Problem Raising the Genoa on a Furlex 200S

[dkinzer]

Today, I undertook to grease the bearings in the Furlex 200S headsail furler on our Hunter 41DS. To grease the upper bearings I had to drop the genoa. When I went to raise the genoa again, it got very hard to pull about 1/3 of the way up. At the moment, the genoa is stuck partially raised (I can't pull it back down by hand) but I have some ideas on how to get it back down. I did lash the genoa to the lifelines until I can get it pulled back down.

The question that I have is what the problem might be. The first 15 or 20 feet pulled relatively easily and then it got very tight. Where the bolt rope feeds into the furler extrusion it looks OK. I did use guide device when raising the sail. Any ideas as to what I might have done wrong?

 

[John T1594]

I had a Furlex 200 on my H340. It was not uncommon for a small fold of sail along side of the bolt rope to become trapped in the furler extrusion groove as the sail was raised. This caused binding and difficulty in raising the sail. I found that I also had to use a fair amount of Sailcoat or other dry lubricant on the bolt rope to have things go smoothly. After many years I gave up on using the sail feed guide device because it seemed to cause more problems on the deck with a twisted sail. I just had to pay strict attention to the bolt rope as the sail was fed into the extrusion. To me, this was always a two person job with someone working the halyard winch in the cockpit.

On reading your post a second time, the fact that you cannot get the sail to come down could be caused by one of the furler extrusion pieces to become detatched/separated and out of alignment. The 1/3 up stuck sail in the extrusion groove could have pulled the extrusion pieces apart. This very thing happened to me and I had to have someone from the yard go up along the forestay in a lift bucket truck to free the sail and snap the extrusions back together. Fulex sells new clips for the extrusions but you would have to take the entire forestay down and apart to install them. If you carefully sight up the forestay extrusion from the bottom (perhaps with a binocular) you may be able to see the extrusion separation. I was able to rotate the lower extrusion cafefullly by hand enough so the separated pieces were aligned and got my sail to come down. Good luck with this.

 

[senang]

JohnT is right, I have had the same problem on hoisting the genoa. To get a grip on the sail I used a carpenter glue clamp around the furler and clamped tightly. Attach a line, lead it through the bow installation and take it to a winch. Never use an electric winch for hoisting the genoa, you have no feedback before it is to late to reverse. Do it by hand, it is only once a year.
To avoid this in future you can try using a prefeeder, but I have not tried this myself.
I think part of the problem is that the boltrope is to loose in the groove.

 

[jssailem]

This is a tricky project.

The obvious idea is to grab the sail and yank.
I would discourage this idea.
It could be an easy way to rip your sail. The more difficult task is to go up the furler using a bosan’s chair and inspect the furler to identify the bind on the sail.

it may not be the sail. It could be the halyard or the slide over the furler extrusion.

Without a back stay it is a bit more difficult to tighten the head stay. You might try to use the main halyard or a spinnaker halyard to tension on a stern cleat. Sometimes the furler extrusion needs to be more taught to easily raise the sail.

I’m a believer in doing the haul up of the sail with manual power. If things begin to stick you feel it right away.

Some times the jam is just the sail cloth getting folded over/under the bolt rope. When the sail cloth is stretched it clears the jam.

Be careful. A torn sail at the start of the season is no fun.

 

[dkinzer]

I was able to get the genoa down, finally. I used two blocks of wood and two C clamps to get a good grip on the sail and bolt rope, routed a line through a turning block tied to the bow/anchor and back to the cockpit to a winch. I had to reset the wood block/clamp assembly several times but the last 10 feet or so came down just by pulling sail. The photo attached shows the makeshift gripper.

I did inspect the extrusion using binoculars and didn't see anything that looked to be a problem. I'll try hoisting it again with the help of an assistant and some dry lubricant.

