123 Sail Performance Analysis of Windsurfing by CFD Simulation

Abstract

Windsurfing is a marine sport that combines elements of surfing and sailing, which started in the 1960s. The rig is connected to the board by a free-rotating universal joint and consists of a mast, boom and sail. A windsurfing sail is made of monofilm (clear polyester film), dacron (woven polyester) and mylar. Cambered sails have battens which help to hold a rigid aerofoil shape in the sail, better for speed and stability. This paper is performing analysis by a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) to grasp the basic characteristic of two-dimensional sail sections. Although various airfoil profiles can be considered in the sail, arc wings are investigated because the wings are the most fundamental profiles. Three type airfoil profiles are analyzed in this paper. There are arc wings, arc wings attached to a mast, and the real sail shapes which are connected smoothly form a mast to an arc wing. Results show that arc wings are obtained the best performance among the three type wings.