The 2025 Yacht - What will it look like?

Shifting ballast, either by pumps in multihulls, or swing-keel in monohull.

Catamaran with pumped ballast, constructed as relatively simple beam between two hulls, upcurved to support a pod, gravity driven damped gimballed. Connection of hull to beam will use cheaply sourced automobile components such as shockaborbers. Unstayed masts on the cathulls, rigged a la freedom.

Now for reality: much the same as today!

<hr width=100% size=1>Black Sugar - the sweetest of all
 
Thanks for your views everyone.

Dangerous to forecast as one is usually only correct if lucky, but briefly I think there will be advances in materials for hull and rigs, and in production boats (putting the price differential between custom builds and production boats even further apart) - all as some have mentioned. Perhaps higher level production boats will become comparatively cheaper if labour costs in the build can be lessened through automation?

Outside of the race boat arena in which extremes can be tolerated, I am not sure that there is alot to learn with respect to hydrodynamics in the near term. But, and I don't think this was mentioned, all boats are compromises so I feel there will be some advances in achieving a better overall sailability, comfort and accomodation result through different combinations of aspects of hull and appendage design. Faults such as slamming, broaching, etc. may be lessened while still maintaining speed performance, comfort and accommodation volume.

With luck I will see out 2025, hope you all do too.

John

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Extending current trends - or not.

Human activity rarely changes direction completely, rather it does more of what it was doing before. Thus I offer two choices.

1. We'll have more of what we have today. 2025's AWB will offer four aft cabins each with integral bath/shower, have a full length deck saloon, plastic roller furlling sails, standing rigging with the diameter of piano wire and a AVS of 91 degrees. Or

2. Some terrible disasters will have happened with 2003 AWB's such that the manufacturers have had the arses sued off them and have all gone out of business. Thus 2025's boats will be built by old fellers with pencils behind their ears to seaworthy un-sued designs dating from the last century, from the likes of Kim Holman.

Remember, you read it here first.

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.writeforweb.com/twister1>Let's Twist Again</A>
 
Re: Extending current trends - or not.

And if OldSaltOz is right and cats are the thing, then maybe we will have AWC's with eight aft cabins each with integral bath and shower!

PS. I liked your knees below the waterline when standing on the saloon sole test you stated elsewhere (at least I think it was you). Think we make it reasonably comfortably (but no way achieve the hips though) but will certainly be doing the test this weekend - hope I don't need my thigh boots to do it by accidently getting the waterline inside the boat!

John

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Unstayed carbon masts, soft wing sails, electric auxiliary drives, of course.

Hopefully the sail will also be a solar panel and the genny will run on hydrogen, electrolysed from the briny by the sail.

Oil will be scarcer than whisky so all boats will be built of wood by robots that always get the bevels right first time and don't complain about a sore back.

<hr width=100% size=1><A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.qei.co.uk/spark>http://www.qei.co.uk/spark</A>
 
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