RC Sailboat & Model Sailing Guide

The video is for a RC Car, but can be as well used for a RC Sailboat

Here’s how to shorten your servo leads in a neat fashion.  Sometimes they’re just a little too long for your application so you want to shorten them up a little bit so they’re not hanging all over the place.

First thing you want to do is cut a small section of any fitting off or or other plastic tube, so you can use it to wrap around your wire.  You only need to cut about 2 sections of the plastic tube; each about 1/8” wide.  Then, you slide your section of fuel tubing over a pair of needle-nose pliers.  Take your servo wire and fold it to shorten it’s length.  Now use the pair of needle-nose pliers to stretch the fuel fitting over your wire.

And that’s it.  Nice and neat and ready to go in your RC Sailboat.

Known for their amazing speed, these Marshallese Outrigger (called rewuits by the locals) rewuits can cross a 5 mile lagoon in just 15-20 minutes! And with an amazing ability to stay on course as they don’t use any remote control or other self control.

Marshallese Outrigger in full speed

Majuro, capital of the Republic of Marshall Island, rests on the tip of a 10,000 feet tall limestone spire of a reef caused by some volcanic eruption thousands of years ago. In one of its windward bays is home to famous sailing competitions for model Marshallese Outriggers or what locals refer to as “rewuits”. Annual races are held for these model sailboats that are fashioned after the traditional Marshallese Outrigger.

Their unique architecture includes an asymmetrical hull that allows the sailboat to sail right into the direction of the wind. It outrigger is a shock absorption system which improves the boat’s glide and efficiency and at the same time, maximizes the strength that can be taken from a gust of wind. On an ideal day for sailing when the tide is high and winds are stronger, locals and even government leaders enjoy an afternoon of sailing with their rewuits by the bay. When properly set up, these rewuits sail on a straight line relative to the wind. It is self steering in a sense that when waves hit or knock it, it instantly corrects course. No matter the enormous speeds that these rewuits display, they still stay on the course as provided by the hull and outrigger innovation that balances the sailboat no matter the direction of the wind.

This impressive sailboat design was fashioned by early Marshall Islanders for easy and fast navigation in the atoll thousands of years ago. They were made in such precision that a small canoe seating a maximum of two people requires communal effort for 8 months.

Here is a site on the background of the Marshallese Outrigger and on the bottom a link to the free model sailboat plans with detailed description on the parts of the Winner of the ‘Marshall Islands Independence Day Race 2000’

Marshallese Outrigger Model Sailboat Plan

Being always interested in more RC Sailboat Plans I recently tested this offer on eBay.

Model Boat Plans DVD

This Model Boat DVD Compilation has all together over 600 plans + a number of how to documents. It definitely could use a little bit better organizatio of all the pictures and plans provided.

But all in all it was worth it’s money, especially when you consider how much easier it is to browse through a DVD than dozends of different websites for days to find even half the plans you can find on this DVD. For anybody looking for plans I can recommed to check it out. Click here

This brilliant concept (called “The Sea Slipper”) by Johnn ‘Trike’ Schroeder uses underwater wings to stablize a catamaran. The wings allow to stablize the catamarn even by hard wind and removing the typical long keel used by RC Sailboat which limits where you can sail it.

The concept came Johnn while working on his model rocket car (did I mention he is a RC genius)! After some discussions on the concept he wrote me a fantastic 6 page article explaining it in every detail including drawings. I want to thank him again and again for this.

I will post this article in parts as it is simply to long for one blog post. If you want to get the full article immediately or have any questions on the concept contact me

SEA SLIPPER high performance catamaran top view

The Concept in detail

Sea Slipper Control system Figure 1

The idea is simple as a concept, the ‘wings’ are used to create a counter force to the heeling motion imparted to the hull by the wind loading the sail/rigging and tilting the boat over.  This is usually countered by a deep bulb keel.  If you wanted to sail a RC boat, in say a shallow reflecting pond, the deep keel boats might not be able to pull it off.  To see how this works, let us look at the idea of a simple pendulum sensor to detect hull motion from side to side, but prevented from swinging fore and aft.

Sea Slipper Control system Figure 2

As the magnet swings over a hall-effect sensor, the magnetic field is detected, and a signal generated to tell the control circuit that a positional displacement has taken place.  This signal is used to create a positional displacement of the wing on a hull, to compensate for the roll effect.  A left leaning of the hull would cause the wing to create a right ‘lift’ to counter the displacement.  A harder lean would generate a harder countering force to the right to keep the hull as close to vertical as possible.  By how the sensors are located, and the number of ‘sensing’ steps used, a moderate heeling force would be allowed, and then a steady correction force can be generated to keep the hull firmly in control.

This same sensor system, using a pendulum fixed to swing only fore and aft, would adjust the wing sets to assist in smoothing the pitching motions of a small model in ‘non-scale’ waters (i.e. our world!)  Or if used on a full sized boat, it would aid in the ride of increasing wave action.  In this manner, 2-axis control would give the wings a dual action capability that would stabilize the craft and smooth the ride for better control (and for full-scale boats ease the motion for landlubbers like stabilizers on a cruise ship.)

As can been seen in the drawing of the model in Fig. 3, the craft has both a front and a rear set of split wings to give rapid easy control to sea conditions.  The split wing design allows half the wing to go up while the other goes down to create the anti-heel response with smaller wing movements.  Secondly, for a pitch correction (up or down) the wings will move together to counter pitch together as if a fixed wing. 

The next part discusses how this control system can be realised with a RC Sailboat. If you want the full article immediately or have any questions on the concept contact me

About the Author/Designer of the Sea Slipper Concept:

I’m a Mechanical Designer with an electronics background and degree, so I married my work and hobbies for increased fun and develop new ways to spend my money in strange ways (according to my wife!)
This is a winter project with an eye towards exploring electronic control to ease the job of the skipper (be it RC or full-sized), and give them a fast, better controlled boat.  The concept came to me as I developed a flap system for a model rocket car.  See Fig. 1 (to keep the dang thing on the ground, instead of becoming airborne so easy.  The last hit Mach 2 eighty feet off the ground!)