OK, I know it's a little early for this, but we got 10" of snow yesterday, it's going to be 5 below zero tonite, there's ice forming on the lake and two weeks till the Winter begins. I was amazed at the speeds attained and can understand the liabilties involved in the Ice Flyer. Any one have/built this kit?http://iceflyer.com/picture/gor00_7.jpg
Preface:
Ice Flyer ice boat has been around since 1993 (inspired by an article in Wooden boat magazine on the large rear sail ice boats on the US East coast) and the wheel version since about 1997. Both ice and land versions have seen some huge refinement since then. Ice Flyer was a commercial interest until the summer of 2001 and the builder stopped production due to a variety of reasons (none to do with how well the boat works - were still finding this unique design extremely interesting).
Although no longer in production (in the US), these boats are quite unique in how they sail so we've kept up the web site as a free source of information (pardon the sometime "commercial look" that is left over). The boat was originally constructed of wood and fairly detailed plans including templates are available as free down loads on this web site and the intention is to keep these plans up to date with the "evolution" of the boat..
Unfortunately, all that is available are the free plans. No parts are currently available and no fiberglass bodies are available. If you own an Ice Flyer and need some sort of parts support, please contact info1 "at" iceflyer.com (replace "at" with @). If you don't own a boat, we unfortunately just can't supply parts.
We'll still try to answer email but sometimes it gets overwhelming and may not always get answered. However, the questions asked are a lot of times useful in knowing what on the web site or plans is not clear and needs to be upgraded.
What is unique about the way the Ice Flyer sails? It makes a great little ice boat that converts to a dirt boat and is comfortable and has a light air sailing threshold right up there with the best. But the thing that really sets it apart is that it's a screaming little fighter jet in higher winds!!!! Its unique turning balancing is similar to a performance sports car and there is probably not any other design that has either the control or maneuverability in high winds.. This characteristic was also one of the things that made it scary liability wise as a business – people would sail Ice Flyer's in some big insane winds – Liability disclaimer – don't sail in high winds, it can be dangerous (you can get flipped, always make sure the tripod stay "roll bar" is in good shape)!!! The design also had a good safety record despite the sometimes really violent sailing done over the years. The safety of the design probably has something to do with the upright sitting position having good visibility and allowing the effective use of seat belts (and a good quality helmet which tends to be a little heavier). Of course, the seat belts could result in drowning if someone went in the water and wasn't prepared to get out of them so they are also not without risk.
In about 2000, the rear beam started to develop a "ground effect" inverted down force foil shape and this has had a fairly dramatic influence on the boats performance, especially in lighter winds. It's probably also had an influence on the boats peak speed. For quite a few years, the peak speed of the boat seemed to be around 64 mph. However, in the spring of 2002 landsailing down in New Mexico on a day with winds in the mid 30’s to mid 40’s mph, two Ice Flyer’s were recording speeds around 72 mph (possibly up to 75 mph – GPS was used which is always questionable but multiple readings confirmed this). There are probably two reasons for this increase in speed. The first is that both boats had the rear beam inverted foil down force shape. The second possible reason was that both guys had purchased hand cranks for “really” downhauling the sails earlier that year. This is probably the fastest anyone has taken a windsurfing sail and possibly the fastest anyone has taken a round mast?
If you bought one of the glass boats, you should consider building the 9 foot foiled beam shown in the plans section (take a lot of care to align the runners).
One final question that gets asked commonly: Can I use iceboats in snow? In general, if you live in an area that has safe ice and periodically gets cleared of snow, iceboats are going to produce some impressive performance. They will also sail with some snow on the ice but it usually needs to be fairly fresh. Once the snow melts and re-freezes or gets very deep, iceboats don't work very well even with skis. Ice boats work because you get very low forward drag and very high side drag. Blades in deep snow have too much forward drag and skis have both fairly high forward drag and also not enough side drag (or bite).
Please enjoy the site; it is usually always being updated (we quit manufacturing but definitely are still sailing).
Ice Flyer
http://iceflyer.com/picture/gor00_7.jpg
