Talk:Hydrofoil

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Hydrofoil in the Aolian islands, Sicily[edit]

I just took a hydrofoil ferry from Sicily through the Aolian islands to Stromboli. I'm not adding it myself as I have no idea what type it was, but a more enthusiastic person might find out and add it to the list of active use hydrofoils.



What has been holding back the hydrofoil from achieving widespread popularity? Kent Wang 02:31, 29 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]

I also came to this discussion page looking for an answer to this question. It would be really nice to see this dealt with on the main page not just the discussion page. I really know nothing more than what I can find on google about this topic myself. It would be great if one of those below such as Gunther Migeotte who answer this question with such expertise could but that info on the main page. I added a bit on adoption of the hydrofoil to the end of the top summary. It would be great if someone more expert than I would improve and expand this. There sure are a lot of amatuer hydrofoil videos on youtube. Cheers! Rusl (talk) 22:22, 20 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

With regards to the picture of the deep flight submersible - in what way is this related to a hydrofoil? Is this not a case of subtle advertising? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.188.71.120 (talk) 16:00, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]


I second this question. 71.192.137.124 05:56, 28 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The main reason for the lack of Hydrofoils coming into the mainstream is due to the fact that foils are relatively complex to design and install on a vessel. On classic hydrofoil systems that elevate the vessel completely out of the water, propulsion systems need to be specially designed for the foil application, thereby raising the cost and stability issues. For small vessels under 7M, the added cost of the hull plus the foil means that the vessel is substantially more expensive to build than a conventional planing hull. One big misconception has been that the foil will be damaged or fall off the foil if it strikes something in the water. Unless the strike is substantial, foil systems are able to withstand considerable abuse before being severely affected.

HYBRID HYDROFOIL SYSTEMS Hybrid Hdyrofoil Systems, such as the HYSUCAT (Hydrofoil Supported Catamaran) patented by Stellenbosch University and invented by Prof. KG Hoppe in 1982 which reduce the effective hull resistance by raising it enough to be as effective as pure hydrofoils has allowed vessels to be designed and built using standard propulsion methods, thereby reducing the fabrication cost substantially. Effective sea keeping is also improved as is stability. Fuel savings are substantial - up to 30% or more; therefore if a vessel is used constantly, the increase in price offsets the additional build cost. In larger vessels, where diesel engines are used, the same speed can be achieved with Hybrid Foil systems by using smaller engines, thereby reducing the overall build cost to match or be lower than other hull forms that require more power to achieve the same speeds. The lack of experience, technical complexities including the design, placement and geometry of hydrofoil systems, which is not in normally academic curriculae for naval architects at present means that very few Naval Architects are qualified technically to design foil assisted vessels. Good results are nearly impossible to achieve without an extensive grounding in hydrofoil mathematics, fluid mechanics, experience and know how. Due to this lack of knowledge, few boat yards will risk building foil assisted vessels unless they have people with prior experience in Hull / Foil Design and construction combined with end user experience as well. Those that have ventured into this field without knowledge but attempted to go into foil assisted boats have done so privately with limited success and those who have done so commercially, nearly all have failed. The few with proven designs and experience are beginning to emerge. Examples of completed craft that work well include: HYSUCRAFT designed by Prof. KG Hoppe, HYSUCAT Ribs by Malan Conradie, HAWC Technologies Ltd, All American Marine. All these vessels are being built using the original K G Hoppe / Stellenbosch University patented HYSUCAT system.

~Gerhard Kutt - HAWC Technologies Ltd. http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/4606291/description.html http://www.hysucraft.com/ http://www.hysucat.co.za/ http://www.hawctech.com/ http://www.allamericanmarine.com/boat-design-advantage/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 42.98.240.118 (talk) 09:13, 8 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]


The hydrofoil main advantages are that it allows high speeds to be achieved with considerably less power than most other types of high-speed craft such as planing hulls, catamarans etc. Hydrofoils also generally offer better seakeeping and comfort on board. THe Boeing Jetfoil is still considered the benchmark in terms of passenger comfort for passenger ferries. To answer your question, why then have hydrofoils not achieved widespread popularity? There are a number of reasons for this: 1) Hydrofoils are sensitive to impacts with floating objects and marine animals. If the hydrofoils hit something the boat will fall off the foils and this often creates a perception of increased danger. However, there have been hydrofoils operating in Hong Kong for 20 years and those waters are some of the most littered anywhere in the world and hydrofoils operate a relatively trouble free operation. The Hong Kong Marine department has online records of all accidents in its waters for those who would like more information on their operation. The second problem is hydrofoils are almost like sharp knives going through the water. Their operation in areas where there are marine mammals such as whales causes a problem as the hydrofoil normally causes fatal damage if hit by a hydrofoil. This is in contrast to normal hulls which just slide over a whale with minimal damage to both.

