Author: Yrvind

YRVIND-TEN will hopefully be propulsed by three different kinds of forces, wind power muscle power and wave power. Here I will discuss wave power.

Whalers had observed that a dead whale floating on the surface sometimes made about one knot of speed due to wave action on the fluke. It is said that some of the seamen being of the lazy kind cut of a fluke and fastened it under their boat that they did have to row. Haven’t been there myself at the time I do not give my guarantee for the truth the above.

What is true and documented and still exists is a boat that was built in 1895 in Neaples Italy by Herman Linden. He worked at the Zoological Institute. He was watching the fishes and especially the dolphins as the moved by moving their tails. Somehow he got the idea to put a fin under a boat and get it to move with the help of wave power. He named the boat Autonaut because it moved by itself. The boat was 4 meter long and had a beam of 90 centimeter. The weight was 200 kilo. The weight of the fins was 40 kilos and part of the ballast. To everyone’s surprise it worked very well it made 3 – 4 knots of speed against the waves.

Many more boats was built and experimented with during the following years.

Einar Jakobsen was one of the experimenters. He had observed that a wooden board released from underwater was not floating straight up but gliding upwards at an angle. That gave him the idea. 1977 after some practical experiments did he build a foil that converted 80 % of the wave energy into propulsion. His foil hinged on an axis. Elastic spring regulated the angle of attack. A BBC TV-team filmed his boat making 6 knots against the wind. There is a lot of energy in the sea, on the average about 100-horse power per front meter. But then of course you have to leave flat water behind you.

In 2008 Japanese yachtsman Kenichi Horie wave powered his catamaran from Hawaii to Japan. The journey took 110 days.

Wave propulsion has seen a lot of promises and a lot of setbacks. The problem is, grownups always want bigger and bigger things. Some things are intended for small things. Galileo was the first one to scientifically explain why scaling up a small successful idea does not work. Among engineers it is called the square cube law. If you double the scale of a structure the surfaces increase by the square that is four times but the volumes increases by the cube that is eight times. The strength is in proportion to surfaces load is in proportion to weight. That explains a lot of things among other why small things are stronger than bigger ones. That is why it easy to build a short bridge and why it becomes more and more difficult the longer they get.  It explains why birds only grow to about ten feet wingspan. It explains why a wave-propelled boat is better being small.

If you are small you can get away with things that are impossible for big creatures. Some small spiders spin a thread when they feel like traveling. The thread being light is caught by the wind. When the spider judges it long enough he lets go of the ground and flies to his desired destination. To land he eats up his thread, recycling it. It is protein after all. Being small he has a happy landing. He has been flying without using non-replaceable fossil fuels. Lets do like the small spider and not like the grownups. Like what is small and natural. Support small projects.

At the moment I am trying to integrate wave power propulsion in the YRVIND-TENs rudder system. I have some good ideas but there is as usual some interference with other functions. Nothing is as much fun as solving problems.

To be continued…

Regards Yrvind.

YRVIND-TEN has two rudders. They are angled outwards 20 degrees and backwards 20 degrees. They pivot (not shown in the modell) as not to break if hitting ice or taking the ground. Each rudder has a top and a bottom bearing. Between them is the tiller or arm. A rod connects the two rudders via the arms. The connecting rod is telescopic. ( not shown)The reason is that in strong following winds each rudder can be angled outwards by shortening the connecting rod. This has a bit the same effect as a drogue. It slows the boat down and make it directional stable. If the boat deviates from it downward course the lee rudder gets a bigger angle of attack while the windward rudder will get less angle of attack. The resulting force will restore the boat to its downwind track.

The steering is done with ropes. Tackles (not shown) provide the correct power ratio.

The bottom bearings is fastened to platform close to the water handy when getting in and out of the water. I intend to swim every day if the weather is not to bad. That will contribute to keep me fit. There is a step on each rudder.

This platform makes it easy to raise and lower the rudders. Hopefully I will develop a water generator that fit the lower part of the rudder, likewise a foil that with the help of wave power propels the boat in calms.

The pictures below show the first model. The scale is 1:2. The real product will be bolted to the transom with four screws. The model is very rough, not more than a mock up and many details are not included. If the concept is difficult to grasp blame me. Better models and explanations will be shown in course of the building.

The connecting rod and the stearing ropes can be seen where the plywood is screved to the particle board.  That position is chosen so that it will not interfere with me getting in and out of the water. I have used pieces from my scrap pile. the big round hole has nothing to do with this project.

In the picture below the stearing lines can be seen crossing each other on the transom. The crossing is to make the boat stear the conventional way. One can also re-learn. I chose to go conventional. Not everyone does. A freind of mine reads upside down. He learnt to read himself at a young age by looking at his fathers newspapers across the breacfast table. He can also read the conventional way. Click on the pictures once or twice to enlarge them.

