In a multihull marketplace previously dominated by two-hull offerings a lot of careful thought and informed-development is ensuring that the trimaran configuration is finally getting more of the recognition that it deserves...

Rapido Trimarans, is the brainchild of directors Paul Koch and James Sganzerla, who ran the highly regarded and successful Corsair Marine from 1994 to 2010. Their collective experience of 60 years building more than 1,500 trimarans is combined with the corporate and production management expertise of Richard Eyre, Phil Johns and Damien Judd. The hard-won experience and eye for detail of this core team guides their talented, 60-strong Vietnamese staff at Triac Composites, who produce lightweight high-end composite structures that span numerous disciplines.

‘Compared with cruising cats, cruising trimarans in general are much simpler for their reliance on only one system for steering and propulsion,’ says Rapido’s designer Pete Melvin, who is one half of the mighty Morelli and Melvin design house famous for everything from America’s Cup and Jules Verne Trophy winners to cruising multihulls and Olympic Class one designs. ‘Less weight, complication, maintenance, tankage and cost are all factors that appeal to serious cruising sailors who are interested in getting further, faster and hassle-free. Sail control systems can also be simpler as the distances to route control lines can be less with a single, central location. This is also less hassle and expense.

‘We produce a high-performance line of trimarans that also offer reasonable amenities and safety. The innovation in design comes with the layout of the main hull and reaching the balance between beam, draught and trim to carry the accommodation without too much compromise on performance,’ he adds.

On both the Rapido 60 and 50, keeping the main saloon on the same level as the cockpit promotes a flow-through feel of being more spacious with better visibility and light than conventional designs. This elevated floor plan is possible with a generous, yet streamlined design to the cabin and also allows for the extra volume needed under the floorboards for propulsion and plumbing systems, fuel, water and waste tanks and storage for other heavy items without hindering access for maintenance.

On the Rapido 60 this is especially true of the full-access engine room next to the daggerboard case at the weight centre of the boat. All parts of the Yanmar 4-cylinder 53 HP diesel are accessible from all sides. This space also includes the fuel tank, an optional 8 kW generator, Spectra 24V electric watermaker, a water heater and electrical charging systems. Watertight bulkheads and an automated fire suppression system protect the space, and since all filters and serviceable items are in this isolated area, any leaks or spills will be confined and easy to clean.

The main hull’s beam achieves a similar balance of desired interior volume for good accommodation without too much compromise on weight and drag under sail. The cross-sectional shape of the main hull tapers with elevation to create more volume. Unlike a monohull, this portion of the hull never sees the waterplane due to the constrained heel angles. The stability advantage in Rapidos comes in part from their high volume floats and a wide beam relative to their maximum displacement. Add the C-curved twin daggerboards on the Rapido 40 and the boat can be driven even harder.

Passive ventilation and Lewmar hatches and portlights ensure that the saloon and cabins are airy on all three designs. The carbon fibre foam sandwich construction provides a high level of insulation. There’s enough space aft of the beams and over the transom for solar panels to provide supplementary electric charging to the DC voltage system.

Paul Koch’s extensive experience is shown in both the build quality and clever innovations. His 30 years of collaboration with Pete Melvin has created a trust uncommon in many designer-builder relationships. Triac Composites’ in-house design engineering team ensures faithful and accurate fabrication to the design specifications provided by Morrelli and Melvin.

Among the modern equipment at Triac’s 3000m² facility in Ho Chi Minh City is a seven-axis Kuka robotic CNC machine mounted on a 23-metre track for milling complex tooling moulds. This is in addition to other CNC machinery, an 8.5 metre autoclave and other equipment that makes Triac a regional leader in the production of complex composites. The factory is on a river with direct access to the sea so boats of any size can be sailed away.

‘We use pre-preg carbon for the high-strength parts such as the cross beams (which are cured in the autoclave), chainplates and bulkheads,’ says Koch. ‘The cross beams are tapered on the ends so assembly is easy, the fit in the main hull is perfect and it’s strong as hell.’

