Jordan Series Drogue or Heave to?

[uncledom]

I knew I had this some where and I re-found it. This might help in a decision. This is a test by the US Coast Guard.


http://jordanseriesdrogue.com/pdf/dr...uardreport.pdf

[uncledom]

The way I understand it is that if a wave breaks that a boat happens to be riding on it is the equivalent of being dropped out of the air the exact same height as the wave and landing on concrete. This is why rudders and masts snap. The whole concept scares the bejezus outa me and so I bought a JSD as these allegedly prevent that from occurring.

[a64pilot]

I had never looked at the report before and this was my first time, and in truth I didn’t read the whole thing.
But it appears the only test condition was a drogue deployed from the stern?
Or did I miss the tests of being deployed from the bow?
I didn’t read the whole thing, merely scanned

[uncledom]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

I had never looked at the report before and this was my first time, and in truth I didn’t read the whole thing.
But it appears the only test condition was a drogue deployed from the stern?
Or did I miss the tests of being deployed from the bow?
I didn’t read the whole thing, merely scanned

It's a good read, very interesting. They used scale models for all the testing and both the USCG at New London, CT and the Brits testing on the Thames came up with similar conclusions. They did simulate lying ahull, bow drogue and series drogue. Of course they compared it to models similar to the Fastnet race of 79.

[a64pilot]

Got a page number for where they tested off of the bow by chance?
I guess really I need to read all 80 pages.
Just I think off the bow and off the stern are completely different things.
Off the bow you want to stop the boat as much as practicable and ride it out.
Off the stern, your still trying to make way, drogue off the stern, chute off the bow, even though they classed them as one and the same, I don’t think they are.
One is to stop you, other is to provide some resistance, and that is different.

[barnakiel]

It takes plenty of weather to overpower your Amel.

The drogue and heaving to are two different things and not alternatives.

Once the waves begin to break in a bad way, you cannot stay hove to anymore.

So, I think, what you are doing is you are getting that drogue and then learning how to park your boat. Then you hope never to have to use that drogue. But you will likely stay hove to now and then if you sail enough.

Do learn to park your boat well: it is a most useful way to get some more comfortable movement and/or time when you want to inspect or fix something onboard, or get some rest in heavy going.

It is also a great way to stop the boat close to a MOB. Either by tacking without letting the foresail go (upwind) or else by a crash gybe, when going downwind.

With plenty of space in this boat you may also look at parachute sea anchors. These are another sea emergency devices, useful in other sort of sea trouble.

Cheers,
b.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

I have done a lot of reading on the drag database of accounts of people riding one out behind a Parachute, I have yet to read an account of the line going slack and snatching, and being glad when it broke away.

Not surprising you never read that on the drag database. The drag database was collated and maintained by Victor Shane who started Para-Anchors International in 1981 and sells parachute sea anchors. I'm not saying that he picks and chooses which accounts to publish, but I'd rather read about it from an unbiased source.

My claim is certainly anecdotal, but it is based on person to person reports from people who've been through it.

[a64pilot]

First thing I noticed was that USCG report went to jordonseriesdrogue.com too.
Everything is biased in some form or other.
I used to do testing for a living, and it is entirely possible or actually probable that tests are set up whether intentionally or not to achieve the expected results.

The drag database also has JSD and of course multihulls as well. It doesn’t seem to show any device as particularly better than the other, although its my supposition that some Boat designs are better suited for running and some may be better suited for the bow into the wind and waves is all.

It’s why I asked where in that report was parachute anchors off the bow tested, probably was, just in my quick scan I didn’t see it.

[a64pilot]

In that 80 page report, there is one paragraph para 6.6 on page 61 of the report that I can find that addresses a chute off of the bow. It basically says a boat may yaw, so it’s not recommended. There is zero substantiation and zero test data.
This report seems to be totally dedicated to drogue off of the stern.
Am I wrong, I hope so, cause otherwise this report is only applicable to drag devices deployed off of the stern, and I don’t ever intend to deploy my chute that way, my Galerider yes, but not the chute.

[CapnCrunch]

Any thoughts as to whether or not this boat will heave to?

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...type=3&theater

[kmacdonald]

JSD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Accept nothing less.

[thinwater]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

I still don’t understand how a 22,000 lb boat, tied to an 18’ sea anchor is going to be driven backwards with any appreciable speed? With 22,000 lbs on one end and an 18’ sea anchor on the other, we pretty much define irresistible force and immovable object don’t you think? Any real significant movement of an 18’ parachute will have forces so high that no line or attachment point is going to survive.
How fast do you have to backslide to damage a rudder? More than 5 kts?

Chute would have to come out of the water I would think.

Line stretch. That is really it, but it can be material with 400' of line out and a wave strike.


No, a JSD and Galerider are not very similar. It is not just about redundancy. They work in a very different speed range and load range, and their action is quite different. A Gale rider is nearly as different from a JSD as a JSD is from a chute. The first slows you a little and adds some stability. The second nearly stops you but allows some give. The third stops you.



Read the USCG report slowly. It is the work of a man that wanted to make things safer, not a commercial interest. Yes, it contains much guess work and personal opinion.

