Just another main reefing question

[Team118]

Hi there!

I have some questions about setting up a main sail reefing system on a 77' Catalina 30.

The main sail has 2 reef points with full battens. The PO has set up the pulleys and fairleads on the aft end of the boom for reefing, but nothing on the mast.

My old Catalina 22 was rigged for single line slabbed reefing running aft and it worked great.

I would like to set up the 30 with a double line reefing system. 2 lines at the mast for both reef points on the luff that run down the mast and 2 lines on the clew that run down to pulleys on the boom that lead foward towards the mast. I will have to go forward to reef, but that's ok.

I know that a typical Luff setup would be for a reefing line to be fastened to a fairlead on the port side of the mast and run up through the reefing grommet and then back down through another fairlead on the starboard side to a cleat. Pulling on the line brings the sail down to the boom.

I thought about attaching the reefing line to an oversized ring and passing the line through the reefing grommet down to the fairlead. The ring would prevent the line from passing through and would pull the sail down.

Would this work or put undo or unknown stress on the sail?

Also, the gooseneck on my boat is not fixed. It floats (as it should) and is currently held up by a rope line that wraps around the mast and is tied to what looks like a spinnaker ring on the front of the mast. Is there a better way to keep the boom up? I do not have a boom vang.

I have read about cunningham rings to help with reefing, but I do not see how they would work with my boom.

In addition, with my reefing system, when I pull the reefing line completely down, it does not draw the reef point on the luff side all the way down to the boom. All of the main sail slugs 'bunch' up in the mast so there is about an 8-12" gap. The result is that if I try to reef even the first reefing point, the clew of the sail is snug down to the boom, but the luff side is high. Is this normal? (one of the pictures shows the 'downward' sliope of the sail while reefed)

I have included a bunch of pictures. Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks
Chris

 

[Team118]

Rats...

I was really hoping someone might some thoughts about my questions...

Just bumping back up to the top!

 

[sinnettc]

I don't have any good suggestions for your slug/batten issue except letting them out of the track. Personally I'm not sure that's a great answer, though it's what happens to me 1/2 the time as my mast gate needs to be about 1mm narrower.

Personally, I don't like the rings; I think you're losing some mechanical advantage (2:1??) that you'd have if you run the line through the grommets and down to the mast or boom.

Sorry I don't have any pictures so I'll try to explain my setup in words.

In my case, the line at the tack end runs from a cleat low on the mast, up to the grommet, down to a turning block on the boom, back up through the grommet, down to a cheek block on the boom, and back to a jam cleat around the middle of the boom on the bottom of the starboard side. 4:1 mechanical advantage here I think, less the friction in the grommet. I could lose the turning block if I put the cleat on the other side of the mast (it's tapped for one) but I think it might tend to creep up on me where it doesn't now with the 4:1 setup.

At the clew end, it's pretty much the in-boom reefing as designed by Catalina - The line is tied off to a padeye near the end of the mast, goes through the grommet, down to the sheave in the boom end, up to the front of the the boom, around a sheave, then out a slot in the bottom to a jam cleat in the middle of the boom on the bottom port side. 2:1 mechanical advantage, less the friction in the grommet, I think.

So far this system has worked pretty well. It only takes a minute or two to reef, instead of 5 or more minutes when I was reefing by tying lines through the grommets and around the gooseneck/boom end, and it gives me the ability to adjust how flat the sail is.

 

[Team118]

Thanks Chris, if you ever get any pictures, I'd love to see them.

Any suggestions would help and sometimes pics are worth a thousand words!

 

[sinnettc]

I'll be down at the boat on Tuesday and I'll try to remember to take some pictures for you. I was darn glad it was set up as we had some really gusty sailing on Saturday and a very nervous passenger. It took us about 2 minutes to reef and then we were golden.

 

[OldCat]

Team118,

From your picts it appears that the clew reefing line pulls too much aft to take the mainsheet loads w/o overloading the sail, unless the line on the far side from the picture angle goes down perpendicular to the boom.

Just a thought,
OC
tich tor ang tesmur

 

[Team118]

Ok, there are 2 reef points to the sail. While I have both of the front reefing points rigged up with the single line and ring terminator, only the higher reef point on the clew end is rigged.

Perhaps the location of the block is better suited for the lower reef point? I would imagine there would only be about 5-6" of line running from the clew reef point to the block on the boom.

I didn't install the second block for the clew reef yet, I will do so and switch the lines and post new pics.

I am more concerned with the reef points on the luff end of the sail using one line and a ring to terminate the connection and the fact that when pulled taut it does not pull the sail snug to the boom on the luff end.

I believe this would be the case even if I installed a padeye on the port side of the mast, tied a line to this padeye, ran the line up and through the reef and down the starboard side through various turning blocks.

Thanks
Chris

 

[OldCat]

Perhaps the location of the block is better suited for the lower reef point? I would imagine there would only be about 5-6" of line running from the clew reef point to the block on the boom.

This may well be true, perhaps picts of both sides of the boom for the first reef will help. Harken shows the angles needed on their website, probably under single line reefing, but I think that angles should be about the same for double line. Harken says between 30 and 45 degrees (30 mostly up).

I am more concerned with the reef points on the luff end of the sail using one line and a ring to terminate the connection and the fact that when pulled taut it does not pull the sail snug to the boom on the luff end.

I believe this would be the case even if I installed a padeye on the port side of the mast, tied a line to this padeye, ran the line up and through the reef and down the starboard side through various turning blocks.

You don't need the sail snug to the boom, in fact, that may cause problems establishing luff tension, or cause sail chafe below the reef tack. I think that what you need is a line from one side to the other that pulls down and forward when tensioned, at a 45 degree angle. You set the halyard, then tension the reef tack line. The luff should be fully tensioned at that point, except for friction in the luff slides which may require adding tension on the halyard after the reef is set to tension the upper part of the luff.

Pulling on only one side may possibly cause a shape problem from the unequal side load.

OC
tich tor ang tesmur