Latest foiling Moth hardware

On display at the treasure trove that is the annual RYA Dinghy Show last weekend was of course the state-of-the-art foiling Moth hardware. The boat of the moment seems to be the latest Kevin Ellway design, the Exocet, built by Maguire Boats in Lymington. The boat made its debut last summer with several examples competing at last year’s World Championship on Lake Garda. At the RYA Dinghy Show various Exocets were scattered around the halls, including Simon Reynolds’ new boat on the Harken stand. We wrote about the Exocet last year prior to the Worlds (more about it here), however it was good to see an example in the ‘flesh’ and understand some more about its basic concepts. One of the most interesting aspects of the boat is that unlike say the Mach 2, which has an almost catamaran-style hull section with a flat bottom (and slab sides) for planing, the Exocet has taken a step away from this. Simon Reynolds explains: “The Exocet has a lot of rocker and a lot of curve on the hull, because the boat gets up of the foils effectively in displacement mode and a displacement hull is quicker at slower speed than a planing hull, so you don’t need a planing-shaped hull.” The foils on the Exocet are particularly impressive. While there once was a trend for having foils with as high an aspect as possible, for a while now people have been reducing the size of the foils on the basis that they are generating excessive lift. The Exocet’s foils have a ‘nose’ and their span is wide, but tapers both in terms of chord and thickness – and this with a full-width flap running along its trailing edge. In short a masterpiece in carbon fibre, the rudder a smaller short-span version without