The one time I'd want to tack a Harry would be to short-tack up a
long inlet in light breezes with a schooner rig.
I've got about five miles to truly open water, and switching two
sails over on every shunt could get to be a bit of a hassle,
particularly because the inlet narrows to 1/2 km at points:
http://mapq.st/OyFukp
It's for this reason that we're upgrading our monohull to a
self-tacking jib. I actually do like to tack some of the time, the
way I also like to drive a standard transmission some of the time,
but there are days when it's nice to just steer without getting up
or putting down one's cold drink. The catamaran won't really handle
a self-tacker, so it remains old-school.
In any case, it would be neat to have the huge sail area and lower
COE of a schooner while tacking when the wind is right.
Very light breezes would demand a shunt, perhaps with the lw hull
to windward. Heavy winds would also demand a shunt. But in the
middle area, tacking could save some time.
That said, it's possible I'm making the wrong assumptions about
shunting.
- Mike
I have never seen the need to tack a harry. Shunting is just too easy and diagonal stability too low to do it in any sort of breeze. A few years ago I designed and built a cat (W) with the ballestron rig in one hull. It tacked pretty easily, so no reason why a similar proa wouldn't. Gybing is a different ball game. In narrow waterways, gybing is handy when running dead square.
The key is not so much making a boat with low enough windage etc to tack, but having both hulls the same length to make it safe. There have been a few "harry cats" drawn, but apart from W, none built, mostly because a proa makes more sense.
rob
On Tue, Jul 17, 2012 at 11:12 PM, bjarthur123 <bjarthur123@yahoo.com> wrote:so can the visionary's tack? i assume elementary can since it has no cabin. ditto for any traditional pacific proa like russell brown's. one would just need to arrange for the main sheet to accommodate a load from the opposite side.
would be an interesting exercise to design a full-sized harry that could point well enough to tack. unarig i presume for efficiency. fairings on the beams. i wonder if the accommodations could be kept as spacious.
do you think it would be more difficult to tack from rig-to-lee to rig-to windward, or vice versa, or both the same? i presume gybing is not a problem.
ben