MaxOVol A flying Maxi Trimaran for solo ocean yacht racing

The key issue when considering the naval architecture, engineering and operating of a competition yacht is to be able to rapidly transform sail power as effectively as possible in the correct direction, while ensuring on-board safety.

Naval architecture, spurred on by the Americas Cup, has made considerable advances in recent years towards making modern multihulls fly over the ocean, by relying on aerodynamics. The object of the MaxOVol project is to design a flying competition multihull for a round-the-world record. The multihull will be designed to be faster than traditional yachts in swells of up to 2 metres and to be handled solo in optimum safety conditions. The aim is to enable it to fly in open sea and to replace controlling the appendages (foils and T-foil rudders) – normally carried out by the crew – with a self-regulating system.

The MaxOVol project will rely on several innovations in particular:

- Designing self-stabilizing, fault-tolerant appendages – Designing a lighter, reliable structure for the yacht’s hybrid functioning,

- Developing active control systems,

- Developing numerical yacht-design tools.

Photos courtesy of: Yvan Zedda/Gitana SA