It was just about this time last year when we were all dazzled by the spectacle that was the Phantom and the N20FCS and GC32... now Gunboat has managed to make a cat that has berths, galley and a head fly... amazing.

https://vimeo.com/124676763

Indeed, amazing.

But I doubt if the balance is correct. The hulls tend to lean a bit forward. Pitchpoling!

(and the crew look like a group posh chickens)

I can vouch that at least some of the crew are quite experienced sailors and foilers. This is not a low budget or corner-cutting operation. I agree, though, it did seem a little bow-down for a lot of that video but it seemed to slice through the waves while staying on foil.

I think your impression of the people was one they were actively trying to portray (perhaps with a little "tongue in cheek")...a relaxed foiling experience....whether that's reality or not, I guess time will tell.

I like how they cut in scenes at anchor in the midst of the foiling scenes. Makes it seem rather posh to go foiling.

Beautiful boat and quite the foiler.

The daggerboard wells have three separate fore-aft adjustable positions 31cm apart. They're using this one as the "test" to figure out the best position.

anything that can foil at 20+ knots while blending my favorite beverage and has hot showers ready gets my vote (and money if I win the lottery)... regardless of how the bow looks

In my experience, foiling a little bow down is more stable than foiling a little bow up. As the boat lifts in that attitude, it doesn't build towards increasing lift and spiraling up until crashing down. Oracle's AC72 often was a little bow down as well.

This is different from "foiling" with C boards in foil assist configurations where you want the bow up all the time and the sterns still planted in the water.

Maybe they want perfectly level flight, but I think they looked very good and very in control, something everyone will want and need when sailing a 3 ton, 40 foot cat.

I think it might look more bow down than it actually is due to the "fat" stern though.

Bingo!

Boat is upside down.
[img]https://scontent-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/h...8e71e0c9635c4981237747f2&oe=55A295F0[/img]

Yeahbut..think of the sunsets1

Insurance rates for foiling cruising cats just tripled

If you're on the cutting edge , ya might get cut.
It's righted and back at the dock. Nice to see that they were pushing it hard enough for that to happen.

very cool that they were able to right with the mast and mainsail intact!

That shows exactly my point which I made earlier.

This Gunboat is nothing more than an overdressed sports-catamaran. And like each sport catamaran, it can flip and it can pitchpole.
And when that happens it's a super-heavy unmanageable cat.

The original promo video, showing lounging white dressed yups drinking champagne during sailing, is foolish. They had no lifevests on, so they were all lucky to survive soaked on their capsized dreamboat.

This forum is fooled by this Gunboat mirage.

It's apparently exactly the same failure mode as Paprec Virbac, the classical Extreme 40 capsizes, or the big off Team NZ got at the last america's cup: You can't dump an hydraulic mainsheet instantly.

I expect the G4 will be equipped with a tilt sensor linked to an instant mainsheet release of some sort in a very near future.

I read that gunboats had a automatic sheet release as a safety. Seems like I read PJ say that it would dump the sails before flying a hull when activated. I would guess it's something that can be overridden.

Seems they would really need a good/fast system on the G4.

Watch the capsize video: no release of the main, it just went sideways…

Dyslexic driver, maybe steering is slightly backwards when keeping the boat up on foils. Anyway they took that gust up instead of down from the get-go.

TNZ wasn't really the same. They have a sheet with a winch for letting the wing out. Their problem was no hydro to tack the wing. As i understand it, they had to physically tack the wing using hydraulic controls and that had a lot to do with how fast they could tack and jibe. It seemed to me they may have been bringing the boat through the eye of the wind partially using the wing.

If Ronald is correct about the no life jackets, they will probably start wearing them after this.

Agreed. You would think the helm had enough experience to not head up. Hard to tell in the video but it looks like he might have loaded up the lee rudder and lost authority due to ventilation. I would wager we'll see second generation rudders with a bigger winglet and more chord.