Posted by lance_ryley (lance_ryley@…>)
Since we seem to be on the subject of sail trim, I’m asking some of
the CK owners to chime in, especially on “close hauled” sailing in
the cat ketches. I’ve been sailing with the main essentially over
the mid-ship cleats, and the mizzen as close to centerline as I can.
Sometimes, this seems a little slow, but easing the main seems to
simply make it luff.
any suggestions, comments, ideas out there?
Thanks,
Lance, “Bright Star,” F40 CK
Posted by Brian Guptil (sailordude@…>)
Freedom CK sail trim.
I am relatively new to CK (freedom44) sailing but I have found 2 issues on SV Cayenne. One is to set the sails so that the mizzen is not back-winded, which means the mizzen is trimmed more to the boat CL then the main. Sailing up-wind, flattening the main helps reduce this back-wind on the mizzen and flattening the mizzen also helps. As one falls off of the wind, the need for the mizzen to be inboard of the main is reduced and soon not necessary. With that in mind, the main will be trimmed at the outer end of the traveler with the mizzen trimmed closer to the centerline. Next is lee-way and on a CK that is a huge issue. Pinching just increases you lee-way to the point where your effective course made good is worse then if your were properly powered up and pointing. But lee-way is hard to detect. If you boat speed up-wind is much less then 1/3 of the relative wind speed or less than 1/2 of the true wind speed, you are probably loosing a lot to lee-way. Fall off (slowly) and look for the maximum boat speed and when you have found that, head back up (just a little) and sail on the up-wind side of the speed peak. In higher wind speeds, there is a way of finding this sweet spot with heal angle. When the sails start working the boat will heal over to a given angle and the speed looks OK and the trim looks good also, but if you fall off just a little more, the boat will heal just a little more, but the speed picks up quite a bit. That is the place where I sail, with good speed and minimizing lee-way with good progress up-wind. And of course, one needs to keep testing this conditions as minor changes in conditions will move things around a little.
Remember, freedoms are not high strung stayed rigs with tight winded sails. Those boats have been compromises adjusted to sail up-wind. It’s a racing mentality thing. With the big fat masts on Freedoms, sailing tight to the wind is just not part of what works. So fall off and go fast and enjoy the other 270 degrees of wind angle. You will find that the stay-ed rigs will need to fly spinnakers to keep up. You know, those very large sails that keep the crew occupied while sailing downwind. Sometimes referred to as “that dreaded spinnaker.”
I have a tow-able generator which, when deployed, is a grate indicator of lee-way. When I pinch, the tow line is well outside of the boats wake.
Brian Guptil http://www.brigup.com206-818-3203 sailordude@…1735 112th Ave. N.E.Bellevue, WA. 98004-3706
----- Original Message -----
From: lance_ryley
To: freedomyachts2003@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, July 21, 2004 4:16 PM
Subject: [freedomyachts2003] Sail Trim Question
Since we seem to be on the subject of sail trim, I’m asking some of the CK owners to chime in, especially on “close hauled” sailing in the cat ketches. I’ve been sailing with the main essentially over the mid-ship cleats, and the mizzen as close to centerline as I can. Sometimes, this seems a little slow, but easing the main seems to simply make it luff.any suggestions, comments, ideas out there?Thanks,Lance, “Bright Star,” F40 CK