Core Sound 20 Hull #102

[brigait1]

Graham, I notice his staysail halyard isn't run to a cleat on the windward rail. Was it just a very light wind day or does he have some extra stiff masts? What gives?

[paul_stewart]

Wes,

For whatever it's worth...   

Halyard/Backstay:  You can see our stays'l halyard serving as a backstay by being tied to an oarlock socket on the windward rail.

Tack:  On the foredeck the red-white line has a center loop midship (the tack of the stays'l clips onto it) and from there the red-white line runs to each side to a block (each side) and then aft to a cleat (each side).   

Sheet:  The sheet from the clew runs to an eye on the aft end of the mizzen spritboom and from there to someone's hand.

(any comments appreciated)

--Paul

[Ken_Potts]

So the block for the tack is just a few inches in front of the cabin  ;D

There's a stopper knot at the head of the sail.  Haul the halyard until the knot hits the block at the top of the mast then cleat it off on the coaming (in Paul's case at the oarlock).

And no - I'm not an expert.  I'll be rigging my new staysail in the coming week or two.

[wkisting]

Thanks guys. That's very helpful stuff. Does the tack of the sail go in the middle of the foredeck, or does it get offset to either side depending on which tack the boat is on? Seems like Paul's setup suggests the latter, though I may be mistaken.

Is the lower aft corner of the staysail cleated to the windward rail, or just the halyard, or both? At the same attachment point, or are there two separate sets of attachment points for the sail and halyard/backstay.

[wkisting]

Okay, I've just about got it figured out, except for Ray's comment about the clew/sheet running to the mizzen sprit??? I can't envision how that works... wouldn't it interfere with the mizzen sail operation?  (Sorry, this staysail idea is all new to me, so maybe I'm misunderstanding something obvious here.)

[wkisting]

Played around with the staysail today... we settled on this rigging setup, which seemed to allow good setting of the staysail in a breeze in our driveway, but we haven't water-tested the results yet:

(1) staysail halyard is on a single block with about 40' of 3/16" sta-set nylon line. We'll tie the end off (probably) to an upside-down cleat mounted under the cockpit coaming (about 2'-3' aft of the mizzen mast) to serve as the running backstay on the windward side.

(2) staysail clew/sheet runs through a single block permanently connected to a stainless hook. The hook permits the staysail sheet to stay permanently reeved through the block, even when we un-clip it to pass it over to the other side for re-setting on the opposite tack. The eye loop on the existing mizzen sheet block (connected to the end of the mizzen sprit) seems to be a convenient attachment place to hook on this staysail sheet setup, so no new attachment point needs to be added to the mizzen sprit.

(3) staysail tack is tied off on a very short (4") length of cordage to another stainless hook that can be clipped onto an eyestrap on either side of the foredeck. We ended up positioning the eyestraps about 54-1/2" back from the bow as measured ALONG the gunwales perimeter or approximately 2' straight back from the main mast step. We screwed them into the inwales with 1-1/2" screws, which seem to give plenty of bite (#10 fasteners)

I'll try to snap a pic and give a performance report tomorrow if we make it out to the lake and conditions are right.

[JeffM]

Paul, your set-up on Dawn Patrol has me curious: what sort of on-the-fly adjustment did you have in mind with that moveable tack loop?

[wkisting]

I was wondering that, too, Jeff, since it doesn't seem as though the staysail can be tacked across without the main sail hitting it. (i.e., it can't just be to pull the staysail tack across without dousing the sail).

I'd guess that Paul drops the staysail halyard and lets it lay flat on the cabin roof, tacks/gybes to set the main and mizzen sails, swaps the staysail halyard and clew over to the other side, then re-raises the halyard. In that case, the rope just makes it possible to switch the tack position without the inconvenience of climbing around the cabin sides. In an open cockpit boat, this isn't necessary because the staysail tack can be easily reached from the cockpit so the rope method wouldn't really ease the process sufficiently to justify the extra rigging. But I certainly understand Paul's decision in light of the cabin on his boat.

Of course, Paul may now chime in and tell me I'm completely wrong about the purpose of his setup.

[wkisting]

Tried the staysail today, but I couldn't figure out how to tweak it correctly for efficiency. We were delighted to find that it's very easy to handle the sail (raising and dousing) because it is such lightweight sailcloth. We also discovered that the sail sets better if there is about 12" of slack between the tack and the clip to the deck (instead of the 4" we started with). But we couldn't get it tweaked right to actually give us noticeably better speed. The sail fills nicely, but it tends to starve either the main or the mizzen no matter what point of sail we try. Perhaps we just need some more experience with it.

Any tips on how to sail with the staysail and get it tweaked correctly?

