Nontraditional Sailing: Catamaran

For over decades, sailing is a progressive tradition. Far from it being good as a physical activity, sailing is the way of people to get to places if a connecting land is nowhere to be found. Being able to reach far off lands makes business expands it reach creating more opportunities.

It was then after 20 years, catamarans are now raising a buzz and making its name among charterers, cruisers, and even casual daysailors. As defined by dictionary.com, catamaran is a vessel with two formed hulls held side by side by a frame above them, unlike the traditional means of sailing of operating with a monohull meaning one hulled center around a heavy keel.

Advantage of two hulls-

Due to it having two hulls, a great advantage of needing less propulsive power from either sails make sailing less energy consuming. Also, the catamaran’s wider stance on water could reduce both heeling and wave-induced motion.

Though most casual sailors avoid sailing on a heavy weather, the thrilling and dangerous adventure might not be advisable to unprofessional sailors but with proper training, getting caught on a bad weather sail could be handled safely.

Catamaran sizes and types-

A catamaran could vary the size with regards to the needs of the sailor. It may be small (such as sailing and rowing vessels) to large (such as naval ships and car ferries) ones. There are catamarans range sizes from 14 feet (4.5m) being the basic catamaran to 100 feet (30.5m) as a racing or luxury catamaran yacht.

Catamarans could be distinguished as a beach catamaran, used for leisurely sailing in the beach, open deck cruising catamarans, bridge deck cabin cruisers, racing catamarans and more.

Why Catamarans are preferred by many?

Catamarans have the size and stability, most vacationers prefer to use. Due to it having more room in between the two hulls may it be below or above the decks. Having the luxury of wider space makes it ideal for the huge number of vacationers to enjoy life at sea. With the structure design of two hulls, the sailing experience was less tiring and not having consciously battle gravity. It is also ideal to be used on shallower places and cat are way faster than a regular monohull sailboat.

Resistance capacity-

A catamaran has a better resisting capacity through passage of water. A lightweight catamaran could resist passage in water with approximately proportional to the square of its speed which will result to only requiring four times the power to double its speed compared to a monohulled sail which requires eight times the power to double it speed having it to start at a slow speed.

Stability power-

Catamarans are known to form stability to avoid heeling and capsize. The hulls on both sides make the even balance of the boat without any struggle with gravity.

If you’re having thoughts of buying a catamaran I would highly suggest you inquire at Rayomarine Inc., a distributor in the Philippines which offers a wide selection of boats as well as catamarans. They also offer kayaks and luxury boats to fulfill that adventure life in the sea.