MBD 50' Harbour Racer Design Concept Sydney businessman, Denis O'Neill wanted a super fast 50' harbour racer, making full use of today's technology, while paying tribute, aesthetically, to the current America's Cup Class yachts. Atomic was designed by Andy Dovell (Murray Burns & Dovell) with aggressive styling that incorporates the advances made in hull design in the AC Class. Atomic's canting keel design (patent pending) has resulted in a boat that is significantly more powerful for its weight than an equivalent yacht without a canting keel. And with the addition of America's Cup type wings on the keel bulb, it solves the need for an additional leeway- resisting surface automatically, as the keel is canted - thus introducing automatic transmission to turbo-charged yachting! Designed to be super fast, Atomic needed to be lightweight, and also had to look super sleek. Black and red being the colour combination of choice, posed questions in choice of structural and finishing materials to obtain the optimum results. Builders, Azzura Yachts on the Gold Coast, and Andy Dovell worked with ATL Composites for the best materials for this project Construction DuFLEX® Composite Strips, cored with BALTEK® SB.50 80kg/m3 end grain balsa and laminated with a unidirectional E-fibreglass on either side, were manufactured by ATL Composites, and used to strip plank the hull of this custom project. BALTEK SB.50 is genetically selected at BALTEK plantations, processed and graded to produce tightly controlled cellular density throughout. The end-grain core has consistent design properties including extremely high strength and stiffness to weight ratio. BALTEK SB.50 is the ideal core material for sandwich structures where extreme performance and weight savings are critical. |
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