Construction is infused carbon/vinylester laminates on closed-cell PVC cores for high-strength areas and E-glass where carbon is not needed. Vinylester is used in the hull and deck laminates for good adhesion and better compatibility with the gelcoat finish than with epoxy laminates, which are used in the structural elements of the boat. Construction meets ISO/CE standards and with CE Category A certification.

The mast is carbon and on the Rapido 60, the diamonds are Future Fibres’ carbon EC-6 attached to a titanium plate tensioned by a hydraulic ram positioned at the mast base. The ram allows easy tensioning for tuning. Deck gear has all Harken winches and blocks, with Spinlock and Karver clutches and Karver halyard locks to reduce rig compression loads, which are adjusted at the tack of the headsails by deck-mounted tensioning systems.

The furling Solent genoa mounted on the inner forestay is self-tacking and the mainsail reef system uses Karver reef hooks mounted on Dyneema straps wrapping the boom to distribute the loads with minimal chafe. A furling fractional Code 0 and a masthead furling gennaker tack on the bow just ahead of the headstay. Two Harken winches on the cabin top forward of the helm station handle main and Solent sheet loads. Rope clutches for halyards, mast rotation and board up and down controls are positioned to use the same winches.

The boom has truss wings with netting to catch the full-battened mainsail, which is on Antal sliders for easy hoisting, reefing and furling.

On a windy tight beat the Rapido 60’s performance is amazing, with racing monohull angles (thanks in part to the deep carbon fibre daggerboard) and speeds of 17+kts, while at reaching angles the boat far exceeds windspeed with exhilarating acceleration. There is a sweet spot between 18 and 23 knots where the boat simply purrs with one finger on the wheel. Even at 27kts the feeling of absolute control, comfort and security is most apparent.

‘At 10 tons in racing mode and up to two tons more when fully equipped and provisioned, the Rapido 60 is a perfect platform for long-distance and ocean cruising,’ says Koch. ‘The Rapido 50 is also suitable for this kind of cruising, while the Rapido 40 is designed for more regional use. We are excited about offering these easy, fun to sail, safe performance trimarans that have so much living space. Interest in these fast and innovative designs is strong as they fill a real void in the market.’

Above: designed and built for fast, safe ocean crossings, the Rapido 60 is a powerful passagemaker with a wide, stable platform and slim, very easily driven waterplanes. Note the flare in the main hull which significantly boosts the boat’s interior volume while hardly increasing wetted area.
Below: on the Rapido 60 (pictured) and 50, keeping the main saloon on the same level as the cockpit promotes an airy ‘flowthrough feel’

For ratios of length, beam and displacement trimarans generally offer greater sail-carrying power and higher performance than equivalent-sized catamarans. Because all the elements of the propulsion, electrical and plumbing systems are contained in one hull and not spread across two, there is also less weight to drag through the water and the centre hull’s design can be more forgiving in trim variation than with most cats.

Trimarans are more stable and more sea kindly than monohulls and catamarans and do not have the slamming and fore-and-aft pitching of cats or the terrible 30 degrees-plus heeling of monohulls. Centralising all heavy equipment in the centre of the main hull, as Rapido does, contributes immensely to comfortable, stable movement through the water.

Accommodation can be as spacious as most monohulls and given the angles they sail at, even in hot summers there’s usually good air flow and shade. Retractable daggerboards and rudder blades enable exploration and anchoring where fixed-keel monohulls cannot venture. Being able to anchor nearer the shore means even coming late to an anchorage one generally gets the prime spots.

As the space taken by support systems is only in one hull, it leaves the outboard amas available for light item storage, water toys, fenders and ropes. The R60 has a custom hatch to access the four-metre-long storage area. With the foredeck and “acres” of nets to lounge on safely even at speed, plus the aft deck with custom outer seating, separate cockpit and generous saloon (plus cabins), owners, crews and guests can choose to be sociable or find their own private space. The other standout is the helm position, with complete 365- degree visibility and views of the bows of all three hulls.

