Adding a Cunningham to a Crowded Deck
- Thread starter Sailavie1
- Start date
jssailem
SBO Weather and Forecasting Forum Jim & John
- Oct 22, 2014
- 22,026
Do you frequently adjust your luff tension while sailing? Are you racing?
If racing and luff tension is an important trim element of your strategy, then you can try stacking the lines and adding another control to your current crowd.
When you run out of horizontal space, you build up. Go vertical.
If racing and luff tension is an important trim element of your strategy, then you can try stacking the lines and adding another control to your current crowd.
When you run out of horizontal space, you build up. Go vertical.
While a Cunningham is a valuable sail control and frequently adjusted for maximum performance, it does not need to be ‘playable’. Therefore it’s OK to leave the control at the mast. It’s a very common solution on all sizes of boat.
LOL Remember a cunningham was developed as a Rule beater for racing, so the luff could be tensioned without going past the 'black band". For just sailing the main own haul does the exact same thing.
I think you mean the halyard. The outhaul is going to adjust the foot tension and with it depth of the draft. The halyard / Cunningham adjust the luff tension and with it the position of the draft.
Nope I mean the main down haul, which adjusts the luff tension on most boats with sliding goosenecks. A boat with a fixed gooseneck would of course need another arrangement.
Install it... 3:1 is adequate... and attach a small horn cleat to the mast. The horn cleat will give you a little more purchase as you bend the line around the bottom horn and pull up to apply the tension. You can use a small diameter line... on my 27 footer the Cunningham and vang both use 1/4 line.... I run them aft to narrow vee/clam cleats with fairleads... to save room and allow one hand adjustment. Here's the Ronstan version:
I use a line tied off at the tack, up through the cringle then down to a horn cleat on the mast; a simple 2:1. You can get a lot of tension by sweating (pulling perpendicular to the line) with a turn on the cleat. Works well and doesn't clutter the deck. I have a spare turning block but no spare rope clutch on the cabin top. I was looking at it on Sunday as I was sailing and wondering if I should lead it aft. I wonder a lot of things while I'm sailing. Then I decided it was working well so let it be.
Nothing like sailing to create the perfect conditions for wondering about stuff.
Any chance you may have a picture of your setup to share?
The Cunningham on my boat is not led aft. I've got a 4:1 at the mast base with a Cunningham hook on it and I have ring tied to the out haul line coming out of the forward end of the boom. I slip the Cunningham hook in the ring to get extra tension on the outhaul when I need it and then hold the outhaul with the clutch under the boom and put the hook back in the Cunningham grommet. And I also use the same 4:1 and hook on a ring on the topping lift to help raise the 16' boom when the main is down. It sounds complicated to new crew, but it's really not once you see it done. I've got a Selden solid vang, but there's no spring or strut in it.
I don't have one rigged but this photo shows how my Catalina 27 is set up. There is a pad eye on the port side of the luff groove and a horn cleat on the starboard side. A line should be set from the pad eye through the cunnigham cringle and to the horn cleat. Blocks could be added for mechanical advantage. But since I can adjust the main halyard with out going forward all I use it for is reefing.
Cunningham used to tension outhaul, top yellow circle is the clutch handle that holds the it after it's tensioned by the 4:1 with the Cunningham hook on the ring in the bottom yellow circle.
Cunningham hooked to the grommet in the sail as a normal Cunningham.
