Electric boats are starting to bloom. There are a lot of different types of boats, and thus a lot of different powertrains that need to be electrified.
One type I hadn’t ever thought or learned much about is a foiling boat.
Motor Boat & Yachting has an article to catch you up on the general idea: “Foiling technology: everything you need to know about hydrofoils.”
The short summary: “Foiling refers to the use of hydrofoils attached to the hull of fast boats, which provides additional lift at planing speeds – often enough to lift the hull completely clear of the water.”
Candela has reportedly created the first electric foiling boat. The explanation for why they went with a foiling system seems to be a practical one: Efficiency.
The enemy of fast boats is the amount of effort required to push them through the water. Planing boats go some way to addressing this by rising up.
It follows that if you can lift the boat completely clear of the water, hydrodynamic drag is only acting on the foils themselves and the sterngear that propels and steers it.
Foils work in a similar way to aircraft wings. In simple terms, as they move through the water they deflect the flow, which exerts a force on the foil. If that force is upward, the faster they move, the greater the lift.
Candela says it offers the “first electric boats with real range.” Increasing the range of a speedboat with hydrofoils means that you all of a sudden have a speedboat that can go quite far (50 nautical miles at 22 knots, which is 57.54 land miles at 25.3 mph). The speedboat has a max speed of 30 knots (35 mph).
The world’s only boat with speed & electric range and an unbeatable comfort in rough seas
Reference- Candela website & PR, Motor Boat & Yachting website, Clean Technica