The GGR race, discussion and news

[Fi2010]

Originally Posted by JPA Cate

A comment about JSD's.... The ones you buy are considered by the manufacturers to be a single use item.

What happens when more than one storm approaches your vessel?

Weight attachment to a Jordan Series Drogue is critical according Donald Jordan. On average Jordan suggests adding 35 to 50 pounds. Some media sources and suppliers of the JSD recommend much less -- 10 to 15 pounds. Such low amounts of weight placed on the JSD can result in shock loading which can damage cones and break rode.

Tests indicate shock loading may weaken rode by approximately 50%. Dacron and Nylon rodes absorb water further reducing rode strength. Wet nylon loses approximately 40% of its strength. Now add current or waves pushing your boat around into the equation. This information is mentioned in the YouTube video “Capt. Teresa Carey deploys a Para-Anchor, Series and a Shark Drogue.”

Another YouTube video by atomvoyager reveals shock loading with the series drogue when approximately 8 pounds is attached. You can see the bridle slackening and then violently become taut. Such shock loading can quickly break rode if used in a storm. You can also see waves breaking near the transom which is not a good sign. Had the video been shot in larger seas the boat would’ve likely been swamped. Similar to what happened in the figure 8 challenge before Randall’s Series Drogue broke.

[JPA Cate]

Ya know, I never saw one painted, before. You have to be careful how you prime aluminum to get paint to stick. I think you are looking at a priming failure.

Ann

[Matt Johnson]

Originally Posted by JPA Cate

Ya know, I never saw one painted, before. You have to be careful how you prime aluminum to get paint to stick. I think you are looking at a priming failure.

Ann

It looks like all the used Sailomats with flaking blue paint. Really a poor idea to paint this instead of keeping the clear anodized finish of the old Aries, but cosmetics don't matter in this race.

Matt

[Matt Johnson]

Originally Posted by Snowpetrel

On another note, I am off to the deep south again for a month, so I will be without means to follow this thread. Hopefully my nominated GGR adviser will give me the odd update. (I am talking about you Gilow)

https://vimeo.com/208792357

https://youtu.be/pu4ogCy5d4k

I'm so jealous! I'll keep applying to PAE and hopefully make it down there one day.

Matt

[GILow]

Originally Posted by JPA Cate

Ya know, I never saw one painted, before. You have to be careful how you prime aluminum to get paint to stick. I think you are looking at a priming failure.

Ann

You are probably right... though it doesn't show too well in the photo, it actually looked a bit abraded to me.

Either way, I'm surprised by the level of deterioration in just six months.

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by ilenart

The safety tube on the monitor is designed to fail. However this is the 2nd time Susie's monitor has failed at the height of the storm. I really wonder if the safety tube should be stronger as this is defintely the wrong time to fail and would be unrepairable until conditions moderated. In contrast Mark's windvane (an Aries?) kept working throughout his storm in the Indian ocean.

Hopefully the maker's of Monitor's are following the GGR and are looking at an engineering solution. Maybe a "southern ocean" safety tube and / or re-engineering a stronger unit.

Ilenart

Different storms... different sea states...

Possibly in Mark's storm the heavy sea was as seen on the cover of this vvv edition of 'Once is Enough' and also in several of the sketches made by the Smeetons themselves which I assume are in all editions.....

Now looking at Susie's storm.... considering the wind force and the rate at which the wind backed I would suggest that Susie was in quite a different and very confused sea.

Falling off a wave sideways ....not the one that pitchpoled her - an earlier one ..... could lead to the windvane trying to turn the yacht -lets say - to port while the boat was taking a wild sheer to starboard... that would lead to the 'paddle' presenting itself at right angles to the not inconsiderable force of the water...

That ...in similar but nowhere near as bad conditions... happened to me in the same area in 2016 .... snapped my aux rudder in half like a carrot...

Now if people followed 'Rule 1020' stuff like this would not happen....

[ilenart]

Originally Posted by El Pinguino

Different storms... different sea states...

Possibly in Mark's storm the heavy sea was as seen on the cover of this vvv edition of 'Once is Enough' and also in several of the sketches made by the Smeetons themselves which I assume are in all editions.....

Now looking at Susie's storm.... considering the wind force and the rate at which the wind backed I would suggest that Susie was in quite a different and very confused sea...

I understand that Mark was in a very confused sea and actually passed thru the eye of the storm, so it would of been a washing machine. Susie also passed very close to the eye and I assume had waves coming from more than one direction. So the storms they both endured appear to be similar.