While monohulls will heel at 25 or 30 degrees, making basic daily tasks and just getting around the boat something of a tiring and even athletic event, trimarans with their relatively flat sailing give far greater comfort, better rest and less stress. The longer centre hull and centerlinemounted rudder and daggerboard contribute to having better monohull-like manoeuvrability than catamarans, particularly while tacking. The lack of a bridge deck also eliminates the slamming of waves common to most catamarans, which significantly affects their ride quality and speed when sailing upwind.

Safety is also an issue that is well addressed in most trimarans. The R60’s construction is foam sandwich with many watertight bulkheads making it essentially unsinkable.

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When Beneteau went looking for the right designers for their very much all-new First Yacht 53 the results were thought-provoking. As is the yacht...

The First Yacht 53 has a lot to live up to. There’s the heritage of the First marque, which represents more than 40 years of offshore racing and cruising. There’s the exceptional pedigree of a design team that combines 25 years at the forefront of America’s Cup innovation with the groundbreaking flair of Brenta and Wally. And there’s also the fact that nearly a decade has passed since the launch of the last offshore yacht to bear the famous brand name, the Juan K-designed First 30. It’s fair to say that this is a long anticipated and eagerly awaited boat. Indeed, five First Yacht 53s had already been sold off plan before Beneteau began building the prototype.

The renaissance of Beneteau’s First series began several years ago with a range of small, lightweight sportsboats, some with simple accommodation. It’s a big step up from them to the brand new flagship of the range. The First Yacht 53 is a return to the mainstream cruiserracer, or “luxury performance”, territory that used to define the brand, but it’s a far cry from the Firsts of 15 years ago, which were designed for a full racing crew to live on board for several weeks. Most people don’t sail like that anymore.

‘This is an important yacht for Beneteau so we held a competition for designers,’ says project manager Damien Jacob. ‘Four design teams were invited to submit their concepts. The result was three very similar designs and a distinctly different one from Roberto Biscontini and Lorenzo Argento with a very wide hull and an interesting cockpit layout.’

Biscontini and Argento got the work, Jacob explains, ‘because we felt strongly that the First brand had to offer something genuinely new and the other design concepts seemed too close to what other brands were offering.’ The Italian team’s CVs, which when put together read like a roll call of the world’s fastest racing yacht hulls and most stylish superyacht designs, must have helped, too. That said, this is actually the first time that either of them have applied their skills to designing a mainstream, mass-production cruiser-racer. Biscontini focused on perfecting the hull, keel, rudders and rig while Argento took care of both exterior and interior design.

‘The hull of the First Yacht 53 comes directly from my experience of designing racing boats,’ Biscontini says. ‘The width of the boat is carried all the way to the stern and it has a hull shape that reduces and elongates the wetted area as soon as the boat begins to heel over. Dynamic length is very important.’

A huge amount of work went into precisely positioning the boat’s centre of gravity, centre of effort and centre of buoyancy. Biscontini brought in one of the world’s leading experts in computational fluid dynamics (CFD), Rodrigo Azcueta of Cape Horn Engineering, to exhaustively test 25 different hull shapes in a very wide range of wind and sea conditions. ‘We also did a lot of work on weight analysis, which is a very important part of the design,’ Biscontini says, ‘especially for a cruising boat with lots of heavy interior items inside the hull.’

Production boatbuilders rarely apply such extensive CFD analysis to the design of a cruiser-racer. ‘It’s all about achieving perfect balance and the best sensations at the wheel,’ Jacob explains. ‘Power comes from the square metres of sail area, but this is about the feel of the boat, making it rewarding to sail.’

The steering system is from Jefa, with Dyneema lines between the twin rudders and wheels. ‘Twin rudders have three advantages,’ Biscontini says. ‘First, you already have an emergency rudder built in, which is a very good thing for an ocean cruiser. Second, on a modern hull shape where full beam is carried all the way to the stern, the leeward rudder works in a very efficient way whereas a single rudder will perform poorly when the boat heels over. And third, twin rudders give you a lot more space in the middle of the stern for a tender garage.’ There’s ample room in the stern of the First Yacht 53 to stow a fully inflated 2.4m dinghy.

