Rolf, I have never seen sharp edges on the bow of any boat/cat. They are blunt enough not to stall and generate lift when sailing upwind. So cutting them away for aerdynamic reasons is not as clever as some people think. You will find a chapter in Marchaj's book about some of the effects involved.
I have a furling genaker on my boat. I sailed the boat with and without it, never realised any difference, so I don`t care even if it is an easy exercise to calculate it. I wouldn't care about the drag of a snuffer as well, maybe about the blocked airstream to the trampoline. But only if I am bored and want to invent problems
Maybe somebody else has tested his boat with and without snuffer and can us tell the difference?
There is some references to pratical experience on sailing without spi gear earlier in the thread and on the F16 class forum. I think we can agree that there is a difference and that the difference is due to increased drag.(AAGH! I got to stop connecting drag with The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert)
About bows and drag. You should know..
John Shuttleworth had an article about how he loocked at minimizing drag from wind passing over the hull in his Tektron and Dogstar designs. He reported that the optimalization done was worth the effort as far as I remember. The articles I read about the design and build phase of Cogito said similar things. They looked at minimizing drag from the platform.
Minimizing exposed area and rounding off surfaces sounds like a logical thing to do to reduce drag? Please do share your thoughts. Interesting topic and something that we can adjust as compared to drag from our bodies while trapeezing.
Is this drag tiny compared to going the wrong way or not knowing how to trim the sails.. Indeed
Doug,
hope you succeed and get finally get that F16
