The aerodynamics of sailing apparel

Investigation of sailing yacht aerodynamics using real time pressure and sail shape measurements at full scale

The steady and unsteady aerodynamic behaviour of a sailing yacht is investigated in this work by using full-scale testing on a Stewart 34. The aerodynamic forces developed by the yacht in real time are derived from knowledge of the differential pressures across the sails and the sail shape. Experimental results are compared with numerical computation and good agreement was found.

Reinforcement Sailing

This thesis examines applying reinforcement learning to sailing. We give two conceptually different models of a simple sailing boat. Standard tabular reinforcement learning is shown to be ineffective in controlling these naturally continuous models. We examine a method [Smith, 2001b] which adaptively quantises both the state and action spaces and show that it has similar performance to the tabu...

Mathematical Theory of Sailing

We show by computational solution of the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations with friction force boundary conditions, that the classical inviscid circulation theory by Kutta-Zhukovsky for lift and laminar viscous boundary layer theory by Prandtl for drag, which have dominated 20th century fluid dynamics, do not correctly describe the real turbulent airflow around a sail under tacking. We sho...

(Sailing to) Byzantium: the Kantian Sublime

Sailing through uncertainty.

choice but to pursue science. My dad wouldn’t accept anything but a science degree. He told me in no uncertain terms that if I really wanted to be an English major or a writer, as I said I did, I would need to figure out how to pay for college on my own. I chose a school 2000 miles from home and overloaded my schedule with literature classes that I claimed were required, but I wasn’t brave or i...