Can you have Comfort, Value and Performance in a Catamaran?

[arsenelupiga]

Originally Posted by malbert73

To go even further, probably need to add 25-30% in length to accurately compare a mono to a cat. 40 foot production cat (example Lagoon 40) and 50-52 foot production mono (example Beneteau Oceanis 51.1) are very similar in price new on YachtWorld. compare interiors and you really are just comparing type of layout not really more or less space. And speed particularly upwind then favors mono. So you’re left with absence of heeling and rolling as only advantage of cats

hm, from my latest sail east coast AU, certainly 50 feet monos were left behind every time. There may be more to performance, ie skipper skills. It is true that when i started my sailing career even 45 feet monos were faster but things change with skills. True, we only sailed in rech/downwind but everyone seem to like these conditions so they are most important.

[mglonnro]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

seawinds not done too well in ARC, i gather.

The ARC marketing and brand effect is interesting. I'm sure manufacturers are quite concerned about how well their boats do there since, no matter how you spin it, people will read the results (and the marketing of the results) in the subjective ways they do.

If catamaran brand A has been marketed as a "performance catamaran" better than the average white lagoons, then it looks crappy if the AWLs are still equally fast or faster... and a lot of other intuitive (but maybe wrong) comparisons people can make.

On the other hand, if it seems your brand C catamaran is outperforming the previous impressions people had, of course it's something that should be used by your own marketing. (In a truthful way, obviously.)

If I was the head of brand/marketing of a manufacturer that promises better performance than others, I would offer a lot of free support (including a pro crew member if they're interested) to people entering the ARC with "my" boats.

EDIT/ADD: ... ESPECIALLY the first time my new brand/model is in the competition.

[arsenelupiga]

Originally Posted by mglonnro

The ARC marketing and brand effect is interesting. I'm sure manufacturers are quite concerned about how well their boats do there since, no matter how you spin it, people will read the results (and the marketing of the results) in the subjective ways they do.

If catamaran brand A has been marketed as a "performance catamaran" better than the average white lagoons, then it looks crappy if the AWLs are still equally fast or faster... and a lot of other intuitive (but maybe wrong) comparisons people can make.

On the other hand, if it seems your brand C catamaran is outperforming the previous impressions people had, of course it's something that should be used by your own marketing. (In a truthful way, obviously.)

If I was the head of brand/marketing of a manufacturer that promises better performance than others, I would offer a lot of free support (including a pro crew member if they're interested) to people entering the ARC with "my" boats.

EDIT/ADD: ... ESPECIALLY the first time my new brand/model is in the competition.

I will be honest with you. after seeing how Masauerdon 5 beating 80 ft racy english cat in ARC, I wanted one ! Both boats were truly racing and it can be clearly seen crew skill + boat result. Only would have to convince my wife and get couple extra coins and wait couple of years to be built. However, looking at results there are bunch of lagoons that have done quite well so I am not too stressed.

[Tupaia]

Originally Posted by mglonnro

EDIT/ADD: ... ESPECIALLY the first time my new brand/model is in the competition.

I think you make a good point, brand new boats with brand new crews. Most of the ARC participants are new sailors, for many it is their first ocean crossing, their first offshore passage, their first boat even. Some even have their new boat delivered to the Canaries and it is the first time they step on-board. It is probably the highest concentration of inexperienced sailors at any one place.

[RoadRacer]

It may have been stated elsewhere but I think privacy is one of the significant benefits of a catamaran. I dislike hearing bodily functions from my guests...bad enough I have to listen to beer burps and bad jokes all evening!

[sailjumanji]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

I will be honest with you. after seeing how Masauerdon 5 beating 80 ft racy english cat in ARC, I wanted one ! Both boats were truly racing and it can be clearly seen crew skill + boat result. Only would have to convince my wife and get couple extra coins and wait couple of years to be built. However, looking at results there are bunch of lagoons that have done quite well so I am not too stressed.

Ok, I see the motivation behind your snide Seawind comment now. I'm glad that having a 52 ft Lagoon finish well in the ARC, reduces your stress of Lagoon 400 ownership. And as you pointed out in another post, reaching and downwind is most important to you anyway. Note the Lagoon 400 was rated 38th "fastest" out of 40 entries. As handicappers, we try to make up for performance issues with rating factor help (i.e., rating a boat slow, so it gets more help on calculation of corrected time).

