I recently read about a an interesting method of downwind sailing in Ann Hammock’s book “Ocean Cruising on a Budget” that I thought may be useful for long downwind runs on B&R rigged Hunters. I would like to get feed back from readers of the forum on whether this could be done with B&R rigged Hunters. It’s a method that was originally used for downwind trade sailing. It involves running Wing-n-Wing with two headsails. The mainsail is doused and flaked in this configuration thus avoiding the running "problem" with B&R rigs....To prevent chafing the main on the B&R’s swept back bird’s nest of shrouds its recommended not to go on a dead run but rather on a series of very broad reaches with repeated gybing when the desired coures in really downwind. The configuration described in Ann's book would be implemented as follows on my 1985 H31. No main is flown. My asymmetrical spinnaker would be polled out to lets say....port with my whisker pole. The 35% Genny would be flown off to starboard. Ann suggests polling out the Genny’s working sheet with the main’s boom by placing a bail out near the end of the main boom and using this to attach a snatch block that the Genny’s starboard working sheet would pass through effectively polling out the Genny. The boom is held in place by its topping lift, mainsheet, acting as an after guy and keeping it off the shrouds, and a preventer acts as a fore guy. The whisker pole has its own topping lift and fore guy. Potential advantages: Prevents wear on the Mainsail rubbing on the birds’ nest B&R rig Ann say’s this method keeps the headsails balanced and keep boat heading straight downwind within an arc of about 60 degrees and places little demand on the helmsman or autopilots. When the sheets are properly set it does not require matched head sails. If the boat starts to head up to port or starboard, the sail on the side heading up will start to loose power while the down wind sail gains power bring the boat back to a run Potential disadvantage: Pain in the @#% to set up and tear down. Requires the boat to be headed up into the wind to drop and flake the main. Probably restricts your maneuverability so it’s only suitable in open uncrowded waters. Therefore only suitable for long downwind runs. i.e. long offshore coastal runs. Wind heading should be steady, not shifting. My specific questions about this downwind configuration and the B&R rig Would this place too much stress on the old style Hunter gooseneck?? It does not appear that my 1985 31’ hunter has a substantial gooseneck (old plastic ball type). Since the boom is being used in what I believe a less than ideal whisker poll arrangement it does not appear that the forces on the gooseneck will be just compressional. It appears that it will be torqued also. Is this worse than when using the main? Would this place too much stress on the B&R rig in general. The 1985 31’ has a split backstay so I suspect that this wouldn't be a problem. Would the masthead be taking too much stress? Has anyone used this method? What are the good and bads? Bill Ebling Yesterday’s Dream 1985 H31 Crab Alley Bay Kent Island MD
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If Phil did not keep losing my JPEGs...
I could show you how well this works ;o) In fact, the wing-on-wing jib option has been discussed in a number of threads over the years. The link below goes to one of the more recent ones. What you propose to do can work very well with B
I could show you how well this works ;o) In fact, the wing-on-wing jib option has been discussed in a number of threads over the years. The link below goes to one of the more recent ones. What you propose to do can work very well with B
You can do it
I think I saw this method first on "Self Steering for sailing Craft" by John Lector. I think you have the advantages and disadvantages down pat. I have never seen it done with a spinnaker and a genoa so make sure you don't overlaod your boat. I have seen it done with a drifter and a genoa. The genoa was on its whisker pole and the drifter was sheeted through the main boom end. I'd expect that most of the time you want to go dead down wind you can just drop the main and used the spannaker poled out. Dropping the main will only slow you down a little and it makes for quiet easy sailing downwind. Try that and watch you GPS and see if the speed drop is too bad
I think I saw this method first on "Self Steering for sailing Craft" by John Lector. I think you have the advantages and disadvantages down pat. I have never seen it done with a spinnaker and a genoa so make sure you don't overlaod your boat. I have seen it done with a drifter and a genoa. The genoa was on its whisker pole and the drifter was sheeted through the main boom end. I'd expect that most of the time you want to go dead down wind you can just drop the main and used the spannaker poled out. Dropping the main will only slow you down a little and it makes for quiet easy sailing downwind. Try that and watch you GPS and see if the speed drop is too bad
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