Getting in and out of my pen with a full keel sailboat.

[Jammer]

Originally Posted by Hugo B

A detailed explanation on how to, as a single-hander, use spring lines to control backing out with a full keeler (mine has the dock on the starboard side) would be greatly appreciated. Any other hints or techniques would also be most welcome of course.

I'm assuming you have a right-hand prop, most boats do.


For backing out, when starboard side to, where the wind is blowing you off the dock, you can use an aftgoing spring line to get "singled up," tied to the dock with one line and with the engine running and shifted into forward, with just enough throttle to keep the boat close to the dock. You set up the spring and shift into gear and then remove the other lines at your leisure with the boat under full control. You can use the rudder to orient the boat and counteract the wind. Once you're ready, you can shift into reverse, which will ease the tension on the line so it can be released, and motor away. The spring line keeps the boat under control until you actually shift into reverse so that the wind has minimal time to push you off the dock.


As you leave the dock, if you're backing the stern into the wind (towards the dock), reduce power as soon as you're clear of the dock and let the wind blow the bow to port.


If you're backing to port, stern away from the wind, you would want to apply a good amount of power and use the combination of prop walk and the rudder to turn the stern. It might not work with a full keel depending on your boat and how much wind, so you may be better off planning to keep your stern into the wind instead and making the turn somewhere else.

[Jammer]

If you're backing out against a wind that is blowing you into the dock, with a 24' you should be able to push the stern off far enough with a boathook that you can back out and turn the stern to port (into the wind) using prop walk and rudder. Then you can either keep reversing to the end of the fairway and make your turn there, or shift into forward if you're going the other way.

[captqrunch]

The Maryland School of Sailing has some excellent videos. This one deals pretty comprehensively with docking issues and techniques:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoGMAEjiHmU&t=3242s

[drdoyle]

Proper use of spring lines are the first step. Using an out and back slip spring line from the appropriate balance point is a good option. Just release one end to depart after it does its initial job guiding the vessel out in a cross wind/current. You could pre rig your slip with "capture" lines that you just drive it into like a catcher's mit. Maybe you need more rudder area - a boatyard project. Another technique is dropping your anchor out front of the slip and using it to back in while paying it out slowly to hold the bow from blowing off to the side.

[sailorladd]

In my case I had similar experiences with backing my 31 foot full keel boat from my slip.
It is an anomaly with a lot, if not most, full keelers.

My rudder is also fixed to the aft of the keel, and it makes for a very strong, effective rudder, and my Hydrovane had a servo blade that was also a stand alone.. Unfortunately I also learned that when I installed this vane, it made backing out even worse, and I always found that when I had taken it off the boat for repairs or maintenance, my aft steering improved a lot...
I have heard that the direction of the propellor also works against steering aft when backing out.

My solution to this was to change my mooring slip to an upwind one (took a while at my marina), or you could just change the position of how you moor your boat if it's possible...
In other words, when returning to your mooring, even in a strong blow, your steering up wind is always most accurate, and it's a lot easier to just cut the engine at the final approach, and when you leave your mooring, allow the wind (if there is and whatever strength) to push you back without the effect of your engine/prop, which may be affecting your steering as it did mine...
Hope that works out for you.

[rls8r]

Hugo B -

Lots of advice here about spring lines and such. What I'd advise that you do is keep a few other things in mind as well:

1) Learn which way the propwalk moves the boat (if you haven't already). An easy way is to stop the boat and then kick it in reverse. Look on either side of your stern quarters - you'll see some turbulence welling up. The propwalk will be in the direction toward the side without the turbulence. You'll use the propwalk to get into the slip instead of trying to fight it.

2) Learn throttle control. Backing a full keel boat is not like driving it forward - you're not going to drive the boat in reverse back into the slip. You'll move in a series of bursts (or kicks) to align the boat in the slip, while alternating with slow, slow reverse all the other times to move the boat back into the slip. Practice throttling full up for about a second and then immediately bringing it back to slow, slow reverse. This kick should be powerful enough to move the stern to the side but short enough so it doesn't impart any headway to the boat. A good drill is to spin your boat around in its length by (assuming you have a right-hand prop and propwalk to port) moving the rudder so the boat moves to the right with forward prop. Kick forward. Then, without moving the rudder - kick in reverse. Then, without moving the rudder, kick forward. Keep doing this until the boat has spun 360°.