As for ARC, I don't know anything about this race. But sometimes the fastest-rated boat finishing at the top of the corrected-time scale indicates they were able to sail in more-favorable weather pattern (i.e., higher wind, better angle, ahead of a front, etc.). Plus the top two boats didn't motor, whereas almost every other boat did. Motoring in our offshore distance races is a disqualification, so not sure how they even account for this in corrected time calculation.

I stand by my assessment of what makes a multihull faster or slower relative to another. Where do you think a 48 ft Atlantic Cat (Chris White design) would have finished? Or a Gunboat 48? And since you brought up Seawind, is there anyone that honestly thinks a Lagoon 52 would be faster than the same-LOA Seawind 1600? If there was any upwind component in the "race." Or alternatively, look in your backyard, at the Hamilton Island Race Week. Boats of length that more of us can afford - who cares who makes the fastest $1 MM cat anyway? With the exception of one boat, all of the Seawind 1160's (38 ft) are rated faster than the Lagoon 39 and Lagoon 40 entries. (They even separate the Lagoon's and put in the slower Black fleet, Seawinds in the faster Purple fleet.) And the 1160 sails well upwind. Not better than the 1190 though - which has daggerboards.

When we cruise (yeah, we spent three months in Bahamas last year, before bring the boat back across the Gulf to Texas), we set the autopilot on 32 deg AWA and watch it sail upwind. I don't suspect that sounds familiar? Better yet, when we were cruising Bahamas, there were a lot of light wind days that we sailed, while the longer condo-cats motored. (Typical excuse - they were motoring to run the watermaker. We were sailing, and the watermaker was running on solar power!) Anything can sail in high wind, but the real test is light to moderate wind.

But OTOH, Seawind didn't have an entry in the ARC! I'm going to lose sleep over that one!

[Mr B]

Originally Posted by sailjumanji

Ok, I see the motivation behind your snide Seawind comment now. I'm glad that having a 52 ft Lagoon finish well in the ARC, reduces your stress of Lagoon 400 ownership. And as you pointed out in another post, reaching and downwind is most important to you anyway. Note the Lagoon 400 was rated 38th "fastest" out of 40 entries. As handicappers, we try to make up for performance issues with rating factor help (i.e., rating a boat slow, so it gets more help on calculation of corrected time).

As for ARC, I don't know anything about this race. But sometimes the fastest-rated boat finishing at the top of the corrected-time scale indicates they were able to sail in more-favorable weather pattern (i.e., higher wind, better angle, ahead of a front, etc.). Plus the top two boats didn't motor, whereas almost every other boat did. Motoring in our offshore distance races is a disqualification, so not sure how they even account for this in corrected time calculation.

I stand by my assessment of what makes a multihull faster or slower relative to another. Where do you think a 48 ft Atlantic Cat (Chris White design) would have finished? Or a Gunboat 48? And since you brought up Seawind, is there anyone that honestly thinks a Lagoon 52 would be faster than the same-LOA Seawind 1600? If there was any upwind component in the "race." Or alternatively, look in your backyard, at the Hamilton Island Race Week. Boats of length that more of us can afford - who cares who makes the fastest $1 MM cat anyway? With the exception of one boat, all of the Seawind 1160's (38 ft) are rated faster than the Lagoon 39 and Lagoon 40 entries. (They even separate the Lagoon's and put in the slower Black fleet, Seawinds in the faster Purple fleet.) And the 1160 sails well upwind. Not better than the 1190 though - which has daggerboards.

When we cruise (yeah, we spent three months in Bahamas last year, before bring the boat back across the Gulf to Texas), we set the autopilot on 32 deg AWA and watch it sail upwind. I don't suspect that sounds familiar? Better yet, when we were cruising Bahamas, there were a lot of light wind days that we sailed, while the longer condo-cats motored. (Typical excuse - they were motoring to run the watermaker. We were sailing, and the watermaker was running on solar power!) Anything can sail in high wind, but the real test is light to moderate wind.

But OTOH, Seawind didn't have an entry in the ARC! I'm going to lose sleep over that one!

