Although that is about $25k as a starting price, so not all that accessible. You can get a boat for $5k that is close and put in another $5k and get it to foil.
I wonder if these things could be made much larger and almost completely automated? If petroleum prices go through the roof, I could see such craft carrying perishable goods.
that speed is also pretty amazing considering they're running with the main reefed (it hasn't been fully deployed up the mast). that's usually done to make the boat more manageable in high winds
The hobie trifoiler is vey cool, however its impratical. It draws about 4 feet, which limits the bodies of water on which it can operate.
As a side not I wonder how many people here are into sailing? I have been actively sailing for about a year, and just started racing. I like all the thought that goes into seamanship and sailing.
The foil that's providing the lift is pretty big in terms of surface area, and so is the drag. On a normal board at speed on flat water, probably only about a foot of the board is in the water, and the fin is tiny by comparison. So the idea seems to be reduce drag by getting the hull out of the water, but the size of the foil required to do this seems to have more drag than the hull did.
I wonder what they use for forward looking sonar. The ocean is rather littered with logs, boards, containers (that fall off ships, floating a foot below the surface) and the occasional whale.
http://hydrofoilsailing.com/boats/bladerider.html