Gone sailing...

A new delicatesse from Craigs Kitchen

Yeah! Gone sailing. For real...

Foiling in the AC62

It seems today everybody is sailing the AC62. The virtual one that is. I am not really sure what the fuzz is all about. We've seen a thirty-something for tests, the AC45er is there, and obviously we've seen the 72 footer too. The 62 footer should really just be a shrunken 72er, no?

BobbieLin and me checking out the AC62

It's a good looking cat. It's a beta, but not just any beta. Supposedly it is the final beta. Me, I think there's too many problems with the shrouds for a final beta, but I am not really into mesh. Perhaps it's a super-easy fix. Dunno. While still moored the shrouds are nicely aligned with the mast anyway.

Top view

While the AC62 is smaller than the AC72 it is still pretty tall as can be seen on the above picture. There are two dots on the ground. BobbieLin on land and me in the cockpit. Hardly visible. Nuff talk. Lets fly...

Cats do fly...

If there is a manual I didn't read it, so it took me a couple of minutes to figure it out. It started out sailing on SL wind. It's been a while since I tried that. Somehow I managed to set the wind to east and the windspeed to 30. Dunno if that's knots, but I hope it isn't meters per sec. The sheets can be adjusted quite alot, so the wing easily ends up outside the usable angles of attack, i.e. windangle. So beware... there's not alotta speed in this thingy if the wing is 90 degrees to the sailing direction.

...and they can fly both ways!

If winged correctly these boats are fast. The high speed generates so much relative wind that the wing is operated within a pretty narrow range of (apparent) wind angles; Somewhere between close hauled and beam reach. The foiling comes easy. We almost foiled instantly, once I got the wing trimmed, and we stayed up there. In fact it is surprisingly easy to get her foiling; Tacking and gybing while staying up is a challenge.

Speeding is allowed

Speeds are incredible. Unreal actually. We made 50 knots easily. I didn't check cause I was busy steering and trimming, but BobbieLin kept yelling "50 knots is unreal". I absolutely to agree. I mean, we were not sailing in a storm, and most of the time the jib wasn't even unfolded.

Super duper speedy flying critters all over

Sadly the grid was very bad today. Numerous sims were offline, so we could just take off, get foiling and withing 30 seconds... boom - we'd hit the border of an offline sim. Rather annoying. After a couple of hits I even heard myself shouting foul words. The few simborders we did manage to cross - they seemed to work out pretty good.

Tradewinds to the lee

The overall performance seems good. The boat reacts swiftly to rudder changes and a bit less swiftly to wing trim, but I suppose that's to be expected with a wing this size. Balancing - we were able to move around - that seemed to have minor influence on the sailing. The only real problem seems to be the speed. As with the 45er and the 72er - the virtual oceans simply aren't big enough. In a split second you'd have crossed our biggest ocean in here. Also, even on a very fast computer and line we'd hit stuff that we couldn't see. The system simply could not rez it (put it on screen) before we hit it. Loads of clear water ahead, then boom... stuck in the middle of an applefarm with no warning what so ever. What fun...

see ya laterz

That's not the builders fault. It's a good boat. It is supereasy to get it foiling, and I hope we can find the space to sail it. While we can afford it and probably sail in our little virtual world, I am more curious how much cheaper the 62 footer will be compared to the 72 footer. Will there be a significant difference? Cutting just over 10 percent of the costs will probably not give us lots more teams in the next round of the AC Circus, will it?

Pictures and stuff

I thought I'd give my photo-album a makeover. The Google views seem to be out of order. You know those flipviews and the others; They used to work for this blog, but now they seem to work only if you scrap your template and use Googles layout. That way all blogs will look alike. Duh!

Pictures tumbling...

Tumblr comes to rescue... I would have never known, had it not been for Bea and her fantastic web-work for SL Sailing; Thanx Bea. In a way, it's annoying to have two sites to update. Still, if only I had used Tumblr from the start...

UPDATE: Beautiful! I forgot the link: Noodles photos. Thx for telling me Mr. A.G.

It's still there

Just checking... Yes, SL is still there and TYC still exists. Pheew. Not that I thought otherwise.

Look! It's still there...

Would be fun to go Laser racing, but hey... I just did... with real water, hehe. It's summer! My computer is asleep in the drawer along with wintery clothes.

Ahoy there!

Well, almost asleep. Couldn't resist a little trip round the race course. Just fifteen minutes round the local waves and all sorts of boats pop up.

Hey look... the new Q2m!

There was a Becca Sloop Light and a Becca Sloop sailing around TYC. South of Dex I saw a Loonetta and the new Q2m - which I have yet to try. Someone passed me in a Cotton Blossom, and I also saw a Trudeau of sorts; One of the newer ones. Oh, and then I visited Craigs kitchen... Who said SL is a lonely experience with no users? Not so. Get a boat and you meet all sorts of people.

Crazy week

After yet another crazy week in RL, - SL offers five minutes of relaxation and dreaming...

Have a break

It's not nearly as good as the real thing, but it's enough to kinda get in the mood. That slow-moving empty minded state you're in when your moored in RL with absolutely nothing to do except tanning, swimming and maybe brewing a coffee to go with the freshly sliced fruits...

Good mooring

All you gotta do is rez a boat, sail for a few minutes and then start looking for a good mooring spot. I think I found one...

Good relaxing

There's plenty of areas just right for this kind of non-action action. The beauty of this virtual world keeps impressing me. The builders continue to add new details: Graphics, sounds, animals and what not. Check this out...

Motoring about

And when ever you've had enough, with a push of a button you are under sail and the ocean is right there... Ahhh! If only I could have a boat like this in RL. Thanx Dutch - for building the virtual edition.

Going for the big blue

To all sailors out there: Have a great weekend. Let's get out and find some real water to sail...

Womens Matchworlds looking good...

Womens Matchworlds looking good with two danish crews on top after the round-robins. I suppose the event is best covered over here: www.matchracing.ie



Gogogogo girrrrls

Arrrrgh; I suppose a second place for the second consecutive year is a sign of stability rather than progress? What a downer but congrats anyway. Not too bad.

What's that?

I just saw these "spy-shots" a few days ago, and my immediate thought was: OMG! Is that a real live Flying Fizz??

Real?

So let's quiz... What do you think? Is it a real live Flying Fizz?

Fake?

Is it just a couple of photoshopped pictures?

Something else?

Or is it something entirely different that just happens to look a lot like a Flying Fizz?

What's' it gonna be?
1) A real Fizz
2) A fake picture
3) Something else

If you are unsure what a Flying Fizz is, then click the category Flying Fizz below here or see this post.