| Vol 3 - Issue 3 | November 1998 |
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The Batcat A Concept Catamaran By Mark Dawson Back in 1985 while I was working as a radio journalist at Tamworth, the country music capital in central New South Wales and a chance meeting when I bought some fibreglass meant coming into contact with a unique catamaran design A local Tamworth fibreglass fabricator was Len Surtees who sold water tanks and one off bits and pieces to farmers and businesses for hundreds of kilometres around. He also had another talent, designing fast multihulls. Readers of sailing books would know the late Tristan Jones as an expert sailor, adventurer and a prolific writer of numerous classic ocean journeys. Tristan, in one of his books, (possibly 'A Star to Steer Her By', but I may be wrong), praised Leo Surtees, as a "brilliant young engineer." Leo, or Len as he is known here, designed and built a 'cool tubes' water ballast system on Tristan's then new trimaran 'Outward Leg,' one of a range of ocean going multihulls Len built in the 70's and early 80's. Tristan had both legs amputated after many years at sea and adventures around the world. After the loss of his first leg, Tristan looked to Outward Leg as his saviour in what was his graduation from monohulls to multihulls. He never regreted making the change to a multihull. (In fact in a Multihulls Magazine article some years back Tristan on his first sea trial of a multihull couldn't get over the lack of heel and the fact his coffee remained in his cup and not over him...but I digress). Len Surtees had designed Outward Leg to be extremely light, fast and seaworthy and in a first--to be self-rightable. Outward Leg was launched upside down and left like that for one week before being self-righted, stocked with provisions and sailed off around the world by Tristan. At the time the boat was hailed as the first re-rightable trimaran in the world. Len Surtees in the meantime returned to Australia and started up his fibreglass business in Tamworth. But he didn't neglect his love of the sea and marine design. In his spare time he designed and built a unique 12 foot wide 18 foot long catamaran he called the Batcat. It was a racey looking creation. |
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The Batcat had a 12 foot beam to maximise righting moment. One
of it's unique features was that the hulls swung inboard using a
patented hinging system to bring the cat down to the 8 foot
maximum trailerable width on Australian roads. You slid the cat
onto its special trailer, removed 4 bolts and swung the hulls up and
over on top of the beams and trampoline. Simple, foolproof and so
easy and you didn't have to have the strength of Hercules to cant one
hull into the air as you do with a Tornado or Nacra for instance.
Batcat had two permanent beams and a front cross beam and whiskers near the bows. Len rigged it with 4 shrouds and a forestay and jib halyard. The prototype Batcat had 3 chainplates per hull, one for the front beam/forestay, one midway between the front and centre beams and the other between the centre and rear beams. |
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Batcat had a hi-cut mainsail and a very full jib. The mainsail was cleated to a traveller on the rear beam and surprisingly the jib sheets were cleated at the end of the traveller as well. It was certainly an unusual arrangement but it worked well. Jib sheeting angles were perfect. |
| Len designed the Batcat with a mini-pod central capsule, much like a pram dinghy, from which all halyards and sheets originated and which housed a large kick up centreboard and a |
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longer than usual
single rudder. Lift the windward hull and by the time the
centreboard and rudder came out of the water you were well on the
way to bottling the cat anyway. With the pod there was no chance
of losing a sheet through the trampoline. The main hulls had neither
rudders nor centreboards and had clean lines, near vertical bows and
a sloping stern, ideal to trapeze off on a wild reach.
In its first series of races the Batcat went like a rocket and was very competitive. Despite the single centreboard and rudder Len said the beast was easy to tack and jibe. The radical design certainly was an eye catcher and local sailors were quick to wander up to inspect the cat whenever she was taken for a sail. I left Tamworth in 1986 and later learnt that Len was in the midst of fine tuning the Batcat before launching a major promotional campaign to Aussie sailors when he became seriously ill and underwent major abdominal surgery. His business, left in the care of his employees, rapidly fell apart and he was forced to sell not only the fibreglass works but the Batcat as well. The prototype Batcat was the only one ever built but it is still being sailed in New South Wales. I got in contact with Len recently to find out what had occurred to him over the years and he told me he still has the Batcat fibreglass moulds. He said sadly he can't go back into fibreglass or boat building work. He said the moulds are taking up room in his garage and he is interested in selling them at a bargain price. If you are interested in the Batcat or to use the moulds as a base for your own multihull concept contact Len Surtees on 02 6761 8508, fax 02 6766 5456. Len went through an extensive period before he was well enough to secure work as a manager assisting people with disabilities to find employment. With his return to health, Len has turned his attention back to design, this time of model aircraft. He's made a mark not only as a designer and builder but also as a competitor, winning the USA national indoor hand launched glider championship in 1997. Len also holds the Australian outdoor hand launch glider record and two indoor Australian records. His creations are made of titanium, carbon fibre and other exotic materials and he remains at the forefront of model aircraft design. I for one hope he keeps those ideas coming and that one day we'll see another unique Len Surtees catamaran design on the water. |
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Mark Dawson dawson309 (AT) aol (DOT) com |