2)Hydrofoils are expensive to build. A vessel like the Boeing Jetfoil nowadays costs about 3 times the price of an equivalent catamarans passenger ferry. This prices them out of the market completely. More simple hydrofoils such as the Russian designed ones and those by Rodriquez in italy are more competitive in price and are still being produced today for operation on ferry routes.

3) it is a very conservative industry. Hydrofoils are still considered exotic by many commercial operators of high-speed craft and many will not take the risk of trying such exotic vessels when they have no experience operating them. Those that do have found benefit in their operation.

4) Technical compexity and high maintenance. This is what killed most military hydrofoil projects. The US Navy for example developed some of the most technically advanced hydrofoils around but they could never get them to be reliable due to the complex propulsion systems and ride control required. This eventually lead to the suspension of their hydrofoil projects and that of most other Navies to. The Russian Navy still operates very large hydrofoils and have been successful in their designs, largely because they have opted for simpler systems which might not have the same performance as the US designs but are much more robust.

80.213.118.173 13:09, 1 April 2007 (UTC)Dr. Gunther Migeotte, gmroaming@gmail.com[reply]

Concerning technical complexity and high maintenance, Transmediterranea, the spanish operator, has been replacing its hydrofoils by catamaran fast ferries due to the high cost of maintenance (http://www.hosteltur.com/noticias/22467_transmediterranea-confirma-su-intencion-sustituir-servicio-jet-foil-otro-catamaran-cubrir-trayecto-morro-jablegran-canaria.html). The last hydrofoil line was supressed even earlir than planned after an accident in july 2005 (http://www.hosteltur.com/noticias/28857_trasmediterranea-adelanta-supresion-jet-foil-islas-canarias-debido-accidente-semana-pasada.html). However, Transmediterranea operated routes between Spain mainland and Morocco, and many inter-island routes in both the Balearic and Canary Islands. --Mcovas (talk) 08:40, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
And I said has been replacing instead of replaced because I think that there is an hydrofoil route between Mallorca and Menorca, but only in the summer season. I'll find out next summer.--Mcovas (talk) 08:43, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I second this, we should add the ferries from Sicily to the vulcanic islands, we took a ferry from Milazzo, Sicily to Santa Marina Salina. They are running daily, as of June 2022. SirDödelbottom (talk) 09:51, 12 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hydrofoil vs. Hydroplane[edit]

Websters New World Dictionary, College Edition, 1968: paraphrased;

Hydrofoil- ... a foil (wing) that lifts a boat out of the water...

Hydroplane- ... a boat hull that rises on top of the water when going fast enough ...

The two are different (Attn:Chinasaur), and my dictionary does not call them the same. Planing requires the hull on the water surface. A foil is submersed.

But a link from here to hydroplane seems reasonable (Attn:N328KF) because they are similiar concepts. (==See also==)

Pud 19:07, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Pud. Hydrofoil is a structure that lift a boat off the water, Hydroplaning can be a phenomonon. Even a car can hydroplane when it speeds across a puddle of water. Kowloonese 19:15, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I have no issue with this. -Joseph 19:24, 2004 Aug 25 (UTC)
I agree; I think in most formal terms, hydroplaning is only when you completely pass your own wavefront, but in practice the term is used to mean anything that causes the hull to lift out of the water (as in "most modern boats are designed to hydroplane to some extent"). So I think the link from hydrofoil to hydroplane makes sense. The hydroplane as a synonym for hydrofoil I just got from dictionary.com. If you looks at the whole page of definitions there, it looks like the terminology is pretty confused, but there is one source that seems to equate "hydroplane" with "hydrofoil", although maybe it means the actual foil and not the whole boat. But I'm not deadset on mentioning that in the article. --Chinasaur 03:29, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)


ASW?[edit]

"…but the program was cancelled due to a shift away from ASW by the Canadian Navy…" The ASW link redirects to Aswan international airport, with no disambiguation page. Could somebody who knows what ASW means in this context please correct this (either create a page about ASW or remove the link and put the meaning in brackets). If the Canadian Navy really did shift away from Aswan International Airport, then the fuller link title would be better. 193.251.50.8 (talk) 12:36, 16 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

ASW is Anti-Submarine Warfare. EasyTarget (talk) 15:46, 9 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Picture[edit]

The picture at the start of the article dosen't really give you an idea of what a hydrofoil is. I think it should be chaged to one of these: If nobody comments in a few days I will change it.

