: Hi Paul,
: If you make ama's yourself, you can make them longer and sleeker
: with the same buoyancy as the bought ones. That will minimise
: the drag or at least balance it with the main hull, the kayak.

: Mike Savage
: South West Cork

: If you design your own, or even if you use CLC's plans, you really
: want to make sure that the balance point is very close to where
: the main hull's (kayak's) is. Otherwise the handling can get
: really strange when the amas are highly loaded. Can get to the
: point it's uncontrollable if the balance is off too far.

: Bill H.

Ahm, I went a bit light with my mention of balance. I probably should have said balance the drag of the ama with the hull accounting for the position of the combined drag of ama and hull (which is about halfway between the two). A certain amount of toe-in usually minimises any tendency to turn toward the wet ama.

I hold to at least 1.5 times total weight as the minimum ama buoyancy, much less likely to pitchpole by burying the ama completely if you manage to fly the main hull. At which point, you have no steerage. And all sorts of weird things can happen. :D

One interesting thing I found with sailing tri's is on a downwind run. Sheeting the sail to the downwind side (opposite to monohulls) makes a tri steer a bit better, the CoE of the sail is more above the CoD of the hulls, better balanced, and there's less tendency to flip-flop from ama to ama.

Mike Savage
South West Cork