The 2025 Yacht - What will it look like?

[MainlySteam]

Looking back around 25 years yacht design has changed significantly over that period - materials, rigs, hull shape, spade rudders almost universal (the myth of the skeg is dead), fin keels almost universal, etc.

Any thoughts on what we might be looking at in 25 years time? I would be interested in your views, whether extreme or measured!

John

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[oldsaltoz]

G'day John,

Not too sure just what they will look like, but I suspect mono-hulls will be in the minority.

Have seen some radical designs for sailing cats with fly bridges, no doubt materials will undergo some major changes in the stronger and lighter areas.

Smelly diesels will be on the way out, perhaps the steam pulse outboard will be fully developed and be used to drive boats rather mix ingredients.

Solar panels may become an integral part of the structure and not be the eyesore they are now; batteries may also be smaller and lighter or replaced altogether with super capacitors.

Large water tanks may be replaced by more efficient water makers, and no boat will be without it's own ice-maker....



<hr width=100% size=1> Old Salt Oz /forums/images/icons/cool.gif Growing old is unavoidable. However, growing up is still optional.

 

[BarryH]

If the french have anything to do with it..........crap! Oh no sorry they call it style.

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[Johnjo]

A giant Solar Panel with sails and all electric motors !

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[Will]

More successful at building boats than the English though.. don't you think?

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[Joe_Cole]

Unstayed masts?

Somewhere on the boat for the tax disc?

Joe

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[BarryH]

Hardly surprising is it. I wasn't talking about the state of the industry, more the drugs that the designers must be on, have you seen the abortions that Renault have come out with latley.



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[Will]

Not sure I agree. I don't think French boats are very attractive on the whole, looking really quite plasticky and airfix kit like. But on the whole I can't think of many English boats that are much better. If you compare a Princess for example to a new Jeanneau Prestige, I know which one is more pleasing to my eye.
Having said that, going back 20 years English designs are far more attractive - think Contessa, Bowman, Rival, Nicholson etc. If, as I do, you find seakeeping lines really make a boat attractive. As for the cars, errr, French win hands down. At least they make an effort to be a bit different! Anyway, we don't make cars, do we?
All a matter of opinion of course.

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[alec]

Inflatable Sails

Inflate/deflate to flatten or deepen. Wind strength sensors could probably do this automatically. Ditto for reefing.

Whether racing rules would allow this is another thing though.

Cruising boats back to basics, as it is found that non activity is killing the human race.








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[alec]

Agree.

I do think that the French are far more innovative than the British at the moment.


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[JOHNOO]

Re: Inflatable Sails

This was done way back in 1978! Did not catch on, too costly (at the time)

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[BrendanS]

Get rid of those big unaerodynamic masts and sails. Big engine. Planing hull.

All the saily boats on the Solent seem to motor everywhere anyway, so might as well go the whole hog! /forums/images/icons/wink.gif



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[AndrewB]

Forwards to the past?

In 25 years time the yachting bubble will have burst. The majority of people will have moved gone on to new fashions in life-style thrills. Cruising will have gone the way of the skateboard and the windsurfer: devolved to the dedicated minority.

Racing will continue, as it always has. But the gladiatiorial death-or-glory high profile "racing" events that in the most serve to keep yachting in the public imagination will have been abandonned, just as they were 60 years ago in aeronautics. Without new horizons to conquer, their appeal will be lost.

Long distance cruising will have lost its point, when all places that can be visited by a yacht have become part of the same global monoculture. In any case yachts will be seen as particularly vulnerable to increasing world terrorism. Regulation will become stifling: costs even more so as island economies fully exploit its potential as a cash-cow.

With falling demand, the incentive for development will retreat. In any case soaring fuel costs will have forced a major mind-shift. Yachts will be costing a lot more in real terms, but with lots of old ones still around, the industry will collapse. Communications and computer based technology may continue to develop, but the other things which make present cruising yachts so power-hungry will disappear. No more fridges, watermakers, and the other appurnances of the floating caravan. There will be a backlash against complexity. Even engines will become expensive luxuries for strictly limited use.

Yachting, and yachts, will be more like they were 25 years ago than how they are today.

 

[Ohdrat]

I reckon yacht design will have gone full circle and there will be a multitude of Average Wood Boats.. all with gaff rig and long fin keels with narrow beams! There will be very dedicated minority of JenBenBavers who fight against all odds to keep their classic glass reinforced plastic boats afloat.. digging up old and now unheard of skills in GRP maintenance and building..

On the other hand someone might have invented the sea-thro hull.. who needs fish finder / echo sounder when you have the brand new transparent silicasteel hulls that self repair at the press of a button!.. these will have apple mac powered computerised controls..

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[BrendanS]

I wonder if aerorig type rigs will take off. From a novices perspective, extremely easy to handle, self tacking. Downside appears to be cost which would decrease in a mass market.

An other area of interest would be if oil supplies start to really scare people. Return of the sail driven cargo boats? Modern clippers plying the trade routes. Touted everytime there is an oil crisis, but there do seem to be quite good economic reasons they would work.

