Control Freak?

[John Nantz]

Cunningham Tightens the Mainsail Luff

When the cunningham is tightened it takes the slack out of the mainsail luff.When the wind pipes up the mainsail luff will typically loosen between the slugs.The cringle about 6 to 8 inches above the mainsail tack is for the cunningham. A line though this cringle to, typically, the foot of the mast, is tensioned to tighten the luff. The need for the cunningham is it is very difficult to tighten the mainsail halyard when there is a load on the mainsail.On a dingy they typically use a downhaul attached to the gooseneck which is on a track. On boats where the gooseneck is fixed one uses a cunningham to accomplish the same trick.Something else to help the boat sail better.

 

[Capt Joe]

No time

I sail coastal N Carolina ( Cape Fear to Cape Hatters), these waters are very dangerous, (currants, tides, shoals, breakers). Inlets bouys are not charted because they are constantly moved by the corps of engineers. I am better off "tweeking" my depth finder, vhf, and charts than tweeking my sails.

 

[Mitch Witt]

We use 4

We primarily use leech line, main sheet, hydraulic boom vang and a preventer.In 7 years of sailing and over 10k miles have never moved the traveller.

 

[Scott Mathey]

Sail Trim

Learning to sail has been a physics lesson with a "nurse Ratchet" teacher at the lake where I sail. Learning sail trim has greatly enhanced our sailing pleasure. Where I sail it is ghusty and the wind speed is so unpredictable. I had the living daylights scared out of me every time consistantly. It came down to either sail with both main and jib reefed all the time and go slow, or learn sail trim and heel it over somewhat and enjoy the ride. At first my Wife didn't like it but now that we are use to it, we have a great deal more fun. In a nut shell learning sail trim made cruising a lot more enjoyable and safe. I use the outhaul, boom vang and main sheet for proper trim for the main. for docking and lowering the main I use the topping lift to hold the boom up with tension on the main sheet. The boom also has a line for reefed main outhaul though I hardly reef any more. Happy sails to you!!

 

[Bill Kirch]

All eight controls

I use all controls. However, we hate folding the main so probably 75% of the time we only use the headsail.Question-how many controls on the headsail?

 

[Dennis]

Basics

Shoot, just as long as there is wind in my sails and Im moving forward, I'm happy!

 

[Andy]

6 out of 8

I enjoy using at least 6 of these. I don't have a backstay adjuster, and haven't used the leech line much, but probably will add an adjuster, and I'm planning to use my leech line more often, too. I really like seeking out that perfect setting, but don't worry about it too much.

 

[Tim Long]

That's what sailing is about

The beauty of sailing is enjoying your surroundings while you are working to optimize your boat's performance. You can take in the same scenery on a power boat, but I would quickly become bored without the challenge of adjusting the sail controls to get the most out of the day's conditions. We constantly monitor the tell tales, compass, and wind indicator to make adjustments to the main, jib, boomvang, traveller, cunningham and outhaul controls. That is what I love about sailing. It is you against the elements. You need to use your mind to develope a stategy to get from point A to point B efficiently. Now you are enjoying the scenery, the complexity of a chess match with nature, and you're hiked out hanging on for dear life like a roller coaster ride! If there is anything better in life, I haven't found it.I guess that makes me a fellow "control freak"!

 

[Kevin]

Tim's on the money

Tim you got it right. I find it interesting how many sailors do not spend alot or any effort on maximizing sail shape. Just last weekend we came upon a Catalina 320 moving like is was draging an anchor. As we went pass it was noticable that poor sail shape and general sail control was the culprit. On the same heading reasonable sail shape vs. poor was about 3 knots difference in 10 knots true wind. The difference was commented on by my 12 year old. Being nice my response was " maybe they are not in a hurry".

 

[SailboatOwners.com]

Final results

Final results for the Quick Quiz ending 10/6/2002:Of the eight major mainsail controls, I will typically use:44% Three or four24% One or two23% Five or six10% Seven or eight

 

[Don Guillette]

