Topping Lift - Mainsail Trim - Light winds...

[44'cruisingcat]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

i just ordered laminated gennkaker that should be good to 55 true, according to sailmaker.

Want to see how this goes in 6 kn of wind, huh!

Who is your sailmaker? Depending on how fast your boat is, 55' true could be 25'-30' apparent.

Good going for a gennaker.

[2Wind]

Originally Posted by 44'cruisingcat

This looks a much easier way.

An of course, when the wind builds, you just release the clutch on the topping lift....and trim as usual.

[arsenelupiga]

Originally Posted by 44'cruisingcat

Who is your sailmaker? Depending on how fast your boat is, 55' true could be 25'-30' apparent.

Good going for a gennaker.

The best I have done so far is 30 apparent with standard sails. Never really tried yet but lagoon is no light boat. Sailmaker is Ulmann Sails.

Looks to me sail will have to go inside shrouds. Still in design stage so nothing finalised yet. It will have to be quite performant to be able to bring apparent up enough. If it can sail 70 app inside shrouds then it can be 110 or so actual. Maybe "tack" will be required to switch to wider angles and may be good from 80 to 140. The other sail I have is sym spi.

Figured out in pacific light winds, doing pacific circumvigation,reaching sail is benefit looking at winds daily.

Sail shape can be modelled after well known high performance sail shape and stays that way until end of life 3 - 6 yrs. It is really important to be light to keep its shape better and not to cause flogging damage.

Mold and uv major enemies. Looking how to address it. Price is not far from PS but i dont like PS and doubt it is good reaching sail.

I am in steep learning curve about all this.

[meirriba]

Originally Posted by 2Hulls

This is commonly repeated and may be supported by certain manufacturer's advice (including Lagoon) never to sail a spi w/o the main. But it seems to me that whatever "support" a loosely or tightly sheeted main might provide can be far exceeded by a tight topping lift + sheet tension without the main whatsoever. Further, it also seems to me that if forces on the mast and rigging can get so high as to be dangerous that the weak link will be the spi itself. It should blow up long before it pulls the rig down. (This logic may not apply for mast head spis on fractional rigs.)

I fly my sym spi almost exclusively w/o the main and the mast is quite happy.

Dave

Tight sheet against the topping lift may in fact solve the issue.
However, my main issue in the post was the idea that you may use the mainsail without interfering with the spinnaker and get valuable power from it. Just set it right.
And, one issue more to consider: if you need to take down/roll the spi urgently for any reason, and do not want to start the engine, you will be with the main up at least and not powerless.

[Benz]

Originally Posted by meirriba

Aren't you mixing foot tension (outhaul) with leech tension (mainsheet & topping lift)?

Since my sail is gaff-headed, I have more shaping options than my jib-headed friends do. I can top up with a lift and ease the peak halyard for more belly going DW; I can peak up hard and outhaul like mad to flatten going UW; there's several ways to achieve a similar thing. But doing one usually affects the others somewhat, on my sail.
Ben
zartmancruising dot com

[2Hulls]

Originally Posted by meirriba

And, one issue more to consider: if you need to take down/roll the spi urgently for any reason, and do not want to start the engine, you will be with the main up at least and not powerless.

Roger that. Even further to the point, with a socking spi, it sure helps to be able to hide it behind the main to get it socked. To this end, I have raised the main to the second reef when planning to sail deep downwind with the sym spi just to be able to use it to at least partially blanket the spi for socking, if not fully raising it when the time comes. When reefed it's easier to put it edge on the wind abaft to keep from interfering with the spi.

Dave

[arsenelupiga]

still waiting for my gennaker. It will fly outside shrouds and will not do 55 true. Maybe, maybe 55 apparent. Will be great for tropics for 5-10 kn winds

However, over the weekend I was alone and had peace in the morning, wind was 3 kn or so, and it was ideal time to test 2hulls approach.

I have not quite believed that one can go 4 kn in 4 kn true wind on lagoon. So i was hoping for 2 kn.

On my surprise, i managed 4 kn in 3 kn of wind for several minutes before wind strength changed!!! Maybe my measurements are off but tested them later for reasonableness and nothing strange.

Great stuff 2hulls !!

