Add a stay sail to 1984 Hunter 25,5 Shoal Keel

[JoeWhite]

I am thinking of adding a stay sail to my 1984 Hunter 25.5. I wanted to know what experience you have with stay sails, and why is this not a good idea. My design would be to add a loop at the deck level just behind the anchor locker and take a shroud to the top of the mast. The sail I am thinking of using is a hank-on storm jib of about 60%. I believe that this will provide me with more horse power and I will be able to point higher. It would feel as if I have two engines. I am not sure if this would increase my heel or not. Thanks for the feed back.

 

[Ed Schenck]

I am not a marine architect but I do sail a cutter rig. My sense is that it would be more expense and trouble than it is worth.

Normally the mid-stay does not attach at the top of the mast. The sail heads would interfere. Especially if you have roller-furling. The jib would hang up when you tacked. There will be enough trouble tacking the jib through that small slot because of the closeness of the two forestays.

So if you move the mid-stay to a lower point now you have an issue with strength of the attachment point and the rig as a whole. My H37C has a very solid mast that is keel-stepped. It also has running backstays in addition to the six shrouds.

Finally because the boat was not designed as a cutter you will have serious weather helm, a very unbalanced boat. Cutters have their masts set farther back which changes the center of effort and makes room for two foresails. So you would end up pointing lower, I think, not higher.

For purposes of just having a place to hank on a storm sail it would be fine I guess. But you would want it removable to an out of the way attachment for everyday sailing.

 

[JoeWhite]

Thanks Ed for your response. You are right about interferring with the roller jib that I have and the strenght of the mast. The reason that I wanted to attach at the top of the mast is that that point has shrouds attached and I hope it is strong enough for a stay stail with a 14 foot luff. The shrouds are about 8 inches below where the forestay is attached - so roller fuling jib will not interfere with the stay sail. As far as tacking - I had thought that I would roll up the Jib and tack then unroll from the other side. I am also going to make it so that the babystay will be detachable from the deck. I am thinking that there must be an advantage in having two jibs. When do you use both of your jibs and how do you tack with both of them open. Thanks for your help.

 

[Ed Schenck]

Joe, the staysail on my H37C is on a self-tacking boom. The yankee(jib) is tacked like a normal jib. The only thing I am cautious about is gybing, in light air I won't do it. But the slot is wide enough that I only have trouble tacking in the lightest of air, the sheet bowlines will hang up on the mid-stay. Otherwise all is normal. But the whole issue is having more sail area while keeping the Center-of-Effort low. I can sail flat in 15 to 18 and would never reef under 20 or 22 kts.