by Guest » Mon May 24, 1999 12:00 am
You are exactly where I was 6 months ago, and this is what I've learned in my first 6 months of racing my Spindrift.
The factory sails are durable and pretty w/ the rainbow stripes, but they are very deep and do not go to wind as well as the Jotz, Cressys, and Norths that I race against. Upgrading to some good used racing sails will help a lot. New sails would be even better if you've got $850-1150 laying around.
The cuddy mounted jib cleats are not ideal, but they are adequate for now. The top racers like to keep the slot tight when beating which you can do w/ your setup, but when you do this w/ your deep sails, you'll probably get a lot of hook on the leech which is not fast.
The tapered mast is important for racing at the national level, but everyone at my club has straight mast except for one guy, and the feeling is that it is probably the least return on investment since a new tapered mast is $1000+. If you already have new sails, a good centerboard and rudder, smooth hull, and have become a good sailer, then you may want to move on to a tapered mast. Of course if you're rich, that's different...do it now, but since you've bought a 15 yr old 17' boat, I'll assume you're like the rest of us and do have a budget.
For rigging, you definitely need to put in a 4:1 outhaul. I did the internal one like they show in the back of the Harken catalog. Others have done external, but I think it's worth the extra hassle to do it inside the boom.
If you don't have a boom vang, get one and it should be at least 4:1 and many do 8:1. A 4:1 Cunningham should be added to although I'm still using my 2:1 that came w/ the boat.
For the main sheet I'd do a fixed triangle for now. If you have the factory setup I think you have a block that runs on the rear triangle, but this doesn't allow you to pull the boom in w/o pulling it down which is important in light wind upwind sailing. Tie the block at the center of your triangle and play w/ the triangle height some. Check out the Phil Root approach on this WEB site.
E-mail me directily if you have more specifics. I'm just learning as well, but I've made some pretty good strides in the past 6 months. Our first race saw us finish 5-7 minutes behind the winner in a 30-40 minute race. Now we usually stay within 2-3 minutes and have beat some of the slower racers that occasionally show up, and I still haven't upgraded the sails....
Kevin Clark
Dallas, TX (racing w/ Fleet 64 in Arlington, TX)
DS 11791
Kevin Clark (clarkr-at-aud.alcatel.com)