3) Remember that the wind (and current) will move the bow of the boat from side to side; the engine will move the stern from side to side. Don't make the mistake of trying to move the bow using the engine. With the rudder to port, kicking ahead will move the stern to starboard; kicking aft will move the stern to port. That's how you 'wiggle' your way back into the slip.

4) Spring lines aren't always needed, but they can help you 'wiggle' the stern (and boat) back into the slip. I'll usually put a mid-ship spring line on the starboard side since I have propwalk to port. When backing in, as the mid-ship cleat passes a piling I'll tie off one end of a rope to the cleat and then loop the line around the piling - leading the other end aft to the cockpit. When I tighten up on the spring line it will move the stern to starboard; if I slack off the spring line the propwalk will move the stern to port. I'm always in slow reverse while doing this except in the rare occasion when I have to kick forward to move the stern away from something - after which I immediately put it back into slow reverse. When I get far enough back into the slip I just tie off the spring line - keeping the boat in slow reverse - to hold its position while I attend to the other lines.

I take a little issue with what sailorladd says about the relationship of the slip and wind (if I understand what he said correctly). I've found that backing into an upwind slip is the easiest. Recall that wind will move the bow. When backing into an upwind slip the wind helps to keep the boat aligned with the slip. When going forward into an upwind slip, if the boat points off the wind on either side (for some reason, say, if a wave hits the bow at an angle), the wind will try to turn the boat and frustrate trying to motor into the slip.

Good luck! Like the lady was told when she asked how to get to Carnegie Hall - practice, practice, practice!

[sailorladd]

I am quite surprised that you take a little issue with me.... I have had my boat in and out of marinas etc since 1977, when I first launched my home built boat (and still have it)
I have sailed virtually around the world, from South Africa to the Caribbean, the Panama canal, Hawaii, the south pacific, Australia, New zealand and returned to Hawaii where I currently reside....

I have written a book about my travels and experiences one of which,I described a harrowing escapade where I had to sail through the very busy anchorage at Pago Pago,(my engine was not working) weaving in and out of the anchored boats and finally sailing up to the old wooden dock, under full sail and letting sheets fly at the last second, and this in a heavy blow... I felt I was qualified to reply to a query about slipping a boat in a marina... BTW a lot of my sailing was done alone....

[rls8r]

sailorladd -

You're certainly more than qualified to respond to this thread and tell Hugo B what your experiences have shown you.

I just told him what my experience has shown me. I grew up as a commercial waterman and have been putting boats [both sail (with and without engines) and power] into slips since I was about 8 years old. But, I'll admit, my experience has been limited to the western Atlantic above the equator. Perhaps if I sail to Pago Pago or write a book my view on getting a boat into a slip will change.

I just wanted to let Hugo B know that there are a range of experiences and viewpoints. Perhaps his experience will differ from both of ours - and that will be OK, too. He can come back here and tell us about what he's found and we'll (at least, I'll) be interested in hearing about it.

[pcmm]

Originally Posted by drdoyle

Another technique is dropping your anchor out front of the slip and using it to back in while paying it out slowly to hold the bow from blowing off to the side.

lol, with a full keel that's a funny thing to try to attempt!!!

[Christian W.]

pcmm and rls8r have nailed it...My ship is a 10.5 ton steel long keeled cutter which I sail singlehanded.
To give yourself steerage way while in the pen, gun the engine while in reverse and immediately go into neutral - the boat will then follow you rudder position. For any following adjustment, repeat...
I sympathise, it's taken me a long time, a few bruises and expensive fenders to learn this technique!

[Hugo B]

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

Hugo:

As a couple of "old hands" have cautioned above: Don't be deluded into thinking that more mechanical complexities will save your bacon :-)!

The ONLY thing that will make your life easier in the long run - and more particularly in the short run - is to learn to do it right.

"Doing it right" is a matter of technique and of the discipline to employ the correct (for the boat) technique every time you employ it.

