I'm a student doing my thesis project on landsailing and have a few questions (by the way, I've never land sailed before, only sailed in water). First off does a landsailer handle wind and steering the same way as a sail boat (i.e. points of sail such as broad reach, beam reach ect)? Does the sail need to be turned perpendicular to the wind when it's behind the sailer? If there's a different way to handle wind, could someone please direct me to a site that explains it or doodle a quick picture? Much appreciated.
I'm looking for a land yachting equivalent of this:
Unless steering is handle the exact same way.
In theory it is like sailing a water yacht... BUT the thing you haven't taken into account is a thing called "apparent wind" which is the wind generated by moving along, this then changes the wind direction on the rig.
So at some stage on a good surface with good wing you may be fully sheeted in going down wind.
Apparent wind is the thing that makes landyachts go FAST.....
Here is a link that might exlain how it all works....http://www.lathingstodo.com/landsailing/groundschool.htm
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailing_faster_than_the_wind
If the case of a solid sail that pivots in the center (like the ecotricity greenbird) does the sail always point into the wind? The "sail" on the greenbird has a "tail" on it that looks like it keeps the sail pointed into the wind (to the point where you would normally be luffing). Am I seeing that right or am I way wrong?
From when it was at Lake Lefroy and we helped assemble it, I gathered that the tail was actually used to turn the wing.
The tail plane also had a forward facing counterweight to dampen the wing wanting to build up an fatal ossilation.
the actual little wing could be finely adjusted to set the angle of the wing to the wind. there was no "sheeting "as such , just the winglet adjustment.
