StoneTool,

  If you're set on a 30' catamaran, so be it.  I personally like longer hulls if they'll fit into my criteria (being able to trailer and store the boat), but that's not to say you'd feel the same way.

  Just for the sake of discussion, though, I'm curious about the 30' length.

  I've seen you mention a few reasons, including cost, build time, and the difficulty of having to handle a larger boat.

  But what if a 40' proa could carry the same weight, go faster, be more seaworthy, be easier to handle, and cost less to build than the 30' catamaran?

  The AIR 40 looks like it would accomplish a lot of what you want with sheltered bridge deck accommodations, two double beds, a head, and a beam that collapses down to allow the boat to trailer and/or fit into a monohull marina slip.  Even the 30' cat wouldn't fit into a monohull slip.

  The proa would be a longer boat that the 30' cat, but given the unstayed rigs that you can depower at any point of sail, and the ability to shunt in very low and very high winds, it's going to be easier and safer to sail. 

  Imagine never having to worry about a tack or gybe, regardless of the wind strength, even if you're singlehanded and pinched between a supertanker and some shoals...

  And while cost does tend to go up exponentially with boat length, an intelligently-infused 40'-er is only going to be incrementally more expensive than the same weight boat with 30' hulls.

---

  That said, you might have a storage facility that's not long enough for a 40' boat, and is too short to allow hull ends that fold up. 

  Or you might have made up your mind for other reasons that will never, ever change.  I can appreciate that.

  I was just curious about your take on the AIR 40.

  I also wanted to ask in a friendly way before submitting another post on hull length and shape -- I didn't want you to think that the next post is part of a campaign to get you to drop the cat design for the 30' length criterion.

        - Mike

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