26 Professional BoatBuilderHIGH SPEED: Foiling, Part 1Rostislav Alexeyev, foiling passenger-
ferry models such as Raketa, Meteor,
and Voshkod were built. Modern ver-
sions are still in service in Russia and
Eastern Europe. The U.S. Navy gets serious
In 1953, William P. Carl, the designer
of the P-38 Lightning aircraft, put two
airplane engines on a 53' (16.2m)
experimental craft called XCH-4,
which is said to have exceeded 65 mph
(56.5 knots) in open water, and from
afar was mistaken for a seaplane. A
1959 article in Popular Science included
sci-fi sketches of 100-knot passenger
ferries and nuclear-powered ocean lin-
ers on hydrofoils. But in the real world,
the boat that embodied a real advance
in foil technology was called Sea Legs, a
small Chris-Craft cabin cruiser with
fully submerged foils arranged in a
canard configuration and actively con-
trolled through an analog computer
with vacuum tubes.
In 1962 Boeing built a 110-ton pro-
totype foiling patrol craft for the U.S
Navy, the USS High Point (PCH-1),
which featured fully submergedbattle. After the war, von Schertel emi-
grated to Switzerland to start the com-
pany Supramar AG, which launched
the first foiling passenger ferry, Freccia
d’Oro (Golden Arrow), on Lago Mag-
giore in 1953. Supramar licensed the
technology to international builders
including Leopoldo Rodriquez Ship-
yard in Italy, Hitachi Zosen in Japan,
and Vosper Thornycraft in England.
It is worth noting that Karl Vertens,
a German yacht designer and contem-
porary of von Schertel’s, who also was
in the employ of the German military
during WWII, later built the Wing
Boat, a 21' (6.4m) foiling plywood run-
about powered by a 90-hp or 131-hp
[67-kW or 98-kW] inboard engine.
No German could afford such a boat
then, but Greek shipping magnate
Aristotle Onassis could.
During the Cold War, the Soviet
Union developed numerous foiling
vessels for military and civilian use.
Led by the inventor and designer^the “Hydrodromes,” a series of foil-
borne craft culminating in the cigar-
shaped HD-4 with four sets of ladder
foils, launched in 1918. Initially this
vehicle displacing 5.5 tons was pow-
ered by two Renault aircraft engines,
but the breakthrough performance
came when Baldwin installed two
12-cylinder, 350-hp [261-kW] Liberty
power plants, on loan from the U.S.
Navy, that drove counterrotating air
propellers. On September 9, 1919, the
HD-4 set a world speed record of 61.6
knots, despite having struck a wooden
crate that damaged the foil system on
a test run beforehand.
Prior to World War II, German foil-
ing pioneer Baron Hanns von Schertel
successfully tested a prototype with
tandem surface-piercing foils, and
later developed foiling craft for Hitler’s
Reichsmarine. German news papers
reported on experimental vessels with
jet engines and speeds of 64.8 knots,
but it seemed none played a role inAbove—The record-setting HD-4, designed by Alexander Graham
Bell and Frederick W. Baldwin, reached 61.6 knots in 1919, a world
speed record at the time. Above right—In the 1950s, the German-
built Wing Boat was an avant-garde water toy for Aristotle Onassis.
Right—Italian inventor and designer Enrico Forlanini, shown here
foiling across Lago Maggiore circa 1910, was ahead of his time—
and his peers.Visit http://www.proboat.com for additional content including photo
and video galleries.BEINN BHREAGH RECORDERWING BOAT MARKETING BROCHUREWIKIMEDIA COMMONSFoiling172-ADFinal.indd 26 2/21/18 7:39 PM