Here's a pic we snapped while the staysail was up.

[Ken_Potts]

  I think the tack is adjustable on Paul's boat only partly because of the cabin.  I think the main reason is to allow the tension on the luff to be adjusted easily.  I've heard Alan or Paul mention something about (I think) easing up on the luff to get a little closer to the wind.  I haven't gotten my staysail rigged yet and I've only been close to one that was flying (Paul's) so don't take my word as gospel.

  I certainly could have used the staysail on Jordan Lake today.

[paul_stewart]

I'd guess that Paul drops the staysail halyard and lets it lay flat on the cabin roof, tacks/gybes to set the main and mizzen sails, swaps the staysail halyard and clew over to the other side, then re-raises the halyard. In that case, the rope just makes it possible to switch the tack position without the inconvenience of climbing around the cabin sides.

I think the tack is adjustable on Paul's boat only partly because of the cabin.  I think the main reason is to allow the tension on the luff to be adjusted easily.  I've heard Alan or Paul mention something about (I think) easing up on the luff to get a little closer to the wind.

Your comments above are correct. 

I am now an expert on how to hook up our stays'l on the "Dawn Patrol".   I have accumulated hundreds dozens of seconds of practice deploying it.   

Judging by some of Alan's warnings,  I think I am also fully capable of using the stays'l to accidentally knock the boat over in a wind shift.

However,  that's as far as my expertise goes.   

I'm still a rank newbie to the mysterious art of using and fine-tuning this wonderful sail. 

My expert sailing son, Alan, said today that the tack of the sail would almost always be pulled over toward the windward rail,  but on some rare occasions might be set closer to the midline of the boat in a manner similar to the way that a spinnaker is sometimes used when racing upwind (in his experience on a Nacra 20 catamaran).   _{....... um, I think that's what he said.}

When bringing down the stays'l in higher winds we have on occasion stuffed it into the cabin.  That reminds me of a definition I read somewhere of "spinnaker"...

"Spinnaker:  Large beautiful balloon shaped sail used in powerful downwind sailing, and when lowered stores neatly into the galley and main cabin and heads all at the same time."

And while I'm at it,  two of my other favorite nautical terms that I read somewhere...

"Ahoy: The first in a series of four letter words commonly exchanged by skippers as their boats approach one another."

"Mizzen:  The shorter aft mast on a yawl or ketch. Any mast that is no longer there."

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

--Paul

[brigait1]

One thing Graham suggested when using the staysail on a broad reach is that you can actually let the main WAY forward on the windward side till it sticks out in front of the bow kinda like a big headsail. You do this by heading down and going wing-and-wing first, then let the main ride way forward and then steer up a bit into a broad reach. It seems strange if you're used to sloop sailing because it feels like sail by-the-lee. But it keeps the staysail from blanketing the main and also seems to balance the helm a little better.

[paul_stewart]

Pete,  one caveat: my understanding is that for those of us with a tabernacled non-rotating main mast, some care is needed regarding the snotter and regarding how (and how far) that maneuver goes.

--Paul

[wkisting]

Thanks guys! All excellent advice. Now I'm envisioning several things we didn't try with our staysail yesterday that might've made her work better.

Per Ray's comment, I think we may have been hauling in too tightly on the staysail sheet much of the time, as we kept her pretty taught on some points of sail or she would start to flutter. But I did notice on one run, while attempting wing-and-wing as well, that I was able to ease off considerably until she had a nice full shape, and then we did see our speed jump up from 4 to 5 kts. According to the weather report, the wind was 4 kts at that time, but I suspect it was blowing a bit harder than that at this particular moment... more like 6 or 7 kts of wind. The rest of the outing, we were moving around at speeds between 2.25 and 3.5 kts, but every time we raised the staysail, the wind shifted or she starved one of our sails so that we actually lost about 0.25 to 1 kts. of speed.

One trouble I noticed is that with the staysail up, the main doesn't want to swing out as far, which on some points of sail creates minor difficulty for the shape of the staysail if you play out the sheet to give her a full shape. In fact, it seemed as though the staysail actually creates a suction effect that draws the main in closer to create this problem... perhaps not, but it seemed that way.

[wkisting]

Went out for 2.5 hours today. Sunny, 62 degrees, wind reportedly blowing at 6-10 knots but I think it was gusting higher than that. We made 9.5 knots of speed on a few runs, which is about 11.5 mph. At that speed, she planes so nice and smooth that the ride becomes really soft and comfortable. The rest of the time we were plowing windward into steep waves at about 6 knots, and we got SOAKED. I'm sure once we get the gunwales on, that will help a bit, but we really do need a dodger. The water is chilly this time of year. 