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[zefender]

Hmm...by 20-25 of course the fuel will have been taxed for some time, and further envornmental pressures, shrinking reserves etc will probably cause fuel to cost 3 times current level. So, unlikely to see many motery types on Solent, I'd have thought, unless they're rowing. I'd quite like to see a squadron fifty something with holes out of its topsides and peeps down below working like mad to a regular drum beat...

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[tcm]

Re: The 2025 Yacht - measured

Imho, advances 25 years from now will be shockingly minor. We are only talking about the same amount of time as since 1978 - and boats from that date are completely recognisable and usable to todays yottie.

Easily the most expensive item in making a boat is the number of people it takes to make them. People are several times more expensive in Europe than they are outside europe, so it is highly likely that the new centres of boatbuilding will be China/far east, perhaps with exported expertise from Europe if they get on with it, otherwise perhaps those countries further developing on their own.

Relatively lower prices from more automation and ude of more advanced materials will raise the bar to entry for manufacturing, so there'll be fewer manufacturers.

I don't think that yachting/boating will have passed its sell-by date and become less popular. There is no evidence nor trend for this. Ever-cheaper (proportionally) methods of manufacture will translate to ever-cheaper (in real terms) boats and continue to open the sport/hobby/pastime/lifestyle to more people, not fewer.

Electronics and computers, I believe, will continue to follow the same path as did electrical appliances. Pre-1930, it was quite feasible to buy an electric motor (if you were rich) and then atach various things to it to do laundry, pumps water, saw wood and so on. Later, dedicated items appeared for these individual functions. Thus instead of a PC, we can expect more and better dedicated units for now-casting and forecasting weather and sea state - along the lines of navtex and some internet sites, for example.

Mobile phone technology, once believed to defy the normal laws of ecomics, will not "mushroom". Failing to make a whole load of money from third generation phones has already been factored into share prices of those who paid billions for the licences.

Economic changes will be interesting to watch: there are already more than murmurs that the Euro may not suit everyone, with German poilitcal arties already circling to not praise the euro, yet not specifically say that they want to get out. Long-term, it is inconcievable that germans will shrug their shoulders at something rather than "fix" it. An exit such as germany could easily pre-date british entry to the euro, and would herald a truly two-tier europe - those with their own currency, and those without. The european union will remain in place, back-peddling or sideways-peddling, still a force for good, somehow, as it encourages more interaction between european countries rather than less, and at least being the "thing to blame " rather than any one individual country.

World-wide considerations are often worth a look, too. It's almost 25 years since the PC was invented, and despite it's rubbishness if redesigned again today, the mass of software and expertise developed in English in part means that the English language will become more, not less important. It is already the case that "doing well at school" in any country from France to China means that you have good command of English. Modern activites need communication, and that communication is increasing in English.

Separately, and by sheer fluke, central europe remains at the "centre" of the world, spanning the times zones of most other centres of poulation in a way that neither the far east nor California will ever do. It has a temperate climate, and limited land mass and a huge attraction for world-wide visitors who have hardly begun to buy property which their increased wealth will allow them to do. Long-term, buying european property, and not european shares - already squeezed for as much value as possible- would seem the thing to do.

all imho!







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[kingfisher]

Emergency stop button

For long I have wanted this. It will look like an industrial emergencu stop: a red mushroom button over a yellow field. And when you push it, you are immidiately transported to your sofa in front of the TV where it is warm and cosy. Many times I have wished for such a device.

Conversely there will be one next to the sofa, so when you see that the weather is fair and the TV schedule is crap, you are immidiately transported to the boat.

You no longer have to have your boat in crap places, such as UK/BE/NL/NoF, instead it could be in the Bahamas/Med/sunny spots

<hr width=100% size=1>Group of people on the pontoon: skipper is the one with the toolbox.
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[ParaHandy]

Re: until the pips squeak .. ?

those who benefit from the growth in property asset values have a natural bent to extol the virtues of property as an investment. there's nothing unusual in this. it has been going on for centuries. in the middle of the 19th century railway assets, with the help of less than honest accounting methods, ballooned in value until intrinsic worth was far exceeded and they then collapsed. when the herd instinct takes over, common sense can fly out the window ... dependance on one single asset class is not wise and property is a uniquely brittish obsession which the inland revenue are awaiting the opportunity to tax

25 years ago rpi was at the bottom of a trough (7%) and within 2 years was 20%


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[AlexL]

I believe the majority of change will be not in the fundamental design of the yacht, but rather in the material / process and manufacturing. Like cars alot of the 'advancement' may well be in the fixture and fittings, rather than the fundamentals. Modern cars are safer, stiffer, more economical etc than their forebears but look fundamentally similar, the improvements are not imediately visible, but lie within the structure and the materials and the design process.
One side effect may be that as the ben, jen, bavs of the world gear up more and more for mass production techniques and the costs keep falling (I think this is a Good think - but thats another discussion) then there may well be room for another market, cheaper and smaller than your oysters and moody 50's but slightly more than your ben , jen, bavs - perhaps a company custom fitting out hulls - more lean manufacture than mass production .

Alex

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