ADDENDUM Sunday 18 Nov 2012

After sleeping on it I realsise that if I add one more sheave to the block fastened to the connecting bar the ropes do not have to cross each other. That will be a neater solution.

To be continued…

Regards Yrvind.

Here is the beginning of my bunk. Becouse much of the sailing will be done in the winter using no heater and no fossil feul I will do plenty of insulating. The hull thanks to the sandwich construktion and Divinycell gives in itself excellent insulation. Still there will be many months of winter sailing therefore inside that insulated hull is an insulated box that is my bunk.

The first step is shown fixing the position of the aft side. I use four sticks of equal lenght to get the planes parralell.

The below picture show how I have have attached the bunkside with epoxy filler. When it sets I will remove the sticks and the clamps to get better acces.

To be continued…

Regards Yrvind.

When building a small boat, deep clamps are good to have. When my former small boat laboratory was illegaly attacked by the oil company (It was situated right on top the worlds lagerst stock pile of oil, 2.7 million cubik meters which they now intended to use. The stock pile was originally intended to be used in the eventuell war against the Sowjet Union, now the oil company planned to use my land. Only problem was my lack of respect for big buisness )  I won the battle but  lost a lot of tools and had to mowe to the other side of Sweden.

To expose the oil companys illigel action I had made a counter attack on their head quarter using smoke grenades in front of most of the Swedish news media including four TV-teams

The alarm went, the police was on its way the companys security force seized me

Minutes later the CEO was informed. Of course the last ones he wanted on the place was the police that would have taken the case to court and exposed there criminal activity even more. They police were ordered back and I released. The action topped the Swedish news that day. I won the battle but the locals did get angry they lost a lot of emplyment and I had to leave town a half finished boat and most of my tools. In my book Konstruktören you can find a chapter dealing with the episode.

Just a few weeks ago I replaced two of the lost 50 cm ( 20 inches ) deep clamps. Today I needed one of them. I was setting the lids of the Yrvind-cleats in bedding compound but could not get enough pressure on them to make it flow. I had tried with my hand I had used the stronger muscles of my leg to give my foot enough pressure on them, to no effect. Finally with the help of the heavy deep clamps it went easy as butter. I was pleased.

By clicking twice on the picture you may just see a bit of black bedding compound beind squized out.

To bee continued…

Regards Yrvind.

I now have a phone that can take pictures. Just for fun I put a 1:10 scale model of myself on the spreader. There are two stepps on each mast in addition to the 30 cm high deckshouse that is not on the mock-up modell.

I like to climb things and it will be a lot of fun to run up in the mast and have a look around now and then. It will also give me some excersice.

To be continued…

Regards Yrvind.

600 days of nonstop sailing, mostly in the southern ocean will very likely expose us to strong winds. Although I will endeavor to make the masts sturdy it will be nice to have a simple way to increase their strengths.

The following pictures shows one way of doing that. I will place a horizontal strut between the masts at about half their height. The strut can also be used for exercises and lookout. From the strut where it connects to the masts Dynema ropes extend down to the deck, to strongpoints, my Yrvind-cleats acting as super-strong chainplates. The shroud angles are never less than 26 degrees. Half that angle 13 degrees is ample. The haliard is now down to half the mast hight. This reduceses the compression and bending appreciably.

I do not think it will take long to set it up, especially after getting some practice. The masts are very close to the hatch and with one mast on each side the operating area will be very steady.

The below pictures shows a one to ten scale mock up of the idea. The first picture shows the port side of the model slightly from foreward with the wind in from foreward.

The second picture show the boat with the wind from starbord slightly from behind on the same tack.

The below picture shows the model going downwind. The nice thing about the balanced lug sail is that the downhaul can be mowed. The sail is not attached to the mast. In this scenario the dawnhaul is on the Yrvind-cleat on the bow on the starbord side. I all of the pictures the sail on tha other mast is rolled into its casset and lashed to the deck.

The last picture shows the same set up but from behind-

To be continued…

Regards Yrvind.

The most convenient and safest departure point for my circumnavigation is Hobart in Tasmania, Australia.

There are however two big problems, logistics and bureaucracy. They give me pimples.

These problems we do not have in Europe. Last year I took my boat on a trailer to Kinsale Ireland. The only hassle was the Calais Dower crossing. I blame it on the English. They always like to complicate things. To get on the ferries between Sweden and Denmark and between Denmark and Germany all one had to do was to pay in drive through gate, elapsed time about one minute. Not that it was very difficult to park the car in Calais and find the office and there do the paying but why?

Leaving Ireland for Madeira was no problem at all I just left. In fact the authorities did not even like to talk to me. I had tried that before first when I sailed a fifteen footer to Newfoundland and later when I sailed a Vega to Florida.

