No Traveller

[Don C L]

Here is a nice little traveler ... no vang necessary... wonder if I could fit one of those on my 8' beam? If I add amas ...?

[jt11791]

My question is, "why is he reefed?"

I don't think this guy is worried about his sail trim right now. Why are we?

[thomm225]

Originally Posted by jt11791

My question is, "why is he reefed?"

I don't think this guy is worried about his sail trim right now. Why are we?

He's not the picture happened to be available.

I'm thinking he's reefed because it appears to be the mainsail from a Catalina 27. That boat has a much longer luff than a Bristol 27.

http://sailboatdata.com/viewrecord.asp?class_id=521

http://sailboatdata.com/viewrecord.asp?class_id=814

[Kelkara]

Originally Posted by daletournier

It's also interesting how some see adjusting a traveller as work or effort, it's easy enough on my boat as it was my last, not quite sure how some see it so differently.

I never adjust my traveller since it seems like too much work. Except in really light winds, if there's any load on the sail I'm not strong enough to safely shift it to windward, and it seems dangerous for fingers to pull out the stop and let it slam to leeward. So it's really only adjustable by easing the sheet to depower the sail, then sheeting in again afterwards, or by tacking twice. I can easily set up the position for the next tack, but I can't really adjust the position on the active tack.

I know more sophisticated boats have travellers with a control line that can be led to winches, but mine just isn't set up that way ... I rely heavily on my vang which is probably much less efficient. I don't know if anyone has any ideas for a simple improvement that doesn't involve re-engineering the back of the cockpit.

[Don C L]

Yeah, in my old boat I had to pull on the car, lift the pin and slide it, and when it was under a load or my hands were cold, or especially both, I'd just live with it and leave it, and it had a lot of twist till the preventer vang could help out...

[soares29]

Looks to me that he would prefer to be in a solid LH drinking some hot cocoa, in good company with the main looking a little funny and blasting comfortably thru that sea. BTW who gives a Sh$&@ ?

Just kidding. I love to have a traveler, I know might not be needed.... but for sure I don’t want to be in that gentleman’s position.

[contrail]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Well, many cruisers sail with the mainsail just kind of stuck up in the wind somehow. They don't care much about the angle of attack or even shape of the mainsail as long as they are getting a bit of drive. Other people really like to sail, make the mainsail into a proper wing, and get it oriented just so into the wind. The second group, and you can put me in there, would just not accept not having control over the angle of attack of the sail.

Well, for what it is worth, the great West Coast sled, Merlin, long the holder of the Transpac record, sailed for decades without a traveller. And, that boat was all about performance.

[Paul L]

Originally Posted by contrail

Well, for what it is worth, the great West Coast sled, Merlin, long the holder of the Transpac record, sailed for decades without a traveller. And, that boat was all about performance.

"Sled", aka downwind machine

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by contrail

Well, for what it is worth, the great West Coast sled, Merlin, long the holder of the Transpac record, sailed for decades without a traveller. And, that boat was all about performance.

We can ask Don Radcliff(e?) here on cf, but I bet Merlin had/has a very powerful hydraulic vang and a fast acting main sheet (small purchase, large winch) that obviated the need for a traveller.

Jim

[Polux]

Originally Posted by soares29

Those are fantastic comments and clearly a lot of passion on this topic. It breaks my heart to see a beautiful new 45 looking all shiny and powerful, but missing her traveler. It’s like gorgeous woman without her high heels... looks gorgeous and is fantastic, but didn’t reach full potential... ( lot of passion as you can see ). Cheers.

You have not looked well, there is a big traveller on that boat:


But today most performance cruisers don't use them. Only cruiser racers that are really used for serious racing tend to have them. You can believe that those performance cruisers are fast even upwind:

[soares29]

I probably didn’t express myself well. I did see the beautiful long traveler in your gorgeous boat. Could have spotted it from a mile... the beautiful pictures that you sent are the gorgeous tall woman without her high heels... Cheers Ploux and thank you for the cool pics.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Polux

. . .