Control Freak

Great responses to the control freak quiz. There is a special group within the whole spectrum of sailors that I think I can help. Read on to find out who they are. Maybe your in that group. At one end of the spectrum are guys like me, who really want to know how to sail their boats and get the most out of them. We are not born with sailing knowledge so these folks go to any length to try to figure out how to properly trim their sails. This group comprises about 20% of sailors. Sailing is like playing golf or hitting a baseball. If you want to become proficient at either you need to follow a step by step approach and understand the dynamics of what is happening to the ball. In other words, I could feed a monkey enough bananas and get him to hit a ball but he'd never be consistent.On the other end of the spectrum is about 20% of the sailors. What they enjoy is just raising the main and rolling out the jib and calling it sailing, which it is. The boat moves through the water and they get where they are going - eventually. There is nothing wrong with that. They are like duffer golfers who just go out and smack the ball around. They enjoy the walk, exercise and they have a good time. They have no idea how the sail trim controls work and don't care either. The next 20% to 25% below the duffer sailors is comprised of folks who have varying degrees of sail trim knowledge, which runs all the way to expert but a lot of them picked up their knowledge here and there. Sometimes the sail trim changes they make work and sometimes they work against each other. This group is pretty confident in their skill level and it is hard to teach them new skills. They just sail along. The problem is "a man doesn't know what he doesn't know". It took me a long time to figure out what I didn't know about sail trim. Now here is the group I'm really attracted to. They are golfers that shoot just over and just under100. They want to improve their sailing skills but they don't know where to get the information. They don't have time to do what I did and go through 25 books, 5 videos and review over 100 sail trim articles from various magazines and compile all the information and then test it on their boat to see if it works. So what do they do? They experiment, talk to their neighbors, try racing and try to find out what works. That's learning the hard way. You'll never shoot under 100 using the self taught method. If you could, you'd be shooting in the 80's.So how can I help this group? I could start explaining sail trim in this forum but space doesn't permit that. Here's the next best thing. I've compiled just about everything there is to know about sail trim into a book and a chart, which you can purchase at the ship store on this site. You've seen the comments of some of the people that have purchased both items. I guarantee that after digesting that material you will know about sail trim than 75% of the sailors worldwide. If you don't believe me just ask some of your dock mates to define draft depth and twist and explain how they work together. Ask them to also tell you what sail trim controls are used to adjust both items.

 

[Don Guillette]

Control freaks

Bill: There are six primary adjustments for your headsail and they are the sheets, halyard, fairleads (moving forward and aft) and fairleads (inside and outside) and head stay sag. I also include the adjustable fairlead system as an optional item.

 

[Don Guillette]

Control Freak

Mitch: You should experiment with the traveler. It is a great control and has many uses. There are only two controls for adjusting the angle of attack and one of them is the traveler. The other one is the mainsheet.

 

[Tom and Greg]

Sail Trim, Shmail Trim

O purists forgive me, but you can over tense about sail trim and miss the purple and gold sunset that is about to recline on the horizon... or get all wound up over the tell-tale flutter and miss the dolphin show that lasts a precious few seconds on your starboard bow. You can busy yourself with the vang tensions and traveler position and miss indefinable essense of sailing, which is not in the excellence of the performance but in the excellence of the moment.

 

[Don Guillette]

Downwind

Not much going on at the Sail Trim Forum so I thought I’d pop over here and take a crack at this subject. I’ll bet there is not one cruiser out there, who at least ONCE in his sailing life, wanted to get wherever he was going a little faster or at least ONCE wanted to give the guy he was sailing next to a “go at it”. Always sailing directly dead down wind is not the answer in all wind speeds. It is for a couple of them. If you are a middle of the pack racer, wouldn’t you like to move up a position or two? The downwind leg can give you that opportunity, as many of the folks in front of you will sail directly DDW to the mark, thus affording you the opportunity to pick them off. I like that leg as that’s when most racers crack open the beer and sandwiches but that’s when I go to work..Have you ever heard a cruiser brag that last year it took him 5 hours to sail from Long Beach to Dana Point but this year he made it in 7 hours? Of course not and the same goes for the Newport to Ensenada race, which is 125 Downwind. A lot a guys sail that race DDW. You could match their sailing time on a 55 gallon oil drum!!So what the answer? There is very little written about downwind sailing technique but help is at hand and it is coming from.our good friends Bly and Phil, who are the owners of Sailboatowners.com and it will be provided shortly to you FREE, with their compliments. All you’ll have to do is print it off and then go out and try it to see if it works for you. I have condensed just about all the downwind sailing information that is in print and condensed it into an 8 page document. It is designed for cruisers, “newbies” that want to try their hand at racing and middle of the pack racers, who want to move up a position or two. Cruisers will find it helpful because there will come a day when they’ll get themselves into a pickle and will find it helpful to be able to produce that needed burst of speed to get them out of harms way and their engine is not the only answer.Here’s what you’ll be getting – outlines and diagrams of the best courses to be sailed for each wind speed, a discussion of how to use oscillating and persistent wind shifts to your advantage, how to locate and use wind shifts, how to protect to the right and left, how far to head up or down plus downwind strategy and a general set of simple techniques.The newest edition (10/02) of my book, which is available from the ships store, includes the 8 page downwind document.

 

[Alan]

VMG

Don, you're right about the bottom 20% except those are the people that don't understand sail handeling and get into trouble when the wind pipes up and need assistance. There's nothing wrong with pleasure sailing, but that does not justify incompetance and lack of knowledge when it is needed. With regard to downwind (or any) sailing, I keep an eye on the VMG which is a very good indicator of best course to the mark and DDW is almost never the best.