Even if is 3 kn in 3kn, too good for me

[2Wind]

Originally Posted by arsenelupiga

still waiting for my gennaker. It will fly outside shrouds and will not do 55 true. Maybe, maybe 55 apparent. Will be great for tropics for 5-10 kn winds

This will be interesting! You must post your experience.....

As for mine, I can get 60-65 apparent in light conditions (less than 8kts) but 65-70 if above. You will need a very tight luff/halyard and you will have the sheet tightly in so that the sail will be tight on the shrouds.

I cant's see you getting above 60-65 with the sail cut to and set outside the shrouds. Unless you have a very extended bow sprint that fundamentally alters the sails angle of attack.

Still, happy to be proven wrong.

Glad you had success with the topping lift tweak.

[arsenelupiga]

oops sorry. Not 2hulls but 2wind

Standard bowsprit. However will probably have to change halyard to 14mm dyneema.

Lagoon article refers up to 60 app for gennaker. This is also what sailmaker thinks, but bit better because of sail quality.

Foresails | Lagoon Inside

See what comes out.

Will post experience.

[mark_morwood]

Originally Posted by 2Hulls

Roger that. Even further to the point, with a socking spi, it sure helps to be able to hide it behind the main to get it socked. To this end, I have raised the main to the second reef when planning to sail deep downwind with the sym spi just to be able to use it to at least partially blanket the spi for socking, if not fully raising it when the time comes. When reefed it's easier to put it edge on the wind abaft to keep from interfering with the spi.

Dave

Having the main up to blanket the spin certainly makes it easier, but we usually choose not to have it up with spinnaker. The best tip I got, and now pass on, for making it easy to pull the sock down over our assymetric spinnaker is to sail very deep, sheet the spinnaker in to bring the clew back, then release the tack line. In our case the spinnker is then streaming forward from the head and clew above the trampoline/bow and it is much easier to pull down the sock. You do need someone to ease the sheet as the sock gets close to the deck. If you release the sheet instead of the tack line, the spinnker streams out in front of the boat and you have to pull it back to the boat as you pull the sock down. I think the same should apply to a symmetric, but I haven't tried.

Mark.

[2Wind]

Mark,

I do as you do.
Steer deep down wind especially with care in a big following sea if the main is up (consider a preventer) sheet in and dump the tack. The sail streams forward over the tramps and the sock line dousing angle is favourable of minimizing socking effort.

Some like to use the Tylaska T12 or T20 quick release shackle. Impi swears by it. I haven't bought one yet. Expect I would drop the fid overboard too often!

[thinwater]

While you certainly can fly a genakar or 150% genoa inside the shrouds, you should consider the the wear and tear on the sail. It can be awful.

* Tacking it is easy to tear a light sail or stretch the luff on the diamond wire spreader.
* The luff will rub on the shroud up high.
* The sail will very likely stretch before its time, even laminate.
* The side force relative to keel lift will be too high, resulting in increased leeway (no boards) and reduced VMG.

I think you may find it is neither actually faster nor very practical. I've had 2 cats with the same style rigging (shrouds and no back stays), and sheeting inside with a full size reacher was a bad plan. It looked fast, but wasn't, and and it was tough on sails for no gain.

As for sailing faster with spin only, that makes no sense on the face of it. If it did make any sense, you would see racers do it. Of course, it is easier in certain ways. Sailing deep fast with both requires better trim.

[mikereed100]

I've been using the topping lift to open up the head of the main for a long time, as I did with my mono's, but I have never figured out how to get it to work on both tacks on the cat with it's greater roach without first lowering the main a bit to get the leech past the topping lift.

[meirriba]

Originally Posted by mikereed100

I've been using the topping lift to open up the head of the main for a long time, as I did with my mono's, but I have never figured out how to get it to work on both tacks on the cat with it's greater roach without first lowering the main a bit to get the leech past the topping lift.

I am somewhat confused - what do you mean by 'open up the head of the main'?
If you mean opening the leech, it can't be done without freeing the mainsheet. If you free the mainsheet, why do you care about the topping lift? the leech will open anyway.
Can you explain a little more?

[Sailingcouple13]

we can get 55° apparent barely up to 10 knots, but it pinching and slow not efficient. 60° is ideal and we can maintain better shape. Without a long sprit it can be difficult to get proper sheeting angel on a 155 at that tight. Here is a pic of ours at 55°

Sent from my SM-G900P using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app