Didn't try the staysail because the wind gusts felt really violent at times so we chickened out. 

[wkisting]

Returning to the earlier topic of mounting a shoot-through-hull sonar transducer...

I finally sucked up the nerve last night to mount my transducer. I decided shoot-through-hull was the way to go, even though Graham suggested that a transom mount has worked well on Skimmer. I decided to mount it in the aft compartment, against the aft bulkhead (the one that separates the aft compartment from the cockpit).

Here's my thought process, for those of you who wanted a report...

It would be possible to mount the transducer on the transom, but I didn't want to have to cut through the exterior transom to route the connection cable inside, and I didn't want the cable showing on the outside of the boat.

Next I considered mounting the transducer right in front of the CB case, which would be a fairly ideal location since it's close to the centerline and surrounded by structure (the CB case itself) which would help prevent it from getting kicked or broken. But it still looked like anything we slid under the forward seat might strike it, so I ruled that out. Also, it would've been very difficult to work in that area with anything except a chisel, and I didn't want to rely on my chiseling skills. The nice thing about this location would've been that the transducer would read the depth of the water in front of the centerboard, but that's a small concern--just would've been nice.

Then I considered mounting the transducer under the thwart, just in front of the Anderson bailer. This was a fairly accessible location that made it possible to use a router, but again, I was worried it still might get knocked off by people's feet, etc., and I really don't want to put the transducer on the boat if I'm always going to have to worry about protecting it or avoiding breaking it. I think Graham told a story about having a transducer in this location on Heron or Skimmer until a grandchild (?) kicked it loose.

Then I considered mounting it in one of the seat compartments, except that the transducer would likely be out of the water when sailing aggressively on one tack, and I'd like to choose a location that would consistently be submerged (as often as possible). More importantly, the drainage channels around each seat hatch opening would make it difficult to work inside the seat and cut a clean cut-out for the through-hull mount.

Finally, I realized that the aft compartment is ideal. Although we keep some stuff in it (PFD's, our "lunch hook" and some inflatable floaty chairs--all very light stuff), we rarely ever go into that compartment, so the transducer would be protected well there. Also, the hull panels are flattest at that part of the boat (no curvature), so the router would cut evenly through the plywood and, assuming the depth were set right, might leave behind the fiberglass outer hull skin, so no need to redo the bottom paint after the operation if one is careful. Plus, even at planing speeds, the hull at that point (the aft bulkhead) is always submerged near the centerline, and it would take a very aggressive angle of heel to pull it out of the water, I think. Best of all, even if the hull somehow ruptured at the transducer, the water would be confined to the aft compartment, so it shouldn't sink the boat even if the rupture happened while we were not around to notice it. Probably unlikely, but you never know.

So, we marked the location: as close to the keel batten and the aft bulkhead as the router would let us get, offset to the starboard side of the centerline because our CB case (which may cause some minor interfering turbulence) is offset to port. I cut carefully with the router, taking away the wood but leaving behind the hull fiberglass skin and bottom paint. Then I 'glassed in about 7 or 8 layers of 6 oz. fiberglass tape (cut to the exact size of the hole) to reinforce the hull skin at that point and ensure watertight integrity. After pressing it carefully to eliminate any air bubbles, I let this cure overnight. Then, this morning, I poured in a thin layer of epoxy, stuck in the transducer (which I scuffed with 120-grit sandpaper per the instruction manual), and poured a little more epoxy all the way around it to fill around the hole.

Looks nice, but I'll have to wait until our next outing to report on the results. I'll be profoundly frustrated if it doesn't work. If it does, then I'll cut two holes: One to route the cable from the aft compartment into the port-side seat compartment, and another to route it through the face of the seat (right under the thwart) to attach to the GPS/Sonar unit (which is mounted under the thwart, port-side). But I want to test its effectiveness before committing to two more holes. 

[Edited for typo, and to clarify I'm doing a shoot-through-hull, not through-hull, setup.]

[wkisting]

I'm constantly amazed by the stupid things people will do to their stuff, and then attempt to claim a guarantee for...

I used to work at a huge sporting goods store where they sold, among many other things, Oakley sunglasses. One of my co-workers told me that a fellow came in one day trying to return a pair that were all scratched to hell... they looked like he put them in a blender. My co-worker asked him how long he had owned them. He said, "I bought them a couple of days ago, but they don't do what they say they can do." It turned out he had shot them with a shotgun (or some kind of gun) because he had heard they were "so shatterproof they can withstand a shotgun blast." (If I recall correctly, this was a $200 or $300 pair of sunglasses.) Apparently, it didn't occur to him that even if they didn't shatter, they would still scratch to hell. And, of course, