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At the Real Club Náutico de Sanxenxo (Pontevedra) today the Spanish team are putting their VO 70 "Telefónica" through the Volvo Ocean Race structural and safety tests

The Spanish team's training schedule continues. This week the calendar features structural and safety tests, with a series of internal checks and reviews. The day chosen for these was today.

These tests are collectively known as the “Pull Down Test”, and are obligatory, as indicated in the Volvo Open 70 class rules. Each entry must pass these tests and fulfil the requirements stipulated.

Checking performance in extreme circumstances

The 'pull down test' is to check the stability of the boat and to examine the structure of the yacht, its performance and the performance of the keel hydraulics in an extreme situation. To sum up, the tests allow the teams to check whether their Volvo Open 70s fulfil all of the parameters indicated by the designers.

“This test basically involves exerting the maximum pressure possible onto the structure and the keel hydraulics,” says Horacio Carabelli, Team Telefónica's Technical Director and the Shore Crew Manager. “The boat's structure and keel hydraulics system respond to extreme conditions with just one cylinder working, to simulate a fault in one of the cylinders.”

In this way, each set of hydraulics in the system is checked separately: “One of the hydraulic cylinders is taken out of action so that only one cylinder and the structure must deal with all of the force bearing down on them,” says Carabelli.

With just one hydraulic cylinder working, the keel pivots to an angle of 40º, meaning that the boat lists to the point of being parallel to the sea. In this way, it is possible to see what pressure the hydraulics can handle, and whether each cylinder could handle being used alone, should it become necessary. One side is tested and the boat's response is gauged, followed by the same operation of the other cylinder, with the keel pivoted in the opposite direction.

Crew, shore crew, designers and measurers are all involved in the process

On board activating the canting keel and carrying out all of the necessary procedures for the operation were the crew and shore crew of “Telefónica”, with Rodrigo Quesada, responsible for engineering on “Telefónica” at the Valencian Juan K studio (the designer of the Spanish boat) and at the final stage, the Chief Measurer for the class, who must give the ultimate seal of approval.