DaySailer.org Forum

The three of us got muscled around pretty good on the reservoir this weekend when, after sailing for an hour and a half at a top speed of two mph on a windless afternoon, a black cloud dumped a microburst on us with an initial gust of 45 mph wind (quoted to us by the park officials when we got back to shore). We saw the wind coming at us across the water, put a reef in, kept our cool and didn't do anything stupid or panicky. We made it back without capsizing and even enjoyed it a little. (Well, some of us did.) Needless to say we are much better sailors now than we were the previous weekend.
We had made some notes on previous sails for the more obvious upgrades we'd like to make to this boat we acquired just a few weeks ago, but this little adventure brought some new ones to light. Here are some things we noticed:
1. The previous owner set up the jib sheets to run through a fairlead and clam cleat on the coaming. To make adjustments you have to have somebody on the leeward side to operate the line, increasing the boat's heel. Also, the force exerted on the clam cleat was so great it made removing the sheet almost impossible. Solution: We will be installing blocks on the old jib tracks and leading the sheets to cam cleats on the centerboard box, so we can all enjoy the dry(er) side of the boat while keeping it flat(ter).
2. Securing the tabernacle with bolts and butterfly nuts (and no washer) is a poor idea. After we made it back to shore my wife noticed that the foremost bolt had wiggled its way out. Solution: We will be putting in long clevis pins and split rings to avoid disaster.
3. The clevis pin attaching the jib tack to the headstay stemhead worked itself loose. It's the kind that doesn't require a spring, it just pokes through a slotted hole and when turned cannot, supposedly, come out. This probably happened also because of a lack of proper tensioning on the forestay, even though we finger-tightened the turnbuckle (probably the original one) as tight as we could. Solution: new stays and fullsize turnbuckles are en route.
4. Ram's horns are difficult to feed through a reef tack when hell is coming your way at 45 mph and your fingers have all been replaced with stupid thumbs. Solution: I'm tempted to say replace the horn with a simple reef hook, but I'm not confident the halyard is bombproof enough to keep the tension on hard enough to ensure that the grommet wouldn't work itself off the simple bend of the hook. I'm wondering if I just need to get better at using the horn or maybe have some thick stainless steel rings that are connected together with webbing installed on either side of the reef grommet that could be easily slipped onto the horn.
Also, the ram's horn is located on the starboard side of the boom. The wind was picking up and coming from port while I was reefing, so it was important that I kept my weight on the high side. It was very difficult to see what I was doing. Should I install a horn on the other side, as well?

Suggestions or critiques are welcomed.

Top Hat,

1. My jib sheets are setup with a fairlead/camcleat combination angled such that you pull the jibsheet forward to engage it in the cleat and center or slightly aft to release it. From my sailing position its very easy to ease the jib sheets quickly without leaving the windward rail of the boat.

3. I use a threaded "D" shackle for my jib tack (because that's what I had handy when my new jib arrived).

4. I don't use a ram horn or a reefing hook. Rather, my boat has reefing lines on both the luff and the leach of the mainsail. They attach to one side of the boom, run up through a cringle in the sail, down to a turning block on the other side of the boom, and then to cleats on the forward end of the boom (so the halyard and reef lines can be worked at the same time. Some folks use a one-line reefing system but mine uses two. I also employ a jib downhaul which is a 1/16" line fixed to the head of the jib, then run down through the jib snaps to a turning block at the tack of the jib, then aft to the cuddy roof. I can release the jib halyard, yank the downhaul, and the jib is down in 2 seconds, greatly reducing sail area when "hell is coming your way at 45 mph".

Kudos to you in that you kept the mast pointing skyward and the water underneath the boat in such conditions.

Many years ago (probably in the late 70's) I had one of those little black clouds on an otherwise calm day pounce on me and a friend while sailing my dad's Mariner. I remember it was short lived, but rather exciting for a short time. Don't know what the wind speed was tho, probably better I didn't. Don't remember what we did to survive it, but we did survive it.

I also don't use a reefing hook with my jiffy reef. I have reef lines set up on both my sets of reef points. As I let up on the main halyard, I pull in on the reef line. The jib downhaul is a great help also.