But today most performance cruisers don't use them. Only cruiser racers that are really used for serious racing tend to have them. You can believe that those performance cruisers are fast even upwind:

Well, that kind of gets us back to the original question which, for all the interesting discussion, I don't think we've answered.

How are all these boat sailed? Their vangs are so powerful that they are the EXCLUSIVE leech tension control, so that the mainsheet does nothing but boom angle?

Or what? I guess if the vang is powerful enough, that might work, but would it? It seems to me that it might work OK if the boom were down somewhat, so that the force of the mainsheet still has a significant athwartships horizontal component, but once you near the centerline, the mainsheet really just pulls down. And I repeat my question which no one has answered -- how do you get the boom above the centerline?

The Halberg Rassy 64 is now off my list, so this is now only a theoretical question, but would I be able to make fine adjustments of boom angle with the mainsheet when hard on the wind?

That system was not enough for my friends on that Swan 60 -- they needed barber haulers. Ostensibly to be able to get the boom above the centerline, but we also used them as a quasi-traveler when hard on the wind with the boom near the centerline where the mainsheet doesn't do much pulling horizontally anymore. Those barber haulers, run to the rails, completely spoiled the clean deck look and were really in the way. That boat would have been really difficult to sail short handed in a seaway because it was so hard to get around those big expanses of deck with nothing to hold on to.

Based on that experience, I'm finding it hard to imagine that those traveler-less performance cruisers like in Paolo's photos will be so good to use upwind. I am guessing that owners of such boats just must not sail much upwind -- using the large engine like on the HR instead.

[daletournier]

Originally Posted by Kelkara

I never adjust my traveller since it seems like too much work. Except in really light winds, if there's any load on the sail I'm not strong enough to safely shift it to windward, and it seems dangerous for fingers to pull out the stop and let it slam to leeward. So it's really only adjustable by easing the sheet to depower the sail, then sheeting in again afterwards, or by tacking twice. I can easily set up the position for the next tack, but I can't really adjust the position on the active tack.

I know more sophisticated boats have travellers with a control line that can be led to winches, but mine just isn't set up that way ... I rely heavily on my vang which is probably much less efficient. I don't know if anyone has any ideas for a simple improvement that doesn't involve re-engineering the back of the cockpit.

OK, makes sense. I control mine with the winchs therefore very easy.

[richr]

Hi everyone. As a racing sailor can I submit the following?

Sailboats work in many different modes. Here we are talking about close-hauled and close-reaching, in light airs (looking for power), moderate airs (powered-up) and strong wind (overpowered). The boundaries between these modes vary between boats.

Close-hauled in light airs, you ideally want to pull the boom to Centreline without strapping it down too hard. You want twist, without forgoing height. Without a traveller or handy-billy, i.e. with a single-point centre main, you can't do that. So you simply cannot sail efficiently. You either have to sail 5-10 deg low with the boom down, or strap it down too hard and lose serious speed.

Do most cruisers with heavy, overladen, 30-40 footers want to sail upwind in under 10kts, making 4-5 kts if you're lucky, maybe 2-3 kts VMG? Probably not, so who cares - as has been said by many already.

So what of the big performance cruisers that have been pictures with centre main? Well, I did say the boundaries between modes are different. If you are 70 feet of carbon fibre, with clouds of sail, a tall rig that hunts higher and not overladen with provisions and live aboard gear, then you get powered up pretty quick! And generate apparent wind. Which means you don't mind pulling down on the boom quite a bit in order to get near the centreline.

For those smashing yachts, you'd probably have quite a nice sail upwind in 8 to 10 kts. The wind below which you'd really miss a traveller is probably more like 6 kts rather than 10 - and below that I guess they are motoring, like us mere mortals.