DPM 15:04, 6 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merger of Foil (fluid mechanics) into Airfoil[edit]

At Talk:Airfoil#Merger of Foil(fluid mechanics) into Airfoil there is a discussion on the merger of Foil (fluid mechanics) into Airfoil. Since it also may affect this article, I mention it here. -- Crowsnest (talk) 12:35, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No mention of The CAT[edit]

This is a large hydrofoil ferry that goes (iirc!) between Maine and Nova Scotia. Imho, it's significant enough to include here. She's has been to Boston, probably for publicity and good will, at least twice. Regards, 66.92.74.189 (talk) 07:09, 21 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sure it would be here, except that the CAT isn't a hydrofoil.. It's a high speed displacement Catamaran :-) (These things are very impressive! I used to regularly ride the Stena Discovery, a similar ferry that ran across the North Sea, any ferry where you can feel the acceleration gets my vote!) EasyTarget (talk) 15:44, 9 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hydrofoil stabilizer[edit]

what is a hydrofoil stabilizer ? mention in article

A hydrofoil stabilizer is a small hydrofoil (in relation to ship size) that has the primary purpose of reducing the roll and pitch motions of a ship in waves. These hydrofoils or fins can be fixed but more often than not have active flaps similar to aircraft wings. The flaps are linked to an electro-hydraulic control system which adjusts the flaps to create a force f that counters the motion of the ship caused by waves. Such fins are usually fitted in the bow of the vessel where the worst motions are expereinced but can be fitted in the stern as well. Stabilizing fins are generally only effective on high-speed craft. They are very popular on fast passenger ferries where sea-sickness of paying customers is an important consideration! There are a number of specialized companies offering motion control systems for high-speed vessels.

--41.133.242.224 (talk) 16:47, 5 September 2011 (UTC) Dr. Gunther Migeotte gmroaming@gmail.com[reply]

Behavior[edit]

Perhaps a section can explain the behavior of surface piercing and fully submerged hydrofoils when hullborne and when foilborne. When hullborne, the foil would act as a keel. I'm guessing that hydrofoil ships thus do not require an additional keel.

water resistance[edit]

also to be mentioned: the water resistance from the different types of hydrofoils and their subtypes. I am guessing that aldough width and height influence water resistance, length does not (as only the front part of the foil eliminates the resistance) I also find it weird that there are no foils with a support over the entire length of the ship

Added images[edit]

I added following images:

Diagrams are useful, technically accurate from what I can tell, and well scanned. But the Handwriting is a bit styalised and unclear. I think a photograph of an actual hydrofoil foilbourne on the water should be used at the head of the document since it is far more illustrative (as discussed previously here). The diagrams can be used in the following section. EasyTarget (talk) 08:50, 18 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please replace the images with Beao's images; the first one should be based on: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/5/56/20090925181044!Hydrofoil_types.svg

yet there are 2 mistakes: 1 title -->hydrofoil types, 2: converting instead of cowerting —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.241.109.50 (talk) 08:26, 14 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Typo fixed. Please note that long texts are not meant for SVG:s. The text is now placed in the description of the file, and can be moved to the caption in articles. --Beao 14:19, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
1 typo remained: Hydrofiol --> needs to be Hydrofoil, in addition, there is no space between T and or (reads as Tor), and the image of the bent beam is best placed under the 2 types (bending is used by both types, not just with the latter). I would also change "stem" by beam or alternatively, pole.

KVDP (talk) 08:35, 30 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Supercavitating hydrofoils[edit]

These are not mentioned; see http://nextbigfuture.com/2009/08/supercativating-submarines-and-possible.html http://www.foils.org/drag_reduction.htm

91.182.214.182 (talk) 09:17, 12 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Last sentence of first section seems unfinished...[edit]

The last sentence of the first section ("Hydrodynamics of hydrofoil-equipped boats ("hydrofoils")") seems unfinished:

"Since wave resistance and other impeding forces such as various types of drag (physics) on the hull are eliminated as the hull is lifted clear, turbulence and drag act only on the much smaller surface area of the hydrofoil and there is a marked in"

This is my first attempt at editing a Wikipedia article, so I figured I would just post it here and let those who know more about this sort of thing fix it at their will.

TBennettcc (talk) 10:38, 30 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sailing hydrofoil speed record inconsistency?[edit]

In the Sailing and Sports section, there is the statement “The Rave is a commercially available 17-foot (5.2 m), two person, hydrofoil trimaran, capable of reaching speeds of 40 kn (74 km/h).”, followed shortly thereafter by the statement “Hobie Sailboats once produced a production foiling trimaran. It was and is the fastest production sailboat in history. It is called the Hobie Trifoiler. Trifoilers have clocked speeds upward of thirty knots.”. This sounds inconsistent; while the claimed speeds are vague, it reads as if the Rave is faster than the Trifoiler (and “commercially available” implies production-level), yet the Trifoiler is the fastest production sailboat! Hawk777 (talk) 20:14, 3 June 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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Vehicles on the Tallinn-Helsinki route?[edit]

Currently the article states that the hydrofoil service on the Tallinn-Helsinki route was replaced with catamarans, which could also carry vehicles. Did any of the catamarans on that route ever actually offer vehicle transportation? The only operator I am aware of, Linda Line, did not transport cars as of summer 2017 (though bicycles could be taken on board). --Michael-stanton (talk) 22:54, 24 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

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