The jib tracks on the inside of the cockpit rails is standard on the DS2. The cam cleats with them are hard to deal with in a hurry. I moved my fairleads and cam cleats to the CB trunk and replaced the rail setup with a block. Easier to work with.

At the base of the mast I have a cover that goes over the tabernacle clevis pins and hingee plate to keep the jib sheets from getting caught on them.

After the lose of a stay (split ring came out somehow) prior to my capsize on the Tx200 this year it was suggested to me to tape the clevis pins and split rings on the side stays. I have the PVC covers, but that proved insuffcient. In the future I will tape them.

John

#1, I agree with your thoughts for upgrade. It's how I have my boat and it works fine. I would recommend using at least a 40 mm block as the friction goes up quite a bit with a smaller diameter.

#2 I agree again here and that is how these tabernacles are sold. I suspect your previous owner lost the pins. I recommend Ronstan split rings. They're pretty stiff and strong but they have a little tail that pokes towards the center which makes it easy to get them on and off. Always have extra's! There is something about those buggers, I think they have legs.

#3 I think you're talking about the shackle that attaches the jib tack. It may be that the shackle has squeezed together a little bit and therefore is not providing enough tention for the captive pin. If you can't fix it I would definitely replace that. They are not that expensive.

If you're going to use your turnbuckles to apply tension to your rigging you need to make sure that they are very well lubricated or the threads will gall. It's better to make adjustments to the turnbuckles when they are not under tension and then apply tension with some other device like a winch on the jib halyard and then transfer the tension to your stays. I use a 5 to 1 block and tackle on my jib halyard.

#4 I have a simple reefing hook. I honestly haven't used it that much. When I have used it, it is somewhat difficult to get the cringle on. Your solution or possibly just a loop of Amsteel tied to the cringle and using your ram horn would be better, I think.

When hell is coming at me, the option I choose is to drop sails completely and start the motor.

+1 on Chris B's kudos!

You people are giving me lots of valuable information. I love it.

+1 on KC's comment about dropping sail completely.

I have a single-line reefing system. The line starts at the back of the boom on the SB side, goes through the reef cringle at the leech, back down to a cheek block on the port side, then forward to another cheek block, up through the reef cringle in the luff, and down to a third cheek block and back a few inches to a cam cleat. (The blocks are 28mm)

The line thus ends back on the SB side, which is the side where I cleat my main halyard. I have to stand in the front of the cockpit, but can operate both lines from the same position.

I experimented with different material for the line, finally settling on a black & white 4mm Robline (very low stretch). That one really cut down on the friction. Before I had to reach around the boom to pull the leech tight first, otherwise only the luff would get cinched. So far, I haven't put the new line to the test in earnest, but I do notice in rigging that the line runs far more freely.

I usually put reefs in very early, and when hove to. Still, there have been occasions when I didn't rig the line going out and had to rig it as well as use it.

One time, putting a reef in allowed me to sail home after some i**t ran his anchor through the clew of may sail. The reef points were above the damaged area. The same incident had ripped the end cap off the boom, taking with it the turning block for the main sheet. That changed my setup to center-boom sheeting with no mechanical advantage - a bit tricky to say the least, but we got off the water.

Good god, man! How can an anchor get so intimate with a mainsail? Was the anchor being tossed around like a lasso?

The anchor wasn't tossed - it was mounted at the bow of a Buchan 37 that barged into a field of boats from behind. One of the joys of doing mixed-fleet racing...

Incidentally, not only was the perpetrator clueless in how to handle his boat, he sailed on without any attempt at finding out whether he had caused any damage, let alone owning up to it and offering to bear the repair costs...

Had a bit of a microburst myself this past weekend. Forecast for Saturday was for NE winds 5-10 with a 50% chance of showers in the pm hours. I decided to go out in the morning before the rains. Light winds so I was flying my UPS all the while keeping an eye on this ever darkening cloud out over the ocean. Wind started building and I quickly took in the UPS. By the time I had it stowed, the wind was up to about 20 with heavy rain. Took the main down and fired up the engine and headed for the lee shore of an island. Waited out the worst of the rain, reefed the main to the second reef point and headed for the ramp. The boat was very well behaved with the double-reefed main and jib.