| Or you could "dive" under the boat's 1' draft and put a larger patch on.

Ya, but that 1' draft becomes, perhaps 3', if you put a hole in the hull of a reasonably loaded boat? Not hard to get under 3', if you can wait for things to get calm. I guess that's better than 2' becoming 6'+. Store the hull repair kit in the on deck toy box? Or should we assume a sump is running to keep the water level down?

I guess the crush bows will help mitigate the holed 'draft' from getting too deep.

Seems nice one has a separate isolated hull you can shelter in if needed, until repairs can be made.

A 3' extension on a hole saw seems impractical. And kevlar might make that a nightmare. But two overlapping holes make a shape that's easy to slip a patch through that will cover the hole easy. Also the patch is easy too!

If I have tanks in a bilge, the hole will only happen directly under them, so I'll need to remove them to fix it. So I need removable tanks.

Rocks on a coast are one thing. At least one is close to land. A hole at sea seems worst case. Do we agree? I guess its better to think on this now, than start then.

| There's always something that's going to want to gouge the hull;

Ah, so tie on the tires on before beaching. Derp! I am rather slow.

Gliding a multihull onto a beach seems classic. But I guess it is kinda dumb.

| >> The shallower the hull, the easier these are to put in place.
| >
| > Why is a shallow hull easier? Shorter jack?
|
|   The boat is still floating when you put these in place. Trying to get beaching bunks/tires situated on a deeper V-profile is going to be more problematic than a shallower flat profile. 

Since we are fitting protection before beaching, this all makes sense now.

| > Does one have to goto the mast to hook the luff downhaul to the reef point?

|   Some boats <one does not have to, but yes>
|   That said, an ultra-simple rig with dyneema hoops and a wishbone boom would probably work better without trying to get fancy with a single line.

If one had a 'large rig', that was regularly reefed, perhaps run the extra line?

|   The key is that the boat is in neutral, the sail is in neutral, and you're in a protected cockpit area (not up on an exposed bow).

So, 'going to the mast' is a different thing on a HP, vs many other boats. A casual occasional thing.

| Thankfully the ferry gave him some room at the last moment, but if he hadn't, the sailboat was going to be in a world of hurt.

I thought 'right of way' favored sails over motors? Like in aviation lighter than air, beats gliders, beats motor (typical) planes. Is this not true?5

I guess if the ferry don't yield, you are hitting something either way. One can sue the ferry though.

|   A bidirectional boat with an unstayed rig, however, could just stop

This is such a huge safety feature.

| > Is it reasonable for me to suggest that a slow boat is less safe?

|   It's a wash.  Speedier is safer in that you have more options in how to get to safety or how to get past the edge of a squall. Unless you push it too far with that supersized rig and then end up having a really bad day.

|   It's like knives. 

Excellent. Thank you.
But the supersized rig is only supersized from the point of view of observed 'expected'. The HP can have a larger rig, and be safer, because the design has a larger heeling moment, as you well know. And you are right, when I push it too far and flip the thing, I imagine many will blame the rig or the design, and less so the sailor.

| > When you have a moment, would you explain where you are with the bidirectional blades and the one way blades? 

|   Unidirectional foils will be more efficient.  But you'll have to rotate them 180 degrees each shunt.
|   Bidirectional foils will be less efficient, but you can configure them to give a touch of lift to windward, and they only have to turn a few degrees.

|   Personally, I'm willing to give up a bit of performance for convenience.  Plus the bidirectionals are almost made for tillers. I love tillers and really don't want to deal with a wheel. (Though I have to say the tilting wheel on the 50 and 60 that can be in the cabin or out on the deck is brilliant).

Yep. The efficiency calls to me, but I can see the simple winning out.

Rob had said (IIRC) the bidirectionals have a few degrees of needed 'cant', that shifts between directional changes. It is a simple thing, but he was working on it to get right.

The wheels seem huge to me. And they don't, to my ignorant eyes, intuitively provide feedback as to the rudder position. Does one need a lot of leverage to turn the rudders? Is the big wheel a tradition? Or is it awesome in some way I am missing. I notice Steinar has two wheels on his renderings now, so I must be missing something.

The more I think on tillers, the more I like them. A 48' boat with tillers is rather odd, no?