DailyDirt: Traveling Fast Via Waterways

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

An enormous amount of cargo travels by boat, and historically, sea transport has been the largest carrier of freight. However, traveling over water isn't a very speedy mode of transportation (typically <20 mph), but there are some possible ways to go faster (though they don't come cheap). Here are just a few examples of sea-going ships that would definitely beat a slow boat to China. If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.
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Filed Under: boats, cargo, ekranoplan, ground effect, hydrofoil, ships, submarines, supercavitation, transportation, wing in ground
Companies: boeing


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  1. identicon
    Anonymous Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2014 @ 5:57pm

    Winged Hulls

    Winged hulls are not new.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2013_America%27s_Cup,_race_1,_mark_1.JPG

    Sailing faster than the wind is not new either. I remember taking a Hobie Cat out, with four passengers (one more than the recommended limit), on a small lake in Massachusetts (where I was teaching a small craft camp for some organisation or other back in the late 70's) and had a head wind of around 8 knots (if you are familiar, the wind speed can be determined from the water surface conditions). As we gained speed the wind came around to the aft quarter. Eventually, we achieved a speed that exceeded the 'hull speed' of the pontoon designs. This caused what is known as tripping (where a hull driven faster than its design will 'submarine' or the bow wake vs the stern wake cause the bow to be pulled down while the stern wake is pushing up) at which point I let go of the sail, as I did not want to get wet at that time.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Anonymous Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2014 @ 5:59pm

    Re: Hydrofoils in action

    Your links are better than mine.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Anonymous Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2014 @ 7:07pm

    Re: Winged Hulls

    It occurs to me that I got part of that backward, and left out an important aspect, apparent wind. The true wind was behind at the start (or on a stern quarter), and moved forward (apparent wind) as speed was gained.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apparent_wind

    As I remember, and that is suspect, the hull speed of a Hobie 16 is around 24 knots, with an aft true wind speed of 8 knots, we overcame the true wind and 'created our own' wind. The effect of the apparent wind, as it moved forward with increased boat speed to over 24 knots, caused the eventual 'tripping' effect.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 29 Sep 2014 @ 8:27pm

    750mph sub

    In an ocean without obstacles this sounds like a great idea.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 29 Sep 2014 @ 10:44pm

    Re: Sailing faster than the wind is not new either

    But how about sailing faster than the wind, propelled only by the wind, downwind?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    Anonymous Anonymous Coward, 30 Sep 2014 @ 8:23am

    Re: Re: Sailing faster than the wind is not new either

    Um, this was originally downwind (note my correction) that ended up close hauled or upwind, as the apparent wind moved forward. So, we achieved a speed of 24+ knots, into the apparent wind, after having started with an 8 knot tail wind.

    After sleeping on this, I have also remembered that it could not have been the late 1970's, as I was not in Massachusetts at that time, it had to be '74 or '75. Details, I know...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. icon
    OldMugwump (profile), 30 Sep 2014 @ 8:39am

    Umm...

    Re subs, the water has to be moved out of the way (and then back again afterward). That would require an insane amount of power for anything as large as a manned submarine. I strongly suspect this is meant for torpedoes only.

    Re "wing in ground", I'm pretty sure you mean "wing in ground effect". Dirt is pretty draggy, y'know.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. icon
    JustMe (profile), 30 Sep 2014 @ 9:38am

    Just waiting for another update from Anonymous Anonymous Coward

    I am really loving this serialized story. I think we need more of these at Techdirt. Will Hobie Industries pursue AAC for violating both the recommended passenger loading and the speed? Ohh, the excitement.

    link to this | view in thread ]


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