 

[kbgunn]

JohnT gave good advice. As the sail ages, the cloth around the rope going into the furler groove wants to bunch up and bind in the groove. Have two people will allow the person feeding the sail into the groove to keep an eye out for bunching and avoid it entering the groove. Pulling gently on the sail perpendicular as it goes into the groove helps a bit. Some dry lube helps, spraying both port and starboard sides as you feed into the groove will lubricate the groove and make hoisting easier. Makes lowering easier too. Spray 2-3ft of sail. Hoist that section into the furler. Then spray the next 2-3 and repeat.

Make sure you hoist the sail high enough to get the proper angle between the top swivel and the halyard. This will avoid halyard wrap when rolling up the sail. Your efforts in greasing the bearings will be rewarded with smooth and easy furling operation.

I've used the Blaster Dry Lube spray with good results and it can be had for around $6 at a big box store. It has PTFE so if you are environmentally conscious you may consider McLube SailKote which has Krytox and supposed to be better for the environment. My local WM has it for $13.

I don't use the pre-feeder device. I found it causes more problems than it solved.

 

[BarryL]

Hey,

The furlex luff extrusion has two tracks. Dumb question but did you put the sail back in the same track or the other one? My last boat had a 200S and one track was always difficult to use. Also, as mentioned be very careful to make sure the luff tape / boltrope goes into the groove and not an extra fold of sail material.

I use three people to put the sail up. One to guide the luff tape into the extrusion, one to spray mclube on the sail and one more for the halyard.

Good luck,
Barry

 

[jssailem]

Inspect the sail luff while you have it down.
Check that the sail and the luff line is smooth no tears or hockles.
You can add the dry lubricant like SailKote to the luff before it is placed in the furler. Then a lot less is needed as you try to raise the sail and the can sprays all over your fore-deck or worse drop into the water.

 

[artboas]

Inspect the sail luff while you have it down.
Check that the sail and the luff line is smooth no tears or hockles.
You can add the dry lubricant like SailKote to the luff before it is placed in the furler. Then a lot less is needed as you try to raise the sail and the can sprays all over your fore-deck or worse drop into the water.

Use PTE Teflon grease on the bolt rope. I really thing this might solve your problem

 

[isaksp00]

You may also want to have a sail loft check to see if the bolt rope has shrunk, causing folds in the fabric if you have them. I had the bolt rope on my mainsail fixed by having them unsew the sail and resew it, for I think about $150.

 

[dkinzer]

I dropped off the head sail at a sail loft today for it to be inspected. They said that the luff and bolt rope looked good but it does need a few minor repairs (UV shield stitching, e.g.).

While I was there, they gave me a short section of luff tape with the correct size of bolt rope and installed a grommet at each end. I plan to haul that up the furler extrusion (with a retrieval line attached, of course) to ensure that it is aligned and clear.

 

[dkinzer]

Also, i hoisted the upper swivel to the top of the mast today, almost effortlessly, and then hauled it back down again. This tells me that the problem that I had had nothing to do with the jib halyard, its sheave or the upper swivel.

Hoisting the scrap of bolt rope tomorrow may provide additional clues.

 

[dkinzer]

The attached photo shows the scrap of bolt rope that the sail loft gave me. Happily, it hoisted all the way to the top quite easily and came back down equally easily. When I get the head sail back from the loft I'll raise it with an assistant. I suspect that it will go OK.

 

[jssailem]

Your tests appear to be successful. Anything is possible. I have seen jib sheets look fair but be wrapped near the top of a hoist and screw up the jib hoist. Wait till you play with a spinnaker...

It was something. You may never know waht. Just get the sail back, and with your helper attempt the hoist again.

Crossed fingers that all goes without incident and put it in the WIN column. Moving forward, there are plenty more exciting events to occur in your sailing future.

 

[quadrille38]

The attached photo shows the scrap of bolt rope that the sail loft gave me. Happily, it hoisted all the way to the top quite easily and came back down equally easily. When I get the head sail back from the loft I'll raise it with an assistant. I suspect that it will go OK.

View attachment 203973

use lots of sailkote on the bolt as you raise the sail. I’ve had similar issue where I got part way up and couldn’t get it to go up or down. Momentary panic and finally got it down. Sprayed with sailkote and slides up easily.