Sunday, January 18, 2009

I Ain't Askin' for a Miracle Lord - Just a Little Bit of Luck Would Do

- Steve Earle

I haven't been writing much in the way of technical stuff, mostly because I'm pretty sure nobody thinks what I'm doing can work, and they might be right. I'd rather let the boat do the talking, but sort of like building your own Frankenstein, it takes a while to teach the Monster proper syntax and grammar. Mostly, it says things like "Sheeeeeiiit! YiiiiiiiiiiAiAiAikes! What are you DOOOOOOHOHOHOHing...cut that OWWWWWWWT FAAAAAAACK." Then it takes off maniacally in some random direction, happy as a pig in mud, asking "How would you like your prime rib cooked, sir?"




The jury is still out - way out. The longer they stay out, the better, in my view. But I see them lurking by the courthouse windows, peering in from time to time.

Anyway it looks different now, but I haven't taken any photos for awhile. The basic setup remains the same. Yes, my daggerboard trunk opening is still square. Whatever. I have also done away with the rudder completely, just to make things interesting.

OK I'm kidding about that last bit.

WhY, YoU mAy AsK?

Why not, I say. I am not cutting up YOUR Prowler, so chill out. More to the point, I wanted to get rid of the flap and all its associated flap crap. Theoretically flaps are pretty good, but practically they have their limitations. So I thought I'd play with some other limitations for awhile and see if I could compensate for the theoretical disadvantages by realizing some practical benefits.

I have been flying this way since August or so, weekends mostly. This weekend there was no wind, which was perfect, because I was sick and it was 80 degrees, and there were a million junior sailors at my club, racing a junior championship in everything but 29ers. All in all, a good weekend to be under the weather:



Digging the Perverted Moth blog, though the author appears to have multiple personality disorder, which doesn't really exist, so it's probably OK. The flatpack Moth idea is long overdue in any event, and the writing is a perfect balance of technical stuff and self deprecation. Galeotti is setting new standards for economy - truly impressive. It is like watching a fuel cell that runs on words. How does it keep going? Air bearings maybe.

Looking forward to some serious armchair mothing this week while I recuperate.

6 comments:

Dubai Moth Association said...

armchair mothing is much better when you do not have your own blog to worry about! My spelling has improved massively as well since i stopped trying to type so fast!

Karl said...

CG I can put a feed out for comments over here, and then have Culnane link it to the blogs page; that might avoid islamofascist blogging filters (if there are any). Still unclear to some of us why you are offline!

MARKLA said...

Thanks for the plug for pervo moth. All design drawings will be made available throughtout the design process.

Have you posted many other photos of your foil?

Karl said...

@ Pervo (Observe cool "Mothie Insider" type punctuation which has no known precedent in the English Language outside Scott "three B's or two" Babage's blog):

Yes I posted some other photos of the foil, but nothing very much more revealing than this one. It is pretty much what it looks like: a basic wing minus a flap. The intersection stuff got a bit out of control, but that's what happens when you read too many books (in my case precisely one).

Anyone wishing to make a similar system should probably wait until this one makes it 'round a racecourse; until then imitators might expect to be dispatched summarily to their nearest rubber room by men in uniform.

All design drawings have been made available, which is to say there aren't any, mostly because I couldn't revolve a profile around an axis in SW if my life depended upon it. But I am working on that, so one day perhaps I shall have artwork to share.

Dubai Moth Association said...

There are no blogging filters out here, i just want to keep my powder dry from now on!! I got a bit tired of the mud slinging that goes on in the mothosphere basically! I think that as a fleet the moths could benefit from some X games type hype for your mates, rather than having a pissing contest!

Karl said...

Amen to that Chris. I think Arabs in dark sunglasses confiscating your Innernet makes a better story though.