My old windflyer. If I had a big area/lefroy or beach I would build another one.
Cheers
aus230
what does a wind flyer do different/better/worse than a traditional landyacht? thanks in advance.
Where do I start.
I don't think the wind flier is for everyone as it is a fairly complicated build. There are a lot of them sailing on ice.
What is does better than my class5
1. I have been a lot faster in the flier than the class5. over 60mph some days something that I have not been able to achieve in aus230
2. It handles like a little jet, Turns on a dine at any speed.
3. Can still sail in wind speeds that I would not go out in in aus230.
4, Takes any size windsurfer sail 5m---10m.(with no modifications)
5. It is also very soothe to sail.
What does it do worse than my class5
1.No class to race it (if there where a few around I would love to race one)
2. It can not tack anywhere near as high as a class5
3. I had a few mast failures(probably my fault as I did not know a lot about stiffening the bottom of the mast.
4. A fair bit of rigging time and a lot of pulleys(I would do it a bit different if I ever built another one)
5. It is quite a big yacht to transport but can be pulled down to fit on a roof rack.
The plans are still available on the ice flier forum. I also have files building some parts.
Hope this answers some of your questions
Cheers
aus230
Really impressive Vic. It looks like a grab handle each side for the turns is an absolute necessity.
Here is another vid of one of these or very similar hooting around the desert.
as a simple suggestion to building one to sail on land, dump the whole windsurfer rig set up and simply fit a regular landyacht rig, then you wouldnt have to hoist monster 8m sails that shatter masts.
I really dont understand why they have stuck with the windsurfer rig
If I built another one I think I would do away with the windsurfer outhaul setup and attach a landyacht boom with centre pull this would remove all the complicated pully setup. I would like to try a small wing as I think it would work well if there was someway to set it up for control.I had no problem with the mast breaking once I stiffened up the lower section of the mast.
cheers
aus230
Vic wouldn't your body interrupt air flow over the bottom section of a wing, reducing its effectiveness in that setup?
I would have thought so, maybe that is why they use larger sails. But on the upside they can go a lot faster than a class5 and in stronger winds. Pasted below from the old iceflyer site maybe it answers the questions
web.archive.org/web/20061024235103/http://iceflyer.com/plans/index.html
"Dynamic" Yacht balancing to include Mast Downward pressure
Caution! ICE FLYER does not condone or encourage high wind sailing. The forces of heavy air are great and there is a risk of both equipment and personal injury. A pilot sailing in high wind assumes all risks involved. The purpose of this article is to discuss from a technical and safety point of view about a different "dynamic" approach to boat balancing which appears to give the boat good range and turning ability.
Dynamic Balancing
On a small (i.e., 12 foot in length and car-topable) wind powered craft, the pilot will typically outweigh the rest of the boat and where the pilot is placed has a significant influence on sailing behavior. The ICE FLYER configuration places the pilot in front of the sail in an upright sitting position and uses the sail area directly behind to reduce pilot drag. This configuration also results in a relatively stable center of gravity (cg) and nearly optimized turning characteristics. Inverted air foils on the rear beam are in an ideal location to counter the tendency of the sail under load to hike the boat.
The balancing recipe
As always, there is a tradeoff on where to place the boats center of gravity (cg). Having the cg forward helps the maneuverability and high wind safety, keeping it back results in better leverage to keep the boat from hiking.
Steering
Formula cars wish to strike a balance between the front end sliding first or "understeer" and the rear end sliding first or "oversteer". A lot of understeer (light front end) results in slower "push" turns and too much oversteer (light rear) is unstable. The holy grail is to achieve a balance between under and over steer and this happens in general with equal weighting on the front and rear runners or wheels.
On the "three contact point" ICE FLYER, the cg is placed at 1/3 from the boat rear (2/3 from the front) which gives equal weight on all three runners resulting in the equivalent weight distribution Formula cars are after. This creates near optimum balance for turning with the maximum possible front runner weight while insuring stable steering under all conditions. Slight understeer (front slides first) is still desirable for stability and this is achieved (picture).
The sail mast downward pressure location (where the mast attaches to the fuselage) is placed as close to the boats cg as possible. The reason for this is that under certain conditions, the mast can exert a downward force on the fuselage and being a force just like the pilots weight, it can shift the boats center of gravity towards the mast down force location.
Note: How high is the mast down force? A windsurfing type sail with the down haul tension pre-rigged into the sail wont have this but with a conventional sheet, the mast down force can be very high but this will also only be an internal force to the structure of the boat and should not affect the "dynamic balance". A sail generating lift which is constrained at the bottom will generate a "system" down force but under normal conditions, it is probably less than the weight of the boat otherwise a lot of small sailboats would sink the front end from mast down pressure. In the soft water analogy, there is some tendency to push the front end down but it can be adequately countered by a single pilot moving backwards on the boat. There do however seem to be conditions where a sail could be generating higher "system" mast down force such as during a high wind downwind turn and once again this is not a recommended way to sail but this configuration seems to handle the down wind turn well.
Boat CG vs sail CE. The sail center of effort (ce) must be correctly placed relative to the boats center of gravity (cg) as this is important for both performance and safety. The boat cg is important as this is where a force applied to the boat will cause it to slide exactly sideways. Apply the force in front of the cg and the front of the boat slides, apply the force behind and the rear of the boat slides. For safety, you always want to apply the sail force behind the boats cg as you can control a boat with the rear sliding but its much more difficult (and dangerous) with the front sliding. A rear sail boat inherently has the sail ce behind the boat cg so will be safe - i.e., the rear end will always get blown down wind but you can still steer the boat. However, for performance, you want the sail ce to be relatively close to the boats cg (but still behind). On the small boat, this is done by raking the rear sail forward.
Forward raked foils can be powerful but unstable on aircraft. However, in this case only a portion of the sail is raked forward (the tip is generally still raked back). Also, the entire sail area is behind the sails rotational axis and this contributes to stability. Most importantly, about a zillion hours of sailing definitely confirms the stability - check out the downloadable video and see for yourself.
Pilot comfort is also of high importance for an enjoyable sailing experience and the front pilot configuration naturally supports this. Normally the pilot will be leaning slightly to the windward side of the boat in order to gain maximum leverage from his or her weight.
The forward pilot (and forward center of gravity) also affects the boats high wind /high speed stability. If the sail lift is let off with the boat at high speed, the sails drag tends to try and lift the front end of the boat causing a loss in control. The geometry of the rear sail/forward pilot boat requires a significantly high drag "pulling back" force on the sail to lift the front end so it tends to stay in contact and in control.
When I shifted to Bridgetown left it outside and water got into the timber over winter and stuffed it
It was them cremated[}:)]
Cheers
vic
