Catamaran Boats
The word “catamaran” comes from the Tamil word ‘kattumaram’. It passed into the English language after India’s conquest by the British in the 17th century and was ‘anglocized’ like so many other Indian words (case in point: ‘Mumbai’ was changed into ‘Bombay’).
The catamaran’s were first discovered in the 5th century when they were used by the ancient south Indian Chola dynasty to move their fleets to invade other southeast asian countries. There have been historical records of catarmarans being used even before that for fishing purposes in the southern parts of India. Polynesian sailors also used catamarans extensively to go colonize other islands.
In recent times, catamarans have become the most commonly used design for sailing boats and ferries, despite criticism from western designers over its structural shape; rather than relying on the tried and tested concept of weight distribution, catamarans relied on geometry for their balance.
A big advantage catamarans have over single hulled vessels is the space; mutlihulls allow the boat to accomodate more.
In western culture, catamarans have come to be associated with quiet, pleasant life by the beach in small coastal towns, an image that has contributed, perhaps, a lot to the popularity of the catamaran as a sailing vessel. Catamarans with colorful sails drifting aimlessly along a beach has become the staple of western literature which contributes to the “sun and sand” image of catamarans.
Catamarans can be very cheap to build. Since they are based on geometry rather than weight distribution for balance, even an unskilled craftsman can build solid catamarans very easily. Also, because catamarans are larger (wider) in size than regular sailboats, they can accomodate larger sails. This, thus, makes them faster than other sailboats of similar size. Catamarans are also immune to capsize “beam wise”, but rather, catamarans capsize forward when the hull dips into the water and tilts the boat forward, upside down.
Catmarans are not very suitable as cruising vesseles, primarily because of the limited live-aboard space their design allows. Rather than having one single livable area (as on a monohulled boat), catamarans, with their multi-hulled design, split the livable area into two halves. Thus, to make a catamaran livable, it must be made fairly large – an impediment that makes this design unsuitable as a cruising vessel.
In the recent years, there has been a mushrooming of sorts of large scale catamarans (called ‘mega catamarans’) that exceed a 100 feet in length and with a top speed of 50 knots. This is a phenomenon quite like the profusion of mega yachts (i.e., yachts over a 100 feet long) over the past two decades. Desipite their limits on living accomodations, catamarans are becoming popular, especially in the larger sizes.