Lars Schrøder d 13

Go to Wismar and sail with other a-cats - that'll be leap for your flying skills!

If the sail is old it a pulley can be the best solution - but usually the problem is that the tube inside the luffcurve has been strecthed, so its too long. So fix the ring in the top of the sail to something, loosen the tube in the bottom of the sail (or the top), pull the tube as much as you can (usually 10-15 cm), cut the tube, redo the stiching, so tube is fixed again - and your ready to go:-)

I'll go for a-cat - simple, no need for crew, cheap, capable of doing +20 knots upwind!

Most proper foiling boats are rather tough to sail, you don't do +20 knots upwind without some work.. I do a-cats.. scary in more than 10 m/s

Hi Michelle - before we started adding lifting foils (c's) and winglets the boat was a POS, so claiming that everything was better before flying, is wrong. We could'nt trapeze downwind and hardly do wildthing (that was'nt really any kind of wild). Downwind was actually rather boring, and mostly a game of not pitchpoling. Some like flying, some don't - for me flying (like the rules are today) is way more fun than the floating, and i'm a rather ordinary amateur sailor, with limited time and money - and can't practice that much! In Denmark almost everybody has changed to flying - and

Ive been using footstraps for the last 20 years - I never have had any issues with my knees - you are not fixed in the footstraps? Go for it!

I was at the dutch nationals at hellecat in august - first 4-5 boats could fly upwind in 8-10 m/s (first 2 POL-41, NED-7 way better than the other ones). The rest of us couldnt (i changed stuff, so it got a little better in the last races- but Im struggeling to make it work in 6 m/s). The australians play another game - they eat this vegemite, that makes them uberhuman in a-cats!

for flying footstraps are a pleasent addition - you can do without, but itll be a challenge you dont need..

The local DNA seems like a good option (depending on price) - when DNA did their first design of z-foils, they did a good job, so the boat will be capable of foiling in 5 m/s (3 m/s will be a challenge, though - also in newer boats). Its crucial that the setup is correct, else its a dog..

I've heard that the most expensive boats are the cheapest ones;- )

Ita16 you should join some more a-cat-regattas with you interesting design! Stats from up north: +80% of the a-cats in Denmark are foiling 100% in Norway Sweden stays with the marstrøms (maybe in their articles?), mostly nonfoiling Don't know on any boats in Finland

I talked to a billionaire who was into horses. He was puzzled on how much the horses was worth when he wanted to buy them, and how little the market was, when he should sell... I guess the same go for some boats.. And cool threads - I feel like buying a way bigger catamaran:- )

A-cat catamaran, because its so much cooler than every other boat! (at least outside other flying boats;- ) They've gotten better, so flying on a-cats is actually pretty stable these days, both up and downwind - we are still working on flying jibes and tacks though. Around a race course a-cat will probably beat most other foiling boats, but its more important to have similar boats to race than being faster... also importantly the a-cat is way more fun in nonflying conditions than all the others flying boats.

On all 4 boats the grinders are pretty active all the time, so that might indicate that continuously adjustments are being made on settings on all boats? For sure at different levels of efficiency and that's what decides who's faster. But go try yourself - theres good access to simple flying boats everywhere. And it's good fun as well:-)

Some of you should go trying a flying boat ... especially the knowitallnz's You need to adjust everything almost all the time, else you're out of speed, that's just the dynamics of a flying boat.