Drifter rig

[T37 Phil]

The PO of our T37 put together a nice complement of sails. One of my favorites is a big, light 155% that he called a drifter. It has a luff rope sewn in, and we've always just run it up the foil and used it as a decksweeper genny. It's a little bit of a nuisance to swap out sails, but not so bad (oh, we're not racers by the way). The drum on the furler is too small to take enough line to furl the big sail, and that's a little more of a problem. Light winds seem to dominate in the middle of the season when we have more time to sail.

Anyway, I was browsing through some old paperwork that the PO included with the boat, and I've come to believe that he really did use it as a drifter/gennaker. Is it reasonable to fly a sail with a luff rope (no wire) by connecting the tack at the bow (with or without a pennant?) and raising the head with a spare halyard? I don't think the sail is light enough to actually fly it like an asymm spin. I suppose the easiest thing to do is just try it, though it's light enough that I'll tear it if I screw up and catch it on something.

As for the bow attachment, there is a padeye about 2 feet behind the forestay chainplate fitting, but I don't recall it being backed by any sustantial member in the chain locker. At least it's mounted with a SS backing plate. We've used that to attach a block for the topping lift downhaul on the few occasions we've played with the tri-radial spin.

 

[Rick D]

Drifter

I have a windseeker / drifter which I tack to the staysail tang aft of the jib. It has a wire luff however. I won't use it over five or six knots of wind. I's just to get the boat moving. BTW, I have only purchased it recently and flown it once. And, it is probably only a 90%, so it isn't so much like your's except being a light air sail. I think you should simply try yours free-flying in light air as you suggest and let us know.

 

[RichH]

A 'drifter' is a lightweight sail usually cut with a 'high full cut shoulder' - the upper part near the head of the sail will have LOT of fullness to give lots of power (relatively speaking) in light winds.
The usual attachment for such a sail is to set the tack AT the stem of the boat, It can go aft of the existing tack (for use when tacking) or in front of the existing tack (for use when gybing).
For raising and lowering, its usually best to 'launch' from a bag (turtle), in the same manner as a spinnaker. The use of furlers, chute scoops, etc. add a lot of unnecessary 'complexity and clutter' when using a drifter.
Such sail will begin to overpower a boat at much above 12 knots of apparent windspeed.

For launching, go to a website that shows how to launch an asymmetrical WITHOUT using a sock or furler.

Unless your boat has a 'spinnaker crane' at the head of the mast, avoid using the jib/genoa furler when the drifter is deployed .... the top swivel of the furler will easily trap and tangle the head of a drifter. A spinnaker crane is a device that holds a block/sheeve and the spinn. halyard 'away' from the top of the mast.

 

[T37 Phil]

Rick - I think the wire luff may makes all the difference. I'll let you know what we find next time we try it out. It may be that wire luffs are mainly to get a light sail to furl on a code 0 and have less to do with sail shape or performance.

Rich -
Set the tack directly to the fitting, or with a pennant or ATN Tacker?

We do have a spinnaker crane, but we weren't planning on raising it blanketed and then furling. I don't expect that we'll need to furl/unfurl a jib with the drifter up. Also, this sail is heavier than a true asym and probably would not work well with a sock anyway.

As for the cut of the sail, that's an interesting point. It looks peculiar to me when it's laid out on shore. It's almost perfectly triangular. That is to say that any nonlinearity in leech, luff or foot is hard to see while it's on the ground. The proportions are such that it looks almost equilateral and its 'triangle' shape really stands out. Most other headsails have some obvious non-triangular qualities when stretched out on shore, not to mention that the shorter foot gives them a taller aspect ratio. The PO called this sail a drifter, but I'm not 100% in agreement.

 

[BobM]

I'd suggest youtube as a source for some nice sailiing how-to videos. I watched some nice videos regarding flying a drifter from a sock, but can't access youtube from work to post the links.

 

[Rick D]

Phil, my drifter has a very high cut clew and not much roach. FWIW

 

[T37 Phil]

It sounds like Rich wouldn't consider your sail a drifter. Is your Hunter a fractional rig? I don't know much about light wind sails for a fractional rig. It seems 90% is pretty small, but maybe that's less true for your boat, relatively speaking.