My project goes very well and the more I work on it the better it seams. The Kinsale starting point will add a lot of miles to the journey. The total will something like 30000 nautical miles with an estimated average speed of 2 knots it will take 600 days. Can a ten-footer have that kind of autonomy? At first it seams impossible. Will my 400 kilo food last that long? A little calculation shows that in fact there is an ample margin. For example muesli is about 370 kcal per 100 gram. 370×4000 (400 kilo muesli ) gives 1.48 million kcal. That will give me 2467 kcal per day.

A calorie calculator for a man 67 kilo 1.67 meter long age 75 years says he shall not eat more than 1855 kcal per day if not to gain weight. 1.48 million divided by 1855 gives 797.8 days or 800 days a margin of 200 days. As far as food goes, therefore no problem, besides I use fewer calories than most. I easily gain weight.

Sailing a small boat in the southern ocean is not the same as staying in an old person home. Still compared to my active life ashore just sitting in the boat for 600 days is not the best. But just sitting is not what I intend to do.

I hope to have a pedal- and crank operated generator to move my arm and legs a bonus is the electricity. Between the side-by-side masts I insert a bar for chin-ups etc. Also there will be a lot of water around the boat to be swum. Up here in Scandinavia there is a special breed of people, the winter bathers. They cut a hole in the ice and skin dip. When living on the island of Tjörn I was on my way to become one. Twice a week I went for swims. I had hoped to do it the whole winter through but in December I mowed to Västervik. Here it is not as convenient.

I can do with a bit more books. Luckily there is a lot happening on the e-book-reader market. E-paper uses no electricity when reading only when you turn the page. Unfortunately the different brands are not all compatible with each other. I like to read books in several languages. Some of the e-book-readers do have dictionaries, however I am not shore you have to be on line to have access to the base. What brand do I chose? Probably several different ones, time will tell.

A problem is that I will be away from my dentist for a long time. I remember reading about a German dentist one of the early settlers on the Galapagos Islands. It was in the thirties bad times in Germany for some. He had decided on a safer place. Most craftsmen suboptimise. He had seen enough of dental problems to realize that the last thing he wanted were to live on an isolated island with toothache. He pulled all his teeth and made himself false teeth of platinum. Unfortunately he became allergic to platinum. I will consult my dentist.

Regards Yrvind.

Cleats are important hardware. The conventional ones are easy to use but other ropes gets caught in them and they are only strong in one direction. Also if more than one rope are atched to them only the last one can be released. the Yrvind-cleat adress these problems.

On YRVIND TEN there will be ten of these cleats. Four are placed on the hull a bit above the waterline, handy for anchor-line for hauling the boat upp on a rock and for attaching a rope around the boat when out swimming. Below are some pictures showing the first four ones. Click once or twice on them to enlarge.

To make it extra strong I removed the Divinycell core. First I drilled the five boult holes through the outer laminate.

With the help of a insex key I smasched the core.

With the help of compressed air and hemostatic forceps (Rudolf – German quality ) I got the pieces out.

It is very important that the surfaces do not get contaminated by oil. I use an oilfree AERFAST compressor.

Here is the fitting.

The space where once the Divinycell was has been filled with glassfibre clippings sized for epoxy with the help of a pair of twezers, then epoxy has been injected. Below the fitting there is now 2 inches, 5 cm solid glassfibre laminate. It is attached with five 8 mm high tensile steel boults from Bulten. The base of the fitting is six millimeter stainless steel the rod diameter is 12 mm. It is strong enough to lift several fully loaded YRVIND TEN.

Inside is a back up plate and extra strong washers.

To drill the holes straight the 5 cm distance I used a mirror, see a previus post.

Now half of the time the sailing will be done in wintertime. to Awoid cold spots I cover the backing plates with divinycell lids. Holes for the nuts are routed out.

checking that the lid fits.

Next I will glue the lids in place.

Some may say this is overkill. To those I ansver. I endeavor to do my best. To make evrything so strong and good as I can. Not neccesarily that it will be needed. This is in cotrast to our society where everything is made just to be barely functional. One reason I build this boat is that it makes me proud and happy. Therefore I do my best and when I look at the result I am filled with joy. It is worth while. An other thing, sailing a boat those built in stormy waters makes for good sleep. By definition the cause of accidents is always a surprise. This kind of boat has redundancy built in.

To bee continued…

Regards Yrvind.

Ignorant persons describe my planned trip as a suicide mission. There are exceptions. This gentleman defended me by writing in Wall Street Journal: All the signs of a suicidal personality are there–enthusiasm, confidence, zest for life, building something that has never been built before, big plans for the future. By golly, you must be right!

I like that. Of course the very idea that I have thoughts of suicide is wrong. My boat and me are sane. A small boat well made is safer than a big one. It is less complicated and smaller forces are acting on it. On a small boat you have more control.

