed’. Nicholls explains: ‘If you’re going into a bear-away or other manoeuvre in difficult conditions, bleed a little cant and the boat settles down quite a bit. You will be faster, even if you are technically slower, because you are more in control.’ As anyone who witnessed the AC50s racing will attest, stuffing the bows in or capsizing is slow. Two buttons also adjust the boat’s
pitch. You remember the AC50’s mean- looking bow-down trim? The pitch con- trols adjust the average lift of the rudders, so more lift equals more bow-down trim. The reason for the dragster look, accord- ing to Nicholls, was simply because it was fast, reducing rudder immersion and there- fore drag. ‘And sometimes you would also push the CoG over the top of the boards, which can be very efficient.’ Conversely the bow would be popped
up for manoeuvres: ‘You don’t want to go into those bow-down because it is very unforgiving [this was the catalyst for Oracle’s scary and destructive AC72 flip in 2012]. So you also might take out a bit of that trim because sometimes there’s a drag- driven pitching moment when the board hits the water. It also puts more rudder in the water and so gives more control.’ Moving forwards of the wheel to the
trimmer’s position, there is that familiar- looking lone rope, the wingsheet, which roughly has the same effect on the wing as the traveller on a normal soft-sail boat. Here the trimmer, like the helmsman, has
a board-up control as most often they will operate this, being first to the new side in manoeuvres. They also have some of the controls for the self-tacking jib – sheet in and out. On the real F50 these are dupli- cated at one of the grinders’ stations, who also gets to adjust jib car and cunningham. The trimmer is also in charge of wing
controls. As popping the camber through in manoeuvres must happen rapidly to keep the boat on foils, so a hydraulic ram assists this. Punching ‘invert port’ pops the camber across onto starboard tack, while ‘invert starboard’ does the opposite. There are also camber ‘+/-’ buttons which auto- matically set the amount of camber the wing will go to in manoeuvres. Another button, ‘invert hold’, stops the camber at any point as it tacks. Pressing again releases the camber onto its normal setting. Twist is induced up the wing via an
up/down joystick also mounted in the cock- pit’s inboard side. ‘If you want to pull the head of the wing in you go up. If you want to ease it away you push down. So you can invert the head,’ advises Nicholls. The joy- stick also has a variable speed: the further up or down you push it the faster it operates. At the front of the cockpit sits the flight
controller who gets to play Xbox with an aeroplane-style joystick. Fore and aft
44 SEAHORSE
The first of the new F50 foiling cats for the SailGP series in early trials in New Zealand. The engineering required to make a powerful electro-hydraulic foil cant/lift/rake system fast and reliable is substantial – hence all the metalwork visible in the foil compartment. Otherwise, however, the removal of two grinding positions allows a much cleaner layout
movement alters leeward foil rake (like the twist grips on the wheel). Left-right changes rudder differential while the button on top affects pitch up/down (like the helmsman’s foot switches). If this were all getting too simple, which
board the joystick is operating swaps over automatically during manoeuvres. So the flight controller is operating the leeward board, then during the manoeuvre the joy- stick control flips over to the new leeward board should assistance be needed during its drop. The flight controller then sprints to the weather cockpit where the joystick flips over to operating the leeward foil. According to Nicholls, while the helms-
man has these controls too, the flight controller is more likely to use them… Obviously with duplicated functions like
this it is important to have agreement on who is doing what and when… ‘The New Zealand capsize showed what happens when you get out of sync between the per- son flying and the person steering,’ quips Nicholls. However, this duplication also allows crews different ways to sail the boat. And if you thought there was only one
way to drop a board you’d be wrong. Nicholls explains: ‘You can use the accu- mulator or the pump for the drop or you can use a displacement mode drop where it pumps all of the way down. With the mode button you can pick the type of drop to suit different conditions: pre-start or light winds, you want a different type of drop from when you are flying.’ You can also choose how quickly the board will rise. The flight controller has the same
rudder differential controls as the helm but additionally can select upwind or down- wind modes. ‘That changes the rudder swap characteristics and some of the gains on the twist grips and joysticks, as well as the drop model,’ explains Nicholls. For example, rudder differential will be less sailing upwind compared with downwind. The French SailGP team, led by Billy
Besson, were training on the simulator when we visited. Besson has huge Nacra 17 experience but never sailed the AC45s or AC50s. Learning the very much more tech- nical F50 has been a giant learning experi- ence. ‘It is very important for our team because it is a good exercise to get used to the movement of the boat. It is very impres- sive because sometimes the boat goes very high and very fast. We began with a lot of crashes! Now we are getting better…’ Coaching the French team is Cup
veteran Thierry Fouchier, who raced with Franck Cammas on the Groupama Team France AC50. He observes: ‘It is pretty close, except downwind where they need to refine the model a bit more. But it is a great tool, especially for Billy to get a feel for how to operate the rake and the rudders.’ The simulator is of course still (and
always will be) a work in progress in terms of the modelling and movement of the background environment. ‘As a sailor everything about the weather and the wind and what you see is important, like the way the clouds are moving and whether that matches how the sea is moving. All these little cues mean something to a good sailor and these details are steadily being introduced,’ observes Nicholls. One can imagine a time when, as with
all good F1 video games, you’ll be able not only to race your F50 but do so on a vari- ety of racetracks, like Sydney Harbour or the Solent. It also seems that if a Cup team developed a fully integrated model for the AC75 and could mock up a cockpit, then this simulator could probably run it. Meanwhile, apart from crew training,
the sailing simulator is providing a great way for Artemis Technologies to test their systems. But it could equally be used to test a new rudder or the new modular wing designs being proposed, or more complex functions such as the stability of new candidate foil designs. Welcome to the future of boat development.
q
CHRIS CAMERON
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