I was talking to an Aussie friend of mine today about his reefing sequence. It must blow like stink down there. He was complaining that his sail still had a lot of power after the first short reef - he has 2 reefs. I had to have him walk me through his sequence so I could figure what he was doing. Here's the way I do it. Let's go through the full range of wind speed and I'm going to over simplfy for clarity. In very light to light wind you want the sails as flat as possable because the wind does not have enough power to get around sails that have any depth. As the wind starts to pick up you gradually induce depth (belly)into the sails. Depth = power. At some point, say 13 to 15 knots, you want to start reducing the depth (belly)by making the sail flatter to reduce power. You will also be inducing twist to spill power from the top of the sail. Before you slap in a reef you want the sail to be as flat as possable and you want to have eliminated all the twist too. In effect, your right back where you started from in the light air situation with a flat sail. Sort of like a dance step where the music starts out slow then picks up and then slows down again. My Aussie friend forgot a couple of steps. The first was he did not make adequate use of his outhaul and left about 30% of belly in the sail. His outhaul was fully forward. The second thing he should have done was eliminate the twist in the top of the sail to make the mainsail as flat as possable before he started reefing. The sail is much easier to work with when it is flat. What happened was his sail was confused. If it could talk it would have told him "hey I'm powered up in the bottom 2/3 and open in the top 1/3 and your trying to roll me up - what's going on". Everyone should learn to talk to their sails and listen to what they tell you. Sometimes they get very angry about what is being done to them.
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Induce or eliminate twist?
Don: I understand why I flatten the sail as the wind gets heavy and why I increase the twist at the same time. All of this reduces power. Why, though, should I eliminate all the twist before reefing? Is it just to help me reef, or does it have to do with sailing prior to the reef? Dick
Don: I understand why I flatten the sail as the wind gets heavy and why I increase the twist at the same time. All of this reduces power. Why, though, should I eliminate all the twist before reefing? Is it just to help me reef, or does it have to do with sailing prior to the reef? Dick
Twist
Dick: It helps you reef. A flat sail does not have much power and neither does a twisted sail. You don't necessarily have to go to the flat sail as I do before you reef. You could keep it twisted off.
Dick: It helps you reef. A flat sail does not have much power and neither does a twisted sail. You don't necessarily have to go to the flat sail as I do before you reef. You could keep it twisted off.
Mast bend too?
Good comment about the outhaul Don, that revolutionised sailing for me. I have what appears to be an entire section of sail cloth (6" at the mid-point) sewn into the foot of my main. The first time I cranked in on the out-haul it disappeared into the boom, cool! So, back to reefing. After the out-haul, my next option is heaving in on the backstay, does that sound right? (Of course, I could just check your trim chart, but they're on the boat in CA, and I'm in Jersey).
Good comment about the outhaul Don, that revolutionised sailing for me. I have what appears to be an entire section of sail cloth (6" at the mid-point) sewn into the foot of my main. The first time I cranked in on the out-haul it disappeared into the boom, cool! So, back to reefing. After the out-haul, my next option is heaving in on the backstay, does that sound right? (Of course, I could just check your trim chart, but they're on the boat in CA, and I'm in Jersey).
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