The design team’s strong focus on balance extended to the boat’s rig and sailplan. The position of the mast was reviewed several times due to what Biscontini calls “a concatenation of factors” that also informed the shape of the hull, the feel of the helm, the location of loadbearing structures and the weight distribution of the boat’s interior furniture, tanks, equipment and systems. ‘We went for a modern approach with the mast quite far aft,’ Biscontini says. ‘This allows a better balance between the sizes of the mainsail and headsail.’

There’s an option for a carbon mast that’s a full metre taller than the standard alloy mast, with a longer crane on top, but whichever rig you choose there aren’t any runners, just a pair of fixed backstays with the option of a hydraulic tensioner. The boat can be bought without sails but Beneteau is offering a North Sails package of mainsail, genoa and code zero. ‘We brought them into the design process early on, to discuss things like the rig and the sails’ shapes,’ Jacob says. ‘It helped to have all of the players around the table.’

Standard specification includes an integrated bowsprit and a throughdeck headsail furler, Dyneema running rigging and lifelines, Harken winches and deck gear, but no mainsheet traveller. ‘There’s a watershed at around 50ft LOA,’ Jacob explains. ‘Below that size, owners tend to want to race a lot; above that size fewer of them are interested in regular racing. They still want to enjoy sailing a high-performance boat, but are likely to race maybe once or twice a year at events like Les Voiles de St Tropez. The rest of the time they cruise. This is why we decided that a mainsheet traveller was not mandatory equipment.’ There is, however, an option for a mainsheet pod with a fixed winch in the middle of the cockpit.

There are two keel options: a 2.5m fin or a 3m fin – Biscontini says the latter is the optimal draught for a boat of this length. Both keels have the same weight of bulb on the bottom, although the performance keel (3m) has a lead bulb and cast iron fin, while the standard keel (2.5m) is full cast iron.

Below: it’s quite unusual to apply the full rigour of Grand Prix racing-style CFD analysis to the design of a cruiserracer, but Biscontini brought in one of the world’s foremost CFD specialists, Dr Rodrigo Azcueta of Cape Horn Engineering, to evaluate 25 different hull shapes in a full range of wind and sea conditions before he decided on the final hull shape. A lot of CFD work also went into analysing the effects of weight distribution and precisely positioning the boat’s centres of gravity, effort and buoyancy. The resulting hull is expected to plane readily downwind in good breezes

‘It’s all relative,’ says Jacob. ‘If the sailplan and the sail trims are the same then for the same sailing heel angle you’ll need less weight on the rail with the performance keel. So one can enjoy better sailing performance with fewer crew. On the other hand, the boat can be raced fully crewed, with more righting moment so is able to carry more sail area in stronger breeze. It all depends on the type of sailing the owner wants to do. Finally, we have a bit more form stability due to the larger beam in comparison to the competition’, he adds.

The shape of the First Yacht 53 is very different from any of its predecessors, yet even at first glance, from any angle, it’s unmistakably a First. ‘It had to be contemporary but I also wanted to be very respectful of the brand’s 40-year tradition of yacht design,’ Argento says. ‘It’s been an interesting challenge. Modern yachting is about new technology, new materials and new ways of using the boat. In the past, boats were sailed more aggressively and crews were larger. Now they’re sailed by a couple or by four people.’ This change has informed the design of the 53’s cockpit and deck layout – although it can still accommodate a full race crew of seven plus a few passengers – and especially the boat's interior, which features huge, deep sofas and a smaller than usual saloon table.

‘With interiors I start with the concept that a boat should be a boat,’ Argento says. ‘There has been this tendency to make boats look like homes and while I agree with some aspects of that, like the comfort of the sofas, it should be clear from the general feel and shape of things that you’re in a boat rather than a house. We dug deep into Beneteau tradition to bring back some of the design details they used in the past, like laminated wood fiddles.’

