Marschassault…if you follow Bill’s posts on the subject he has given specific engineering data for why he has not limited his ARC 22 design to 8.5’ beam. He has given example after example of why 8.5’ catamarans are stuck in the doldrums of PN# of +- 60.

As far as an 8.5' ARC 22 or SC20...look on their web site and you will find the ARC 21...it is designed at 8.5' beam.

I am interested in methods of overcoming the land-based problem of transportation rather than compromising on the water. I understand the Shark does it with hinges, but there you are dealing with a hard deck…it seems to me that someone could design a hinge system that would work with the 4” or 4-1/2” round aluminum beams that are commonly used. Given that we have vastly superior technology (compared to WWII) the ability to design on CAD, and to cut it out with CNC without expensive tooling, it should be doable.

I just finished a course on Autodesk Inventor 7, a parametric modeling program...I would think that it, or something like it, would be up to the task...you can even animate it showing it in its extended (locked position) and folding up...

Bob