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Software mogul Jim Clark challenged Royal Huisman to expand the limits of its capacity and creativity in building his impossible dream: tremendous three-masted schooner Athena.
by Jack A. Somer
photography by Stephane Bravin, Franco Pace, Hans Westerink
03/01/2005
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Athena
is under
the command
of both Capt. John
Clark and
Sailing
Master Steve Hammond.
She
is driven and
maneuvered by
twin 2,000-hp Caterpillar
diesels with
variable-pitch
propellers, and
270-hp bow and stern thrusters.
Cruise
speed
under power is 14 knots, with a top end
speed of
18
knots. For
“silent running” before the
wind, her
plate-built
Rondal Alustar masts,
carbon
fiber booms and gaffs
carry 2,660 square meters of
working
Gatorback Spectra,
computer-designed
in 3-D
by North Sails’ main
Connecticut loft
in exemplary
airfoil shapes. The
three headsails furl
onto
their stays; the three topsails
furl into the
upper masts; the
three mainsails furl into the
booms,
requiring
exacting
synchronization
of peak
and
throat
halyards with boom furlers.
Athena’s
top speed
under sail is in excess of 20 knots. But,
even as her
spectacular
sailplan’s prime
purpose is to drive
her
in a breeze, it also exerts
a
muscular influence on
her
vital power-generation
system. (click image to enlarge)
It is a
given
that a sailing yacht of Athena’s dimensions
hungers for electric
power in every
nook and corner,
transmuting her in practical
terms into
a motor yacht with
masts. From the outset,
Clark
insisted that
she be a
“one-generator” boat: a
noise- and
pollution-free environment in which
two
generators,
each one large
enough to supply all
household
electrical needs alone, run
alternately to
spread
wear and tear and
allow time for
maintenance. But
Athena has 86 sailing-related
hydraulic
functions
associated with
her
omnipotent rig. Once Huisman technicians
calculated
the supernormal kilowatt load
demanded when Athena
tacks or
jibes –
when
numerous robust winches and
furlers
compete for every
precious ampere with
lights, air
conditioning, galley, electronics and
wine coolers –
it became clear
that she had been
designed with
insufficient power-generation
capacity.
By
summer
2001, Clark logically
acquiesced, and the
two Caterpillar
245-kW gensets
planned were
replaced by three
290-kW
sets. The engine
room,
however, was well
under
construction by
then, and had to be
redesigned and partially
rebuilt in
midstream to
accommodate the
change.
But having
three gensets in
no way
diminishes
Athena’s
“sailboatness.”
She is a
modern
ballast-keel
machine,
but one whose
traditional garb gives her
the audacity and magic of the most
cultivated
classics. She is steered
by a
small wheel or
autopilot
joystick from
inside an
efficient
wheelhouse
equipped
with seven identical
flat screens that
monitor
navigation and
shipboard functions (Clark
wanted no jungle of
dials and
gauges from disparate
manufacturers). She is also
steered from bridge
wings
in
close quarters, and for
the
romantic at heart, a
traditional
spoked wooden
wheel
with binnacle graces the deck
forward of the
bridge.
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