Matthias Bröker, veteran designer at Judel/Vrolijk, designed the 9.14 metre long boat for himself. The ergonomics in the cockpit are consistently designed for single-handed and double-handed racing. Some of the dimensions are even based on the leg lengths of the future owner, who will be sailing his new weapon on the water. popular single-handed and double-handed regattas in Germany and Denmark would like to start. All controls such as the tiller, sheets, halyards and outhaul are concentrated in the front cockpit section between the companionway and traveller. The ORC-orientated boat requires no water ballast.
Balsa, flax and wood mouldings
The boat and all its parts apart from the rudder stock and keel fin, which are made of carbon fibre, are built by Friedrich Deimann's shipyard Greenboats in Bremen from battens made entirely in-house using natural flax fibre, bio-epoxy and a core of balsa heartwood. It is said to weigh just 3.05 tonnes when ready to sail. With the self-tacking jib and a total sail area of 55 square metres, this results in a high sail load factor of 5.5, which indicates a strong performance, as does the relatively high ballast ratio of 40 percent on the 2.05 metre deep keel.
Technical data single-handed yacht 9 MB
- Shipyard: Greenboats
- Construction: Judel/Vrolijk
- Hull length: 9.14 m
- Waterline length: 8.75 m
- Width: 3.15 m
- Draught: 2.05 m
- Weight: 3.05 tonnes
- Ballast: 1.20 tonnes
- Ballast content: 40 per cent
- Mainsail: 31.0 m²
- Self-tacking jib: 24.0 m²
- Sail load capacity: 5.5 (dimensionless)
- Gennaker: 77.0 m
Boatbuilding discovers flax fibres
Greenboats is a pioneer in the use of sustainable materials such as flax fibre and has developed its own raw products, which it also offers to other boat builders. The product range called Greenboats Fabrics includes unidirectional and biaxial fabrics as well as woven fabrics and prefabricated sandwich panels. Flax is already widely used in boatbuilding, from Greenboats' daysailer Flax 27 (see YACHT 22/19) to various individual constructions and the new Outremer 5X performance cat. The material, which is grown in Belgium and France, is tear-resistant and resistant to pressure and buckling; it is considered to be on a par with glass fibre. Production is CO2-neutral and the material is easy to dispose of. Flax also has a noise-insulating and vibration-reducing effect, has an attractive structure and can be coloured for transparent solutions. The scrims are available as a dry product or pre-soaked in various fibre orientations or as hybrids mixed with carbon fibres. The disadvantage of flax fibre is the higher price and the more complicated processing.
