Autonomous sailing world record – feasibility plan hydrofoil design and performance benefits

Autonomous sailboats are used in industry for a variety of reasons including: marine wildlife monitoring, surveillance and security. This report presents a feasibility plan for the attempt of an autonomous sailing world record. The plan is based on entry level research into design elements, funding opportunities and current designs. Whilst research is completed for various aspects of autonomous sailboat design, the focus of this thesis is to complete preliminary design phases for hydrofoils. The hydrofoils created are loosely modelled on Dalí hydrofoils, used on many of the IMOCA 60 Vendée Globe class racing yachts. Modelling software was used to create a solid model of the hydrofoil. Once complete, computational fluid dynamics simulations were run in Ansys Fluent, to obtain results for generated lift, induced drag and local deformations. The hydrofoils can be scaled to fit any hull-length. For demonstration purposes, the hydrofoils were scaled to fit a three-metre-long hull (a conventional size autonomous sailboat). Simulations provided promising results, with the fully scaled hydrofoil producing enough lift to raise 102kg of sailboat. Drag analysis proved that the implementation of these hydrofoils would be beneficial with regards to overall drag. Furthermore, analysis verified the hypothesis that the implementation of these hydrofoils would be beneficial, to the attempt of the world record, by increasing stability and structural integrity. It is recommended that an internal ribbing structure be incorporated into the design for further stress analysis