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Freedom 39

Posted: Wed Sep 07, 2022 11:08 am
by Camino
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A4B65808-5594-4AA1-B9DE-F063F6B40F25.jpeg (96.38 KiB) Viewed 4545 times
A couple of friends of mine are members of the Tradewinds Sailing School in Richmond CA and had access to use a Freedom 39 (1985). They invited me along knowing of my Freedom. So Tuesday, in stifling heat and zero breeze we motored out of Richmond and headed for the slot. Breeze started to fill in and up went the main and mizzen (both are huge). Soon the breeze went north of 25 aws. We fooled with various sail angles to reduce weather helm which was significant and at 30 kts aws we reefed both sails - weather helm went away and had a great sail to the gate, city front, and back. Downwind we could sail wing and wing and jibbing was not a problem. Good time. We put in about 28 nm, had max sog of 10.1 kts and were remarkably dry. Still can’t figure out how rotate pics here :D

Re: Freedom 39

Posted: Wed Sep 07, 2022 6:47 pm
by DonHodgson
Thanks for posting this.

I have a recently purchased Freedom 33 with a "Tall Rig" and when out in 20-25 kts also had significant weather helm, but the reefs are not rigged so its next on the to-do list. Not sure if you have another picture that might provide a description of how the reef lines were run for the Freedom 39?

Re: Freedom 39

Posted: Wed Sep 07, 2022 7:06 pm
by Camino
Hi Don - I have a poor video of sailing but nothing on the rigging. This F39 carried two reefing points for main and mizzen, all lines running to the ample cockpit. Single line reefing - not sure whether shuttle blocks were involved or simply “single lines” as I use on GoodWay. In about 30 kts aws we used the first reefing point - which did the trick nicely. Reefing lines from cockpit to base of mast(s) through blocks to luff cringle reefpoint , down to block, through boom to end, to leach reef cringle and tied off on boom. Same for second reef point …make sense?

Re: Freedom 39

Posted: Thu Sep 08, 2022 12:04 pm
by DonHodgson
Tom, Thanks, that is very helpful and I really appreciate the help. I was trying to determine if I needed shuttle blocks or if I could just run the lines directly through the boom. Thats how I had recently set it up, but was second guessing the decision after looking at the Isomat boom website information. I'll go ahead and give it a try.

Re: Freedom 39

Posted: Sun Sep 11, 2022 9:34 pm
by Camino
Timely- sailing yesterday trying to match the environment we had with the F39 with my F 35- putting a reef (2nd reef as I don’t run a first reef), line got hung up and the power winch ripped the luff reef block apart and tore the line in half- main got stuck up and had a time trying to get it down :D. So I ordered from Defender 100’ 3/8 - 10 mm line for the second reef I destroyed…. Ouch. Having shuttle block(s) would see half that as a replacement- my problem with my shuttle blocks was the putting a reef in was smooth, but shaking the reef out took like 30 minutes! With single line reefing and a power wi ch, easy does it and make sure all lines are clear :D Which I didn’t.