DSM's selected Oxeon's TeXtreme® Spread Tow Fabrics as carbon reinforcement for the boat and partnered with German boat builder Empacher.
"To improve the performance of the Dutch Olympic rowing boat, we used TeXtreme carbon fabric in combination with DSM’s styrene-free Turane resins," explains Edwin Hendriks, Project Manager Building, Infrastructure and Sport at DSM.
"This resulted in an increased rigidity (25% more stiffness) and a lower weight of the boat, allowing for a different construction that increased the stiffness even more. The new boat deforms less in the water at every powerful stroke of the rowers, and as such can better maintain its speed."
One important goal was to improve the stiffness of the boat, making it better equipped to handle the rigours of a race. By combining DSM's Turane resin with TeXtreme spread tow carbon fibre fabrics the stiffness of the hull has been increased up to 25%, reducing the energy loss of each stroke and thus increasing the speed.
The increased stiffness reduces the amount of energy that gets lost due to deformation of the hull, a common issue in the sport as the boats are not fully capable of withstanding the enormous amount of force unleashed by the crew during every single stroke. Reducing the deformation of the hull means that the crew can better build up and maintain speed.