Beneteau expects to sell around 25 to 30 of these boats per year, but has no plans for a one-design class. The First Yacht 53 will race on handicap with an IRC rating of 1.213 for the version with tall carbon mast and three-metre keel options. Its polars predict a reaching speed in excess of 12kts on flat water with an asymmetric spinnaker in 20kts of breeze. Racing or cruising, it sounds like a great deal of fun.

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The F50 cats are so astonishingly fast that SailGP needed to adopt new B&G technology across its chase boat and race management fleet to ensure reliable and accurate data to run the racing… at 50 knots

The technology focus for the new SailGP global championship has been on the F50s and for good reason. The F50 is a new class of boat that shares DNA with the revolutionary cats used in the last America’s Cup. The boats are turbo-charged with advanced foils and sophisticated control systems. It has been an impressive undertaking and has delivered yet another step forward for high-performance sailing.

F50s are capable of more than 50kts (60 mph) and can make 30kts downwind in less than 10kts of breeze. The technical advances are clear to see. ‘Race Control set and modify the course on a PC-based navigation system, which is sent to the LiveLineFX servers for processing and redistribution’, explains Matt Eeles, R&D lead for B&G. In addition to a Fibre Optic Gyro compass, the committee boat utilises a B&G H5000 motion corrected wind solution to calculate true wind data, which is used by the Principal Race Officer to set the course axis and length. It also provides the true wind data for the layline and wind broadcast graphics.

The B&G Multifunction Displays (MFDs), show the live race data as:

• Moving vessels, like AIS targets
• A course layout with marks; target and actual positions
• Course and spectator boundaries
• A Twitter-like “chatter feed” giving updates of race information
• Course updates and changes which are committed before or during a race

This information is received on all B&G MFD-equipped vessels within the SailGP combined fleet, which are on the LiveLineFX telemetry network.

The B&G MFDs are off-the-shelf units with custom software developed under the SailGP and B&G technology partnership. This has enabled Race Control to use the B&G MFDs as a central means of communication and visualisation for the on-the-water race management team.

One of the key features of this system is the ability for Race Control to send out course data to the 22+ support vessels, including:

• Team chase
• Mark set
• Marshall
• On-the-water umpires
• TV camera catamaran
• Salvage
• Safety/medical
• Race Control

Graphically displaying desired mark locations and course boundaries on the B&G MFDs allows mark set boats to navigate to a precise position and set their course marks. Each mark has a GPS telemetry transponder that identifies its precise position and name so it can be tracked within the LiveLineFX telemetry system.

The custom software also allows Race Control to define the boundaries of the course as well as the spectator boat boundaries, which are displayed on the B&G MFDs enabling marshall boats to accurately and safely patrol the racecourse while allowing spectators to be close to the action.

‘Once Race Control has established the course axis and race configuration, the race can be “committed” and pushed out system wide,’ Eeles says.

‘Every race yacht and every mark has a differential GPS unit which means a resolution of up to 2cm is possible. This level of accuracy is required not only for digital umpiring, but helps to produce the augmented onscreen graphics that are delivered for TV broadcast by the patented LiveLineFX Technology. The marks also have their own solid state compasses and sonic wind sensors which report back to Race Control.’

When it comes to race umpiring, given boatspeeds that get well into 40 kts+ at times, remote umpiring is the only realistic option. As a result, all tracks, speeds, headings and orientations of the race yachts are transmitted live to an “umpire booth” located on land, where three umpires can review the data in a similar way to football’s VAR system. From there they can issue and monitor penalties.

But employing modern technology within SailGP is not solely about the cut and thrust of the racecourse. A B&G 3D StructureScan Sonar System is on board the salvage and safety/ medical vessels to map shallow areas, especially close to the launch places, to ensure there is no risk to the long foils of the race yachts.

