Clark Myers
I’m at Browns Creek on Lake Guntersville. Temp 36; winds 14 gusting to 20; one
other sailboat on the lake. I’m about ready to go sailing myself. I plan to sail
down toward the dam and Honeycomb Creek. This will be a beat to windward but
will allow me to run back to the marina. If I don’t post again by 5pm please
call my cell phone and if I don’t answer please consider calling the Coast Guard
or Alabama Marine Police.
Clark Myers
I’m back… It was fun while it lasted. I left my slip under power at 1400 and
motered out about 400 yards before idleing back, rounding up into the wind, and
hoisting the mainsail with 2 reefs tucked in. I fell off onto a reach and was
making about 5 to 6 knots. I made the main channel (about a 1/4 mile down stream
from Lower Guntersville Light) in under 30 min.
13 minutes ago · Like · Comment
Clark Myers
The wind was starting to worry me and I decided to turn back for Browns Creek
Marina. I tried but could not force the head through a tack so I executed (what
I thought was) a controled gibe (boom only moved “free” about 3 feet but that
was enough to snap ALL of the luff slides from the head of the sail down to the
second reef line.
8 minutes ago · Like
Clark Myers
It is not a good feeling to have the wind that strong and see one’s sail unzip
from the mast. I mean, SHIT, I just replaced all of the luff slide a year ago! I
started the outboard and dropped the main, using the halyard to lash the sail to
the boom to keep it from flying out like a crazed backwards spinnaker.
3 minutes ago · Like
Clark Myers
Time to go take the sail off of the boat and see if I have any spare luff slides
left. Catch you later…
2 minutes ago · Like
So, does anybody know of better or stronger luff slides than the original equipment Brainbridge #H228200 3/4" Universal? This is my second set since buying the boat 2 1/2 years ago. They don’t seem to like the combination of 20 mph wind and near freezing temps.
hi
cant make out the part number you quote , they seem to be bainbridge ones can you post a pic ! they usualy are available in stainless with a teflon coating but id like to see your mast track first to see if youve got the right ones for the track and if not what else to sugest. please post pics and acurate dimensions of the track ie width of groove , thickness of metal making up the groove and the internal diameter of the track
all the best , phil
Do you want Standard or Metric dimentions with those pics? I will get back to the marina again over the weekend so, I should be able to post pics early next week.
I lost a total of 8 attachment points (7 failed luff slides and one broken shackle). I have seven replacement Brainbridge slides left over from my April 2009 refit. They came in 4 packs and are labled 5/8 x 1-3/16 PLSTC SLIDE 4PK PA007/4 and carry a UPC of 68775802895 (I bought them from either Defender or West Marine). I also have a dozen Ronstan shackles (PNP63 1/2" x 5/16" 601123) that I bought at the same time so as to replace the ones securing the slides to the sail. I did not replace the shackles in 2009 for a reason I can not now recall.
see if you can find anything useful here, there are some stronger slides made of ptfe coated stainless we usualy put these on headboards which stops the peel effect you experienced!
phil
Acording to the Brainbridge catalog you posted I used A007 slides the last time I replaced old/broken slides. I probably should have been using A008 slides. I wonder if the A108 slides would work any better on my boat? I am hesitant to try the B307 teflon coated stainless steel slides as I fear the aluminum track would fail before the slides would and the track would be both harder and more expencive to replace than the slides would.
Wow Clark, didn’t know the temp could cause such failures.
The winds you describe are well within limits it seems. The wife and I really enjoy taking the boat out with winds in the 20’s, without reefing.
So far I’ve only reefed it once when I was taking others out along with me.
I’m not entirely convinced the temprature was the only cause of the failure. It seems I used 5/8" slides instead of 3/4" when I replaced them in April '09. The slides failed because the windward flanges of the slides snapped off.