[Sojourner]

Originally Posted by barnakiel

It takes plenty of weather to overpower your Amel.

The drogue and heaving to are two different things and not alternatives.

Once the waves begin to break in a bad way, you cannot stay hove to anymore.

So, I think, what you are doing is you are getting that drogue and then learning how to park your boat. Then you hope never to have to use that drogue. But you will likely stay hove to now and then if you sail enough.

Do learn to park your boat well: it is a most useful way to get some more comfortable movement and/or time when you want to inspect or fix something onboard, or get some rest in heavy going.

It is also a great way to stop the boat close to a MOB. Either by tacking without letting the foresail go (upwind) or else by a crash gybe, when going downwind.

With plenty of space in this boat you may also look at parachute sea anchors. These are another sea emergency devices, useful in other sort of sea trouble.

Cheers,
b.

Thank you (and the others) again for the advice of people sailing much longer than me! That's what I was looking for... I do know my boat is a little beast, I started my life with her getting caught in 3 nasty winter Med storms on delivery of her in Feb. Never even thought of slowing down let alone heaving to or droguing or even changing my course, though the max wind was only about 40 knots, the seas were nasty Med things, breaking but not huge (I did sail through a corsican firing range cause I wasn't about to add 30 miles to my trip going around it they were very nice to let me thru)....

I can heave her to fine. My real dilemma is almost philosophical in nature: If the weather is going to crap, should I deploy the drogue even if objectively most of us could heave to and wait it out, on the thought that if the weather worsens, am I gonna want to turn the boat broadside and then deploy the drogue in seas high and breaking enough to make me go to the drogue in the first place (ie getting realllll crappy), or just deploy the drogue earlier than I need to so I'm set no matter what comes later and can go downstairs and have a beer...... which I know is something probably no one can answer for me, just wanted some other brains on the idea to ponder....

[Neptune's Gear]

Originally Posted by wingssail

I chose heave to and particularly NOT a sea anchor.



Here is how: The sea anchor and the boat do not move in synch, the line goes slack between waves, then the boat can move astern on the next wave which results in strain on the rudder and BIG shock when the boat fetches up against the sea anchor. This is why many people have said they were happy when the sea anchor finally broke away.

We've sailed a lighter weight fin keel spade rudder boat for of 55,000 ocean miles over the last 20+ years. We never carried a sea anchor or a drogue (expense and lack of space and actually I was never convinced either was a great idea). And we never felt that we wished we had one.

We have heaved-to twice. We hove-to the first time basically as an experiment during heavy weather north of New Zealand to see if it was an option for us at that time (two days, 50+kts, significant waves). We'd been sailing upwind with small jib and three reefs but the boat was going too fast and the pounding as we came off the waves was un-endurable for us. We found that heaving-to was a very viable option if we wanted to use it but we chose to keep sailing, fore reaching under main alone, with the motor idling in gear to keep some speed on for steerage, and keep the heave-to option as a last resort. The wind vane was steering. This kept us progressing toward our destination and worked for 24 hours, then the wind freed and the conditions moderated and we resumed sailing.

A second time we hove-to was in the Bashi Channel between Taiwan and Luzon (50+ kts, huge waves). The boat had been sailing very slowly upwind with main alone and got too close to the wind and then stopped and knocked backwards by a big wave, at which point the wind vane was broken and unusable. So we hove-to until morning when we could start hand steering. It worked fine. (Our autopilot is not strong enough for those conditions)

So our strategy is this:

1. Stay out of storms. It is not hard if you are choosy about where and when you sail. (we've never been anywhere near hurricane strength winds, we've neve been in any conditions when we couldn't move about on deck to handle sails or when we couldn't continue sailing.)

2. Reduce sail and keep sailing if you can, upwind is much better (because it is slower) than downwind.

3. Heave-to if you need to. If our boat can do it, probably any boat can.

4. Rig warps with anything you can put on them if you feel you need to go downwind under bare poles.

5. Spend less time obsessing about how to survive a hurricane and more about how to avoid one and how to sail when the conditions are bad.

That is not my experience. If the warp to a parachute goes slack, then the chute is not deep enough, or the warp too short. I have not experienced any sternway at all, and never seen the warp go slack - sure, the tension does cycle a bit, but the stretch in the warp and the catenary weights mean ive never seen it slack.

It seems to me that most who say they would never use a parachute anchor have no experience of them, and dont fully understand how they work. I re-iterate, properly set, there is no sternway. Ever.

[Sojourner]

Originally Posted by Neptune's Gear

It seems to me that most who say they would never use a parachute anchor have no experience of them, and dont fully understand how they work. I re-iterate, properly set, there is no sternway. Ever.

Ciao! Let's say you're right (which if you speak from personal experience I have no reason to doubt)... and let's say they work equally well just differently (the Coast Guard report defo does not recommend chutes and does recommend series drogues as their conclusion).... Again, the factor on my mind is once the seas are dangerous enough that you need to go to a chute from running off, you gotta turn, then probably go to the bow to deploy. And as hard as a JSD is to retrieve, I've read chutes can be much much harder. So all things being equal, the stern drogue still seems to win out.... ?