Ed help me with my staysail

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Sep 3, 2010
69
Hunter 37C Annapolis
Heard the boat sails faster as a sloop, so I am wondering or considering removing the staysail for light wind summer sailing and buying a 140 jenny. Sailed it a a short light wind race with a 5 oz 130 or so jenny and did real well. Only problem was tacking and getting the sail past the baby stay. Any thoughts on how I can easily remove the stay sail and put in back for offshore or heavier wind spring and summer sailing.
 
Jun 2, 2004
5,802
Hunter 37-cutter, '79 41 23' 30"N 82 33' 20"W--------Huron, OH
The simplest conversion would be to make the staysail a tacking sail. Get rid of the boom and related hardware. Then you can purchase or fabricate one of those tensioning levers that will let you snap off the baby stay and move it out of the way. When you sail with the hanked on staysail you will need two sheets and the blocks to run them back to winches on the cabin trunk. I guess if you were going to make the change infrequently that you could just reassemble the boom and hardware.
 
Jan 2, 2009
93
Gulfstar 50 ketch holland
How many crew on board? Have somone help the sail thru this is done on sloops also.If you are short handed you can rig a line from forward to a block back to the cockpit to pull the clew forward around the stay. That said I like the looks options of a cutter if racing is the may concern pulling the stay back (on windward leeward courses) is probably the way to go. On a reaching course the cutter maybe faster. On anything but hard on the wind to when I set the chute the staysail adds about 1/2 knot, I also will fly it with the spin.
 
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