A furling main is becoming more and more attractive to me as I scope out a new boat. This is because the new boat will be bigger--40 ft--and I'm getting older. Although I'm a cruiser, I want to go fast and point high. I hate to turn the engine on. So here's my question: In a mast head rig (typical Beneteau or Catalina) will I make up for lost performance due to roachless furling main by getting a high quality, radial cut 130% furling jib. And what would you recommend for Jib construction and details?
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Sails
Selden and Doyle make great sails with verticle battens and a large roach. Yes you are right you won't get good mainsail performance with an OEM mainsail but look for a better main if you want to move the boat. I don't sail Long Island Sound but hear it is light air, a 155% Genoa might be a better choice to get the heavy boat moving. Doyle makes a performance Dacron sail called Quicksilver, I have a 155% an love it. High quality sailcloth a great cut, I race with it and do well. Good Luck
Selden and Doyle make great sails with verticle battens and a large roach. Yes you are right you won't get good mainsail performance with an OEM mainsail but look for a better main if you want to move the boat. I don't sail Long Island Sound but hear it is light air, a 155% Genoa might be a better choice to get the heavy boat moving. Doyle makes a performance Dacron sail called Quicksilver, I have a 155% an love it. High quality sailcloth a great cut, I race with it and do well. Good Luck
Jib
Typically a mast head rigged boat is characterized as "jib driven". As long as the leads are located in a position to give you optimum adjustment abilities, by all means maximize the dollars to be spent in the direction of the jib and you'll have superb performance. I have a fraction rigged boat with a roller furling main. My boat is "main driven". So I spent the big bucks on a new UK vertical batten mainsail and have noticed drastic improvements over the original OEM sail. (I also spent a few dollars more on a nice little 120 carbon fibre tape drive jib) Good luck.
Typically a mast head rigged boat is characterized as "jib driven". As long as the leads are located in a position to give you optimum adjustment abilities, by all means maximize the dollars to be spent in the direction of the jib and you'll have superb performance. I have a fraction rigged boat with a roller furling main. My boat is "main driven". So I spent the big bucks on a new UK vertical batten mainsail and have noticed drastic improvements over the original OEM sail. (I also spent a few dollars more on a nice little 120 carbon fibre tape drive jib) Good luck.
There is a point being missed here...
I own a 1999 Hunter 380 which has a furling main and jib. That the main has less of a roach is not a serious concern if you understand that my boat has a mast that is almost three feet taller than a comparative boat without furling main. Advertised specs on my boat without furling main when I order it was a mast of 59 feet, 2 inches. I specifically order the roller furling main and I got a mast that is 62 feet, 3 inches which probably compensates for the less roach aspect. Quite frankly I have all the sail power that I appear to need and I live in a light air area of the country. We tend to reef earlier than I would have on my other boats, but reefing is a snap when you just crank in on a furling line. As for pointing, I can point with the best of them. We've been using fractional rigs in racing for years. Look at the America's Cup boats and the Round the world open sixties. However, should you want more roach in your sails, I would look at Doyle's folding batten that they place in their mainsails for this type of rig. It will give you about 12 percent more sail area. If you are going with a boat that has a B&R rig I definitely would not make your jib any larger than a 120 percent. I put a 155 on a boat that had the B & R and we were slower in most cases. I have talked to Steve Pettingill (I never spell his name correctly), the guy at Hunter Marine who raced Thursday's Child around the world. He told me that putting on a bigger head sail would slow you up--he was right! You have to look at the entire rig and see what the boat does under sail. I wish you well on your search.
I own a 1999 Hunter 380 which has a furling main and jib. That the main has less of a roach is not a serious concern if you understand that my boat has a mast that is almost three feet taller than a comparative boat without furling main. Advertised specs on my boat without furling main when I order it was a mast of 59 feet, 2 inches. I specifically order the roller furling main and I got a mast that is 62 feet, 3 inches which probably compensates for the less roach aspect. Quite frankly I have all the sail power that I appear to need and I live in a light air area of the country. We tend to reef earlier than I would have on my other boats, but reefing is a snap when you just crank in on a furling line. As for pointing, I can point with the best of them. We've been using fractional rigs in racing for years. Look at the America's Cup boats and the Round the world open sixties. However, should you want more roach in your sails, I would look at Doyle's folding batten that they place in their mainsails for this type of rig. It will give you about 12 percent more sail area. If you are going with a boat that has a B&R rig I definitely would not make your jib any larger than a 120 percent. I put a 155 on a boat that had the B & R and we were slower in most cases. I have talked to Steve Pettingill (I never spell his name correctly), the guy at Hunter Marine who raced Thursday's Child around the world. He told me that putting on a bigger head sail would slow you up--he was right! You have to look at the entire rig and see what the boat does under sail. I wish you well on your search.
Yeah, but...
...there's no getting around the fact that you will lose performance with a furling main, regardless of battens or high-performance jibs or even taller masts. I have a vertical-batten main almost identical to the one on Rick Dalton's boat, but in light air I can't get the same sort of twist a conventional full-battened main can get, and in light air your best wind is at the top of the mast, which is where mast-furlers all suffer because it's not just about sail area, it's about sail shape. The question is whether the loss of performance is justified by the increased safety and convenience a furling main provides. I opted for a furling main because it gives me the ability to short-hand a hugh boat in a windy area, and because I don't seem to be as young as I was ten years ago.
...there's no getting around the fact that you will lose performance with a furling main, regardless of battens or high-performance jibs or even taller masts. I have a vertical-batten main almost identical to the one on Rick Dalton's boat, but in light air I can't get the same sort of twist a conventional full-battened main can get, and in light air your best wind is at the top of the mast, which is where mast-furlers all suffer because it's not just about sail area, it's about sail shape. The question is whether the loss of performance is justified by the increased safety and convenience a furling main provides. I opted for a furling main because it gives me the ability to short-hand a hugh boat in a windy area, and because I don't seem to be as young as I was ten years ago.
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