As for myself I was raised on the windward side of a small Island in the North Sea and as a grown up person I have messed about in small boats for more than fifty years. I have in small homemade boats contented spent more than a year in those southern stormy waters called roaring forties and screaming fifties. That includes passage in a nineteen feet boat, east to west around Cape Horn in June, the full southern winter. And that was before GPS-navigation. The sun did not rise more than 11 degrees above horizon at noon. Compared to that modern navigation is easy. I know what I talking about and I know what to expect.

Most people misunderstand life. Let me explain.

Comfort does not make you happy, on the contrary it is dangerous to your health. It makes you lazy, fat and bored.  It is only by using energy that you can create energy and it is the surplus of energy that makes you happy and healthy. Happiness cannot be bought for money.

Man adapts. The human being is the most adaptable creature in the universe.

When a person smokes more dopamine than needed is released. Dopamine is part of natures feedback system that helps us to survive. This nicotine release creates a momentarily happiness not connected to surviving. To restore homeostasis the body adapts by reducing its dopamine receptors. In the same way as a sensible farmer would reduce the area he cultivates if it suddenly started to grow more food than he needed.

When the dopamine receptors are artificially over stimulated. The size of the receptors is reduced and the smoker becomes a slave to nicotine. Smoking is short sighted.

Borrowing money for consumption is also short sighted. It is pleasant momentarily but the borrower becomes a slave to the bank. Borrowing is a disaster in the long run.

Daily I use a bicycle to transport myself. Occasionally when leaving for a different part of Sweden to give a talk I use my car. By pressing the accelerator I can climb steep hills with no effort. It is pleasant and my body adapts quickly. It learns that going uphill can be easy and fast. The next day when I am back on my bike climbing a hill I am in for a surprise. It is laborious. My body has adapted to the ease of driving. It has been addicted to the power of oil. Had I not used my will power and returned to my bike and used effort to climb hills I would have become a slave to my car.

In a thousand ways our civilization over stimulates us. Not just by nicotine, by cars or by lending us money. Most people nowadays are slaves to many masters.

As with all addictions we need more drugs, more borrowed money, bigger cars and bigger boats. We get deeper and deeper into trouble and misery.

With my voyage I hope to show mankind that, luckily there is an opposite way, a more natural, sane and ecological way to be happy. Slowly as I have gained insight I have made myself less and less dependent on stimulants, I have become less and less a slave. I have never used coffee, beer, vine, or tobacco, not even once. Twenty years ago I stopped drinking tee. I have no TV. Ten years ago I stopped listening to the radio. It took about a year for me to get detoxed. Now I need no radio. I hear my inner voice loud and clear. I do my own thinking.

The way indigenous people orient themselves in nature and navigate at sea is amazing; still a Swedish man born into such a society at a young age will acquire the same skill.

Blind persons compensates by developing other senses like hearing to guide them through life.

Feelings and moods is nature’s way to guide animals and us to a behavior that favors survival. Animals are not bored, except caged in a zoo.  What makes us different from animals is not feelings but control over feelings by the frontal lobes. We use alcohol to anaesthetize them when we like to relax.

In my planned trip I will be at sea for more than a year. There I will be protected from over stimulation. Hopefully that way I will gain much of my senses potential power and increase the clarity of my mind. A voyage like my planned one will give plentiful stimulation. I aim to come back a younger man to start building a nice small cruising boat; one not restricted by a ridicules ten feet rule.

These thoughts are old fashioned. They have been around for thousands of years. They can be found in all ancient civilizations in one form or other they are based on fundamental principles, but as no one makes money on them money is not spent to advertise them.

Regards Yrvind.

Orthogonal, perpendicular, normal, square and right angle, we have many names for the things we love. And right angles are one of the cornerstones of our modern civilization and for good reasons, without them everything would be crocked. It is so basic that even our Euclidian space is defined by it with the help of the Pythagorean theorem.

Even boat builders are well served by right angles. But it is not always easy create them.

Here is a trick. Use a mirror. A straight line reflected into a mirror continues as a straight line into the mirror only if it is at right angles to the mirrors surface. The pictures below illustrates the point.

Click once or twice on the pictures to enlarge.

On the picture below I do not hold the stick at right angle to the mirror

In the picture below the stick is at right angle to the mirror.

My boat has a very thick hull, almost 50 mm or 2 inches. Now I like to fit strong points with backingplates, each having five bolts, hence the holes have to be at right angles to the surface. You may have noticed the mirror image of the drill when drilling into shiny surfaces like polished metall, when holding the drill at right angles it looks like a stright line. When it extra difficult I use a mirro with a hole in it to drill a pilot hole as seen in the picture below.

Below is a picture of the fitting and its backing plate. In the background is the 40 mm Divinycell core.

To be continued…

Regards Yrvind.