Ilenart

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by ilenart

I understand that Mark was in a very confused sea and actually passed thru the eye of the storm, so it would of been a washing machine. Susie also passed very close to the eye and I assume had waves coming from more than one direction. So the storms they both endured appear to be similar.

Ilenart

Ah... missed that...or forgot it... nothing new there .... so if sea conditions were equal then it could be design issues... unless he was sailing fast and she was just jogging along with drogue deployed...

[Peter Foerthman]

OVERLOAD PROTECTION - KEY QUESTION IN WIND VANE STEERING

This was my public posting to Don McIntyre about windvane striptease:

https://windpilot.com/blog/en/golden...-mcintyre-ggr/

Peter Foerthmann

[250224]

Originally Posted by Peter Foerthman

This was my public posting to Don McIntyre about windvane striptease:
https://windpilot.com/blog/en/golden...-mcintyre-ggr/

As always with Peter, a *really very lengthy* article... Being a satisified Windpilot user (but only experienced up to 35 kts so far) I'm mostly interested in how the Windpilots (and other products) hold in strong winds.

Such conditions are difficult to create in a 'controlled test setup' like for e.g. anchors, and thus I find the following statement from Abilash almost at the end of the blog post interesting:

>>Having sailed my boat solo and exclusively with WindPilot for over 12000 nm, this is what I have to say:-

(a) The construction is very robust and simple. It just doesn’t seem there is anything that could fail unless you intentionally tried to destroy it, other than the control lines. I did have a link rod failure but that happened after almost 11000 nm in some real bad conditions. Replacing it in gale force conditions and in rough weather was not a very difficult affair.

(b) WindPilot mountings are perfect and they help make a very solid connection with the boat. Thanks to this the WindPilot sits firmly and steers the boat without any problem

(c) The installation is a straightforward affair. The tuning is very simple (and thanks for taking me through it at each step). And, as I discovered, if you want to play around, there is a lot of scope for that too!

(d) Even after almost 3 months continuously at sea, there were no rust streaks, creaking etc etc

(e) At one point, I wondered if I was the skipper or if it was WindPilot, because I rarely got to touch the tiller.

(f) My boat suffered violent knockdowns in a very bad storm on 21 Sep. Almost everything standing above deck was wiped out. The only piece of equipment that remained untouched was the WindPilot. It came through the storm and knockdowns almost untouched! I think one huge reason for this could be the fact that the blade is not restricted in its movement to either side.<<

[boatman61]

How the hell did you manage a knockdown in 35kts.. to much sail.. or beam too in a big sea..???

[oschonrock]

Originally Posted by blu3534

It came through the storm and knockdowns almost untouched! I think one huge reason for this could be the fact that the blade is not restricted in its movement to either side.<<

This is THE key point. All traditional Windvane systems have "Shearpins" or "Safetytubes". Both, traditional Pendulum systems and Auxillary rudder systems have these, because they must.

- Monitor: has that tube
- Aries: has a similar device
- Hydrovane: has a pin which holds the auxiallary rudder

These have been all been regularly failing on the Monitor and the Hydrovane in the more challenging conditions of the GGR. Not on the Aries yet. Perhaps lucky, perhaps a stronger shear pin.

The point is: It is very hard to size that pin/tube correctly. Too weak, it breaks too early. Too strong, something else breaks - maybe the pendulum or auxillary rudder itself breaks, or the frame/mount breaks, or it tears right off the stern!


The Windpilot is different. It's a more modern design. As Abilash says "the blade is not restricted in its movement to either side.". There is no frame for it to bash against and break...it just rotates right around when extreme things happen in big/bad waves.

This design is proving to be a critical advantage in storm conditions?!


It's true, Peter's post is long, but worth reading in full:

https://windpilot.com/blog/en/golden...-mcintyre-ggr/

[Matt Johnson]

Originally Posted by boatman61

How the hell did you manage a knockdown in 35kts.. to much sail.. or beam too in a big sea..???

That was a quote from Abilash in the Windpilot article and not from our blu3534

Matt

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by funjohnson

That was a quote from Abilash in the Windpilot article and not from our blu3534

Matt

Ahh.. Okay apologies.

[AiniA]

Originally Posted by Orion Jim

Isn’t that was the safety tube is designed to do if the water paddle is struck by an object in the water? Or are we to presume it was a spontaneous component failure?

After our RTW I did a major rehab on our Monitor including taking out the safety tube. I was shocked to find that it was broken about 2/3 of the way through. You could not see that there was any problem at all until you took the tube out of the unit. I don't think we had hit anything, at least anything substantial, with it since the rudder is pretty well protected by the boat rudder. i wonder if it is just a fatigue thing since the vane is operating under pressure constantly moving back and forth gazillions of times?