Can I ask, what are these guys trying to do in this video?

[endoftheroad]

high wind sailing knockdown extreme squall intense heeling sailboat wet wild 11/11/11 - YouTube

Are they trying to force a knockdown?

[psk125]

Looks to me like they are taking their time putting a reef in the roller-furler genoa. It takes them five minutes to lead the r/f line to a winch on the windward side, ease the sheet, and grind in the r/f line. At the end of the video they still haven't sheeted the furled sail in as it should be, and it looks like they may still have too much sail up. From the way the spume is blowing across the water, it looks like about a steady 35 knots.

[Tar34]

Yes trying to reef the jib. The furling line fairlead is preventing a smooth transition. The lead from the stanchion to the winch is almost 90 degrees. Would not be surprised to see it part from the stanchion.

[shorebird]

I would have considered easing the main to reduce the angle of heel, then reduced genny.

[Tar34]

No sense in flogging the main. He mentions he has stoped making way and is in control. Lots of pressure in the jib. It is not totally released. The power of the winch is not enough to overcome it. I see breakage in the future.

[Alecadi]

Originally Posted by shorebird

I would have considered easing the main to reduce the angle of heel, then reduced genny.

Yes, me too or at least if they sought that reefing the main was too hazardous for them, ease the main sheet to reduce heeling and then work the genny more easily.

[elliebell]

Looks like they are making a good case for having a more manual reefing system. Perhaps 3 reef points in the main?

[S/V Alchemy]

Originally Posted by shorebird

I would have considered easing the main to reduce the angle of heel, then reduced genny.

Not to mention steering to windward just past close-hauled in order to partially back (and therefore depressurize) the genoa, which could be rolled from half to none.

The seas look underdeveloped and I suspect a short fetch, so I doubt the bow would have been thrown around much. In 20 footers on the ocean, I would not have tried my own suggestion, to be fair.

I also found the flogging sheets annoying. One hand on them would've kept them fair and untangled.

But how they did it worked, so I can't be too critical. If you are smacked with a squall, and you reduce sail and regain way on without busting things, you have done it "right".

I found this nearby. Notice how easy the boat's movement is at 55 knots. Granted, it's a 46 foot Oyster, but still...the skipper knows how to balance his sails:

2 - 55 knots wind.avi - YouTube

[shorebird]

I'm not a very experienced sailor, but I wonder how much steerage they had with the rail in the water. At any rate, when a fairly sustained wind heels my Hunter 31 past my comfort zone, I simply ease the main to reduce heel enough to then furl the genny. If its a gust, I steer a bit to windward a bit, then decide if I need to furl.

[Cheechako]

sailing along nicely, main furled apparantly....

[msponer]

Originally Posted by S/V Alchemy

I found this nearby. Notice how easy the boat's movement is at 55 knots. Granted, it's a 46 foot Oyster, but still...the skipper knows how to balance his sails:

Well, the Oyster is broad reaching with just his jib up -- so that's much easier to balance than the first, smaller boat that's close reaching.

Do you guys see the jib pumping the Oyster's rig?

I really avoid letting the rig pump, since I feel like it loads it up quite a bit. But I don't know -- maybe I am wrong? I don't have an intuitive sense of how strong boat things are -- if that's stressing the rig enough to try and tune it out of the groove you are in, or if it's completely inconsequential. Do you guys know -- would you be comfortable with the jib pumping the rig like that?

In the past I've rolled the jib up more until it stops pumping. Unfortunately that slows us down and we lose some of the nice sail pressure and speed that stabilizes the boat. If I want to keep the speed up or improve the ride I've also set a whisker pole to stop the jib from doing that, which works great, and sometimes allows us to head a little closer DDW and make for a nicer ride as the waves overtake us more from behind and heel us less when they lift the stern, but I'm a bit cautious about using the pole if the waves get larger or start to lose the nice regular shape that those have. I don't like setting myself up for more work later if the conditions get stronger.

So it'd sometimes be nice to decide to ignore the pumping and go faster without the pole, if that's still staying well within conservative margins for stressing the boat.

[Cheechako]

Maybe if he had a little main rolled out it would help. Doing pretty well for the conditions though...

[S/V Alchemy]

He's on delivery and to be blunt, may not care if the owner has stipulated "get boat to location X by time Y". So there may be a "need for speed". Me, I like to preserve the rigging, too.

On the other hand, if that 50-55 knots is going to persist, maybe he wants to get out of there as fast as is safe and comfortable to achieve, or maybe he knows that the seas will build to the point where his next move is heaving to. The Alboran Sea is the westernmost part of the Med:



so we don't know if he's got a strong east or west wind, or even a northerly out of the Gulf of Lions (France), or whether he's looking at a lee shore at sunset.

Without those parameters, I couldn't judge, only to acknowledge that good seamanship sometimes means making what seems to be a sub-par choice is actually the best option out of a bunch of even worse choices.

[Matt Johnson]

Originally Posted by S/V Alchemy

I found this nearby. Notice how easy the boat's movement is at 55 knots. Granted, it's a 46 foot Oyster, but still...the skipper knows how to balance his sails:

He is just under furled jib.

Edit- Man i'm slow

[msponer]

Originally Posted by S/V Alchemy

Without those parameters, I couldn't judge, only to acknowledge that good seamanship sometimes means making what seems to be a sub-par choice is actually the best option out of a bunch of even worse choices.

Oh, I am not judging -- I'm just curious if I too strongly avoid pumping the rig. If I can feel it in the hull, I figure out a new groove that does not have it. I'd like to know if I am over reacting (or over prioritizing it).