Advice for Replacing Sail Wardrobe on My Cat

[Lucky]

Hi all and Islandplanet,

The boat is the Beloize 43. I did not want to use a reefed headsail, but rater possibly smaller than the original, which is either 44 or 42m2 crosscut. I attach a drawing that came with the boat showing the main and genoa size and shapes. The benefit of a smaller headsail is obviously that i can keep that fully rolled out longer than the larger one and instead reef the mail.
Hopefully the drawing is attached as I cannot see it in my replybox that I'm writing in.

Happy lead free sailin
Lucky

[islandplanet]

Lucky,

Be good to chat on the phone/skype about this. When you reef the current genoa, where do you sheet it?

[davecalvert]

Hi Lucky,
I also have a Belize 43 cat. This came with Dacron main and genoa.
I quickly replaced these with a Spectra base load path set. But, depending on the budget, the ultimate sails for performance cruising are triradial cut Hydra Net sails.
This Hydra Net, is a woven Dyneema cloth from Dimension Polyant sail cloth manufacturers. This offers the best in shape holding, strength, UV resistance, and long life.

In addition to the lower stretch construction, we increased the roach in the head and upper leech. This is not a square top but has about the same sail area of the square tops, keeping all the battens parallel to the boom. With a square top design, the head of the main needs hardware to release ithe head cars from the head of the sail, to allow the main to stack for a cover. The "elliptical" head offers about the same performance with out this hassle.
On the Belize 43 genoas, this large size offers good performance in most sailing conditions. I wouldn't want to go smaller. We reef the main in about 20 and a small roll in the genoa in about 25. The correct cut, sail material, and having a foam or rope luff should give this sail a good usable shape when well reefed.
We do build multihull sails but I am not posting this commercially.
I have been pleased with the performance of the Belize 43, even after owning a racer/cruiser before this. Increasing the area of the main, using better sail materials than Dacron and adding a good off wind sail, made this boat a good performance cruiser.

[Surfer Girl]

Originally Posted by islandplanet

Lucky,

We don't like to see headsails routinely reefed, especially on a catamaran. Ordinarily our strategy for a cruising cat is a headsail that is either unfurled completely or rolled up. For lighter air, we'll use screechers, gennakers, etc.

So glad to hear you say this...... there has been a 'bad' trend in the last 10 years for sailors to use the headsail furler as a permanent reefing device, which it was never designed to be. Your partially furled headsail will not be an efficient foil, especially to windward - the luff is now too fat and round and will create turbulent airflow and drag; the 'new' belly of the sail might stretch & deform because the sailmaker cut the sail to be an efficient & strong foil in its full form. You'll have little control over the shape of the half furled sail, as well.

If the wind strength picks up or drops off you need to do a headsail change underway. It's a safety thing as well as an efficient sailing thing and with practise can be done very quickly & safely, both up wind and down wind, depending on the sea state & number of crew.
Sure, if you'll be back in port within the hour, or you know the squall will pass quickly, it's OK to partially furl the heady and 'reef' it for a short time. Also, if you are single handing you probably won't have much choice (get a cutter rig with a stays'l furler).

But if the wind strength calls for a jib, drop the genny and hoist the jib and get that boat balanced and sailing well (which is also sailing safe)....

Sorry to go off topic, Lucky but it is something that annoys me - I'm wondering if sailors actually want to sail any more or just sit in the cockpit and press buttons.....

[davecalvert]

Yes, a reefed genoa will not be as efficient as the full sized sail but, if this is designed and constructed to be reefed, the reefed shape can still be good.
Of course changing to a smaller jib would improve upwind performance over a reefed, partially furled genoa. But few cruisers want to purchase two headsails for their cruising catamarans.
Most husband and wife crews, will not want to go forward in a blow to remove a genoa and hoist a jib on a furler headstay foil.
Also, few cruisers will want to be sailing to windward, on a cruising cat, in strong winds unless offshore with no choice.
Genoas on cruising cats should be build with similar material and construction as the mainsail as these are working headsails.

[Lucky]

Originally Posted by islandplanet

Lucky,

Be good to chat on the phone/skype about this. When you reef the current genoa, where do you sheet it?

It's sheeted no different than the full genoa, however I always set the block to the most forward position on the rail. Problem is that regardsless of the position of the block the genoa produce a "belly" that totally destroy upwind performance.
Cheers Lucky

It would be good to have chat about this so can you give me a contact phone number?

[Lucky]

Hi Davecalvert,
Soundslike you have got a very well working suit of sails for your Belize. Not quite sure what the budget would be for the sails, would be grat to discuss with you. I'm thinking the same as you have done replacing the standard crosscut sails (did you replace the main with a triradial?)
A friend, as mentioned in an earlier part of the thread has a similar set-up on his Mahe 36. The boat outperformed even fast larger monohulls with top notch sail to the extent that some crews asked the owner to crew on his boat incoming races.

If you would provide contact details I would be very happy to learn from your experiences with your Belize post new sails.

Happy lead free sailin
Lucky

[islandplanet]

Originally Posted by Lucky

It's sheeted no different than the full genoa, however I always set the block to the most forward position on the rail. Problem is that regardsless of the position of the block the genoa produce a "belly" that totally destroy upwind performance.
Cheers Lucky

It would be good to have chat about this so can you give me a contact phone number?

The belly may just be a result of stretched Dacron. Have you tried moving the fairlead aft to take some fullness out of the foot?
Another possibility is the sail wasn't designed for the sheeting angle.

Contact info sent via PM.

[davecalvert]

Originally Posted by Lucky

Hi Davecalvert,
Soundslike you have got a very well working suit of sails for your Belize. Not quite sure what the budget would be for the sails, would be grat to discuss with you. I'm thinking the same as you have done replacing the standard crosscut sails (did you replace the main with a triradial?)
A friend, as mentioned in an earlier part of the thread has a similar set-up on his Mahe 36. The boat outperformed even fast larger monohulls with top notch sail to the extent that some crews asked the owner to crew on his boat incoming races.

If you would provide contact details I would be very happy to learn from your experiences with your Belize post new sails.

Happy lead free sailin
Lucky

Hi Lucky,
Yes, I have a fair amount of experience with the Belize 43 and other similar size cat sails.
You can reach me by e mail at calvsail@aol.com
Cheers,
Dave