There are two kinds of stalls:
1. the stagnation stall where the luff of the sail visibly shakes
2. the separation stall where the important airflow boundary layer 'explodes' and the air becomes completely detached from the wing/sail but isnt visible to the naked eye, only to the tell tales.
Even without telltales the 'best' angle for pointing is (usually) the one that approximates the greatest heeling angle that you can attain .... so you can both use the tell tales AND the seat of your pants to get the best beating angle.
Alan's 'maximum horizontal point' on a polar diagram .... simply elegant, graphically IS the optimum trigonometric target sailing angle ---- and couldnt be simpler.
Of course their is an advanced technique that is better than simply beating off at the maximum angle: called power pinching. Anyone interested?
1. the stagnation stall where the luff of the sail visibly shakes
2. the separation stall where the important airflow boundary layer 'explodes' and the air becomes completely detached from the wing/sail but isnt visible to the naked eye, only to the tell tales.
Even without telltales the 'best' angle for pointing is (usually) the one that approximates the greatest heeling angle that you can attain .... so you can both use the tell tales AND the seat of your pants to get the best beating angle.
Alan's 'maximum horizontal point' on a polar diagram .... simply elegant, graphically IS the optimum trigonometric target sailing angle ---- and couldnt be simpler.
Of course their is an advanced technique that is better than simply beating off at the maximum angle: called power pinching. Anyone interested?