‘When it comes to transmitting and receiving the data,’ says Eeles, ‘prior to each event, the LiveLineFX team installs a private LTE cellular network in the local event area which enables all the race yachts to provide live streaming telemetry data to Race Control and the umpire booth. This is also the means by which Race Control can commit changes to the racecourse boundaries for display on the MFDs.’

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When looking around a modern performance yacht for some nice aesthetic details the furling boom is not usually the natural place to start... not any more however

Furling booms are not new to cruising, but modern performance cruisers can challenge even the cleverest spar designer. They demand not just ease of use, reliability and reasonable cost, but also low windage and weight, the ability to shape the furled sail effectively to suit the conditions and compatibility with existing spar systems. It’s a lot to ask but Hall Spars has the solution.

Hall Spars had already met this challenge with its range of high-end furling booms for yachts from 50 to 150ft but saw a hole in the market for the owners of mid-sized yachts who wanted a premium product without the premium price tag, which led to the development of the Legend Series booms.

The Legend Series took many of the components and systems that had been honed over many iterations in the superyacht world and shrunk it to suit the size and price point of yachts from 45 to 65ft. Yachts in this size bracket needed a furling boom that was sleek, stylish and, most importantly, had proven performance, reliability and ease of use. These boats are often sailed by a husband and wife team who want to be able to relax while sailing, knowing that if it gets a bit windy they can reduce sail quickly and reliably without having to leave the safety of the cockpit or even the helm.

A finite element analysis by the Hall technical team proved that on smaller yachts a monocoque construction would suit a furling boom just fine. The righting moments and mainsheet loads of yachts in the 45-65ft range meant that they could do away with the internal structural shelf that was one of the most time-consuming parts of constructing the larger booms. Doing so meant that a little more carbon was needed in the shell to handle the sailing loads, but it removed a massive amount of construction hours – and therefore cost – from the build.

Larger Legend series booms are built from pre-preg carbon fibre with lightweight Nomex cores and then cured in an autoclave to ensure the ultimate laminate density and strength-to-weight properties.

Another blessing associated with smaller yachts is that the shorter mainsail foot lengths and reef loads meant there was no longer any call to have the upper edge of the boom supporting the mandrel when the sail is reefed. So the upper edge of the boom and the roller supports were removed, which further reduced construction time and also eliminated contact between the sail and boom shell, a source of chafe.

Starting with a fresh sheet of paper, Hall Spars approached the fittings that integrate the boom into the mast from a different angle. These booms were designed to be easily retrofitted to yachts with any type of mast, so aluminium goosenecks and sail feeder ramps were used, making installation a case of putting in a few fasteners instead of bonding carbon parts onto a mast.

Drive mechanisms are available with components from numerous suppliers, including Hall Spars’ proprietary manual drive as well as hydraulic and electric drive options. Reefing locks come as standard. Reefing can be done at any batten by furling the main down to the desired height, engaging the lock, and re-tensioning the halyard. Job done. Reef locks are particularly crucial for the manual furl system, as most other manufacturers rely on the furling line in theory not slipping on the furling drum, which in practice is not reliable at all.

Furling units are placed at the outboard end, which differs from other manufacturers in this size range who prefer to keep the weight at the inboard end. With their customengineered lightweight shells, Hall Spars locate the furling system at the outboard end of the boom to make them fully accessible for service or troubleshooting by removing just a few bolts. This is in contrast to having the system hidden inside the mandrel at the front, which requires removing the sail and unhitching the mandrel to gain access to the drive unit: not something you want to do at sea.

Most of the load in a mainsail is down the leech or trailing edge, so putting the furling drive outboard means a more direct transfer of the torque generated by the furling drive into the most highly loaded part of the sail rather than passing it down the length of the mandrel or across the sail. Direct transfer of the load then means less material is required throughout the shell so the weight penalty of moving the drive unit outboard is thereby negated.

Finally, if the boat loses hydraulic function or electrical power, a ratcheting spanner can be used to turn the mandrel manually. An alternative to this is an emergency ratcheting furling drum that can be bolted to the front of the mandrel.

Click here for more information on Hall Spars »