Ferrari has unveiled the latest design and engineering innovations developed for its Hypersail yacht.
The project has been conceived as a research and development platform, to deliver new solutions for ocean sailing through collaboration across different disciplines.
The team under the coordination of Ferrari’s aerodynamicist Panayiotis Agathangelou, is aiming to promote the most advanced ideas, expertise, practices, and tools.
To develop the rig and sails of the Hypersail yacht, the team is working with North Sails designers and with multiple world champion Glenn Ashby, who is bringing his experience, vision and insight as both a world-class skipper and designer to the project.
Thanks to this system, the number of sail changes — which can often be problematic — will be greatly reduced.
Giovanni Soldini
A D-section mast paired with a double skin mainsail, similar to the one developed for the America’s Cup AC75s, will be used, applied for the first time to ocean racing.
The double skin mainsail will be mounted on cars and tracks, rather than a traditional luff groove, which the developers say would not have allowed for efficient reefing.
“This disruptive choice will allow us to adapt the profile of our mainsail to the wind conditions: we will be able to change the socalled ‘camber’ of the sail depending on wind angle and strength, which is comparable to having a mainsail with five or six gears instead of two,” said Giovanni Soldini, team principal of Ferrari Hypersail.
“Thanks to this system, the number of sail changes — which can often be problematic — will be greatly reduced, with clear benefits to the boat’s efficiency and performance.”
Innovating and tackling challenges
And Giovanni explained that the team has collaborated with a range of experts to come up engineer the concept, ‘those with America’s Cup expertise in rig and sail design and use, and those with vast experience in ocean racing’.
“Once again, bringing together different cultures allowed us to innovate and tackle great challenges,” he explained.
With the mast playing a central role in shaping the sails, the Hypersail team designed the mast and sails together as part of a single aerodynamic package.
To support the double mainsail, the D-section mast is stepped on a spherical bearing and features a rotation capacity of over 45 degrees to either side.
Shorter design times
Integrating aerodynamic methodologies development tools with from the high-performance automobile industry into Ferrari’s Hypersail yacht has enabled advanced calculations that have shortened design times.
The yacht is a 100ft ocean-racing monohull prototype, designed to fly stably on three contact points.
One foil is linked to a canting keel, with the other support points being a rudder and, alternately, the two lateral foils.
The craft is currently under construction in Italy, and scheduled for launch in 2026.
