I bought your book. I am still a little fuzzy on how to rig and use a barberhauler. The book and sailtrim chart are great, I am going faster every time out!
how do i rig and use a barberhauler?
- Thread starter Ms Hillary
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I'll give it a shot
I thought that others with a better sailing vocabulary would jump on this, but I'll give it a shot. Barber haulers are great for controlling the angle of pull on a headsail sheet. Mine is a basic block and tackle (similar to your main sheet, but the loads are much less, so fewer pulleys are needed) hooked down to the toe rail and up to a snatch block that snaps around the genoa sheet. Depending on where you attach it, it can either pull the sheet down or in. For example if the top of the head sail is luffing before the bottom, put the barber hauler on and pull the sheet down a bit until the whole leading edge of the sail luffs at the same time. If you are using a smaller headsail than normal, it may want to be sheeted in closer to the centerline of the boat for best performance. Here, a barberhauler could be attached near the mast to pull the sheet more towards the centerline. For many new fangled fancy boats, barber haulers are not needed because these boats have multiple and adjustable genoa lead tracks that allow one to get the perfect sheet angle regardless of conditions.
I thought that others with a better sailing vocabulary would jump on this, but I'll give it a shot. Barber haulers are great for controlling the angle of pull on a headsail sheet. Mine is a basic block and tackle (similar to your main sheet, but the loads are much less, so fewer pulleys are needed) hooked down to the toe rail and up to a snatch block that snaps around the genoa sheet. Depending on where you attach it, it can either pull the sheet down or in. For example if the top of the head sail is luffing before the bottom, put the barber hauler on and pull the sheet down a bit until the whole leading edge of the sail luffs at the same time. If you are using a smaller headsail than normal, it may want to be sheeted in closer to the centerline of the boat for best performance. Here, a barberhauler could be attached near the mast to pull the sheet more towards the centerline. For many new fangled fancy boats, barber haulers are not needed because these boats have multiple and adjustable genoa lead tracks that allow one to get the perfect sheet angle regardless of conditions.
Ms Hillary: Thank you for buying my book and chart and I'm happy you are getting good results from the material. The barberhauler is pretty simple. I assume your boat has outboard tracks. The outboard track is used when sailing on points of sail other than closehauled. For closehuled work, you want to use the inboard track, which most boats don't have. So what you do is get a short pice of line (about 10' or 15')and merely attach one end of the line to your jib sheet. The knot you want to use is the same one you used as a girl scout to secure your tent line. The advantage of this knot is that you can slide it up and down the jib sheet and it is easy to untie. You'll have to experiment to find the correct spot on the jib sheet, that is why it has to slide. On my boat (C30) I merely run the barberhauler line over to the lazy winch and controlled it that way. Some times I just sat on the cabin top and pulled in on the jib sheet. How powerful is a barberhauler? I was in a race in Long Beach. We were 6th or 7th and about 300 yds behind the next boat. I asked the skipper if I could try the barberhauler and he did not want to. I told him he invited me on board to give my suggestions (like why am I here otherwise)and what harm can it do as we are next to last anyway so he finally relented. We not only caught the next boat but passed the one in front of him also!! When we turned the mark, they both regained their position but that leg of the race was a win for me. Some mates may wonder where the name barberhauer (cross haul) came from. It is named for the Barber brothers, who sailed lightnings with Dennis Conner in San Diego. They are now both dentists and Dennis Conners is one of their patients. Now you know "the rest of the story".
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