Another factor is the relative height of the boom. On a big yacht, the boom is incredibly long but still only needs to be 7 feet above the cockpit floor to give headroom So the geometry of a centre main is less harmful - the takeoff point could be effectively (relatively) closer to the boom than on your 30 footer.

Big boats of a pure racing persuasion, of course, have travellers.

Once you are powered-up, regardless of your boat, you don't mind - in fact you want - to heave down on the mainsheet and reduce twist. So a centre main does minimal harm. If you see an average racing yacht in 12-14 knots, they have a tight main leech and the traveller is usually only a couple of inches above centreline, with boom slightly below.

Once overpowered, or close reaching then (ignoring the subtleties of fore/aft mast bend, which is affected by the vang but probably negligible on a stiff cruiser mast), it's all about the vang. If your vang is both powerful and strong, a centre main does you fine. The problem is that technology of yesteryear gave us neither strength nor power. Back to our 70 footers - bet they have loads of hydro. And also they don't often plan to sail in 25 knots plus.

All of which leads to my personal conclusion. I will never own a yacht without a traveller - and one that works - because I might want to sail upwind when underpowered, because I really, really, like sailing efficiently even when cruising, and because I am uncomfortable close-reaching in 30knots with total reliance on the vang, within the constraints of any vang technology I can reasonably afford.

If you don't want to sail upwind until 10 kts plus, and you can't be bothered to tinker, and if your vang is trustworthy within your personal upper wind limit, then a centre main can work just fine, and you can use a handy-billy to fill in when you feel the inclination.

[Polux]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Well, that kind of gets us back to the original question which, for all the interesting discussion, I don't think we've answered.

How are all these boat sailed? Their vangs are so powerful that they are the EXCLUSIVE leech tension control, so that the mainsheet does nothing but boom angle?

Or what? I guess if the vang is powerful enough, that might work, but would it? It seems to me that it might work OK if the boom were down somewhat, so that the force of the mainsheet still has a significant athwartships horizontal component, but once you near the centerline, the mainsheet really just pulls down. And I repeat my question which no one has answered -- how do you get the boom above the centerline?

The Halberg Rassy 64 is now off my list, so this is now only a theoretical question, but would I be able to make fine adjustments of boom angle with the mainsheet when hard on the wind?

That system was not enough for my friends on that Swan 60 -- they needed barber haulers. Ostensibly to be able to get the boom above the centerline, but we also used them as a quasi-traveler when hard on the wind with the boom near the centerline where the mainsheet doesn't do much pulling horizontally anymore. Those barber haulers, run to the rails, completely spoiled the clean deck look and were really in the way. That boat would have been really difficult to sail short handed in a seaway because it was so hard to get around those big expanses of deck with nothing to hold on to.

Based on that experience, I'm finding it hard to imagine that those traveler-less performance cruisers like in Paolo's photos will be so good to use upwind. I am guessing that owners of such boats just must not sail much upwind -- using the large engine like on the HR instead.

Your friends on the Swan 60 were racers and the boat was used almost exclusively for racing. In that case a big aft travel makes all the sense for ultimate control.

Nobody is saying that you don't get more control with a traveler than without one. The question here is if you gen get a very powerful leech tension and a strong boomvang that extra control makes sense on a cruising boat, even a performance one.

As you can see by the pictures I posted those sails seem to have a nice shape, upwind without a traveler.

I like my boat to have a traveler. I like to trim the boat, I have fun with it, in getting the last 0.1k out of it, the same way I pass a lot of time at the wheel when the conditions are enjoyable but I know that I belong to very tiny minority of sailors that like to do that instead of having it on autopilot while cruising.

Regarding my traveller, that is a harken performance one and a standard piece of equipment on racers and high performance boats it seems that my words regarding it were not well understood: it does not need a winch in any situation and it is easy to work with but in strong conditions with gusts it is not designed to be worked by an old 65 year women, not one of a sportive type. The force needed is too big for her. I have no problem with it....but I am at the wheel and the traveler is on the other side of the wheel.