The Supermaxi is our modelyacht technology base.

Since September 2007 we enhanced this boat. Now it is fast – very fast.


Model yacht technology base.
A canting keel is at an angle of attack of 45° and a heel angle of 25° almost horizontal to the water surface and cannot work against drift. That’s why the Open 60 and VO70 use daggerboards which need further outlets and are very difficult to handle. This makes no sense for model boats.

The X-keel is a sideways rotable keel on one axle together with a fin (idea: Mark Oliver von Ahlen, VA-Yachtdesign >>). As the fin works in the opposite direction to the keel, the fin is always vertical and minimises drifting. So we do not use daggerboards. We changed the former construction tested on “Sailovation”. The fin always moves with half of the speed of the keel to leeward. We arranged the fin in front of the keel so you do not have any distorted current at the centerboard if the keel is in the central position.

The keel/fin axle is screwed from the bottom with 2 aluminium bearing blocks into a suspension. The elliptical keel is useful for a deeper balance point. Fin and keel are directed as a lever into a thin “wetbox”, in which it is controlled with Dyneema ropes. Front and backmost bulkhead take over the forces from the keel, keel adjustment and rig. Due to the sweep aft of the centerboard and the keel, the centre of pressure is still far enough at the back. As the model can be sailed upright with the canting keel, the rudder can be relatively small, because you do not need to take that much buffer for the increasing weather helm when heeling. The underwater hull is almost symmetrical up to a 25° heel angle. A bulkhead alongside from keel to rudder take over the forces from winches, rudder and backstay. Carbon tubes in the bow distribute the forces from forestay and mast foot into the hull. The keel adjustment is equipped with a ball-bearing. In this boat we only used carbon and epoxy.