My 34 foot Cat needs 3 knots of wind before its moving, FWIW, Hahahaha

[sailjumanji]

Originally Posted by Mr B

My 34 foot Cat needs 3 knots of wind before its moving, FWIW, Hahahaha

We've done almost three knots in no wind! (Gulf Stream)

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by sailjumanji

We've done almost three knots in no wind! (Gulf Stream)

We've done 4 knots with NO RIG and no engines. Ha ha ha. In the icw.

Had a fuel pump failure and boat didn't have a rig yet.

I was very concerned and had the anchor ready when I noticed the boat never really slowed down! I put a board down and we "sailed" several miles through bridges at 4 knots to the next populated area to get a fuel pump.

It was a windy day.

[tp12]

Originally Posted by sailjumanji

As for ARC, I don't know anything about this race.

I'm going to guess the reason for that is that it's not a race. It's the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers. It's designed for people who want to cross the Atlantic in company, with support and organisation.

[mglonnro]

Originally Posted by tp12

I'm going to guess the reason for that is that it's not a race. It's the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers. It's designed for people who want to cross the Atlantic in company, with support and organisation.

I think it's better described as both that AND a race, with each boat approaching it in whatever way they desire to. And the ARC does have an official racing division as well. Maybe it's kind of like those marathon competitions, where you have world elite runners as well as those who didn't do it before..

This was cool:
https://www.sail-world.com/Australia...?source=google

[tp12]

Originally Posted by mglonnro

I think it's better described both that AND a race, with each boat approaching it in whatever way they desire to. And the ARC does have an official racing division as well. Maybe it's kind of like those marathon competitions, where you have world elite runners as well as those who didn't do it before..

This was cool:
https://www.sail-world.com/Australia...?source=google

I think your description is more accurate,thank you.


That's a super cool boat!

[Tupaia]

Originally Posted by mglonnro

I think it's better described as both that AND a race, with each boat approaching it in whatever way they desire to. And the ARC does have an official racing division as well. Maybe it's kind of like those marathon competitions, where you have world elite runners as well as those who didn't do it before..

This was cool:
https://www.sail-world.com/Australia...?source=google

This thread seems to have veered off course a bit.

The ARC is not a credible "race" - 8 days 14 hours, 39 minutes and 51 seconds is pretty slow as records stand.

The east west Atlantic sailing record is held by Spindrift - 6d 14h 29m 21s

This is over a distance of 3884 Nm compared to the ARC 2664 Nm so Spindrift's average speed of 24.5 kts is almost twice as fast as Leopard's 12.9 ktns

I can guarantee that the crew of Leopard were not comfortable, 23 people in bunks and had to put up with the discomfort for twice as long. This was a job not a pleasure cruise. I would also suspect that Leopard cost considerably more and looked a lot more "comfortable" hand crafted joinery, teak, silk linings in the heads, at the boat show, than Spidrift.

[malbert73]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

hm, from my latest sail east coast AU, certainly 50 feet monos were left behind every time. There may be more to performance, ie skipper skills. It is true that when i started my sailing career even 45 feet monos were faster but things change with skills. True, we only sailed in rech/downwind but everyone seem to like these conditions so they are most important.

I don’t doubt your experience, but seriously doubt a Lagoon 40 will be faster than a same-priced Beneteau 51.1 if same-skill skippering. Especially in lighter air. There are other reasons to buy a cat of course

[sailingharry]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

True, we only sailed in rech/downwind but everyone seem to like these conditions so they are most important.

I hear this, or similar, a lot. Cruisers go downwind. Gentlemen never sail to weather. Etc. I can't help but feel very sorry for folks who consider upwind as "bad" or "avoided" or "never done." In my 50 years of sailing, my point of sail has always been determined by the given wind and the given destination. Granted, on a weekend, I'll see if can play the weather forecast for two downwind days -- but that's pretty rare.


We did two 9-day cruises here on the Chesapeake last year, and for both, the itinerary was at least sketched out before we left, and the wind was the wind.


We did a lap through the BVI's on a charter boat a few years back, and there was as much up as down.


The Baja HaHa is followed, by most, by the Baja Bash. Sucks to go home, doesn't it?


Either those that don't go upwind don't sail much, or have the time to wait and wait and wait for a windshift. There are the microscopically small percentage of cruisers who do a tradewind cirumnavigation, but I'm not sure they could be described as "most."


Of course, "gentleman don't sail to weather" specifically meant that paid crew do that instead -- but again, most of us don't have paid crew for the nasty parts.