A two'n'an'arf ton boat of utterly conventional design should be a piece-a-cake to back out of any pen that I have ever seen, but to give you sound guidance we need to know 1) what engine you have, 2) your propeller's diameter and pitch and "handedness", 3) whether you have a "clean rig" or whether you have a roller furling headsail, 4) whether your boat still has the original tiller steering or whether she has (Heaven forfend!) been converted to wheel steering.

We also need to know what PRECISELY you mean by "pen". Do you mean the space between two finger pontoons projecting from a bigger pontoon or from a quay?

I take it that the Top Hat of which you speak is this one:

https://sailboatdata.com/sailboat/top-hat-25/

Give us the info I said we need to know, and we can probably get you off towards an enduring, non-mechanical solution to your problem.

À la prochaine

TrentePieds

Hi

Everyone, thanks a million or the replies so far! If you have more advice, please post it, I am very interested, because this is a bit of a vexing issue.

TrentePieds, thanks for your willingness to give further advice. Here is a bit more information.
My boat is actually a Top Hat 27 (27 ft), quite rare, with only 4 ever made (all the others are 25 ft). She weights 3 metric tonnes. The engine is a 2GM20 yanmar, plenty of power, giving me about 5 knots at 2000 RPM in open water. I am not sure about the prop diameter and pitch, but there is definitely a strong prop walk. When I back out, the stern has a very strong tendency to turn to starboard, almost unavoidably so. This is not the direction I want to go in as then going out my bow ends up pointing to port which is the end of the marina and I have to do a tight U turn to get her out to open water. There is not much of a channel between my pen and the pens on the opposite side and that u turn is a worry in itself in strong cross winds.

I do have a roller furler and she is tiller steering. With the pen I mean I have a finger pen on the starboard side, and another boat next to me on the port side, with about 2 meters in between.

If there are two of us, I often "walk" the boat back by holding the bow close to the jetty before I jump on. That way I have a fair chance (with the tiller pointing to port and the engine in reverse) that the stern ends up to port, countering the strong prop walk turning the stern to starboard. This is the best solution but I am not keen to do this when I am leaving the dock alone because the boat is already kind of halfway leaving the dock before I jump on. Anyway, any further advice will be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

[Benz]

How far is it to where you could more easily turn? You might just back the boat right out of the marina, or into some place where the natual tendency to turn to starboard works in your favor. I back 37-ton steel schooner out of a narrow 100-yard-long winding channel all summer long, and often the wind determines for me which way I put the bow at the end when entering the fairway. Once you have water flow over the rudder, you should be able to pull the stern wherever you want, while the bows are more at the mercy of the wind.

[sinnerman]

Your boat is small enough to use lines to control it when backing out of the slip (as one blogger already mentioned)..

My boat has a good amount of prop walk in reverse, forcing the stern to port when backing (right hand prop).

If the wind is coming over the port side, it will worsen the situation by also
pushing the bow to stbd and making the entire boat rotate clockwise in the slip.

To counteract this I run a line from the aft dock cleat stbd side to the stbd genoa winch. I then actually PULL the boat aft out of the slip with the line, using reverse as necessary.

The line prevents the stern from moving to port / rotating through the process..

I then slip the line and pull it aboard.

My two cents

Cheers

[MicHughV]

I find the trick to avoid "prop walk" is to put the engine in reverse for just long enough to get a small amount of way on.
Once the boat is moving in reverse....even ever so slightly, the rudder will have water flowing over it and have directional ability.
The trick then is to keep a firm grip on the wheel or tiller, to avoid the rudder from slamming over, and with just a small turn on the rudder in the direction you want to go and re-engage the engine in reverse again, and you'll be able to back the boat out like a pro.

Once you've got even a modicum of reverse speed going, the rudder will have a good bite on the water.

I've learned to use this method to the point where I can back my boat (43' in length) pretty much anywhere I want to go.

[rslifkin]

Aside from technique with the engine, another thing to try is avoid using too much rudder too soon. Start with just a little rudder in the direction you want, then as you feel it start to bite and the boat gains speed, slowly feed in more rudder. Some boats will stall the rudder in reverse and lose steering if you get too aggressive (either too much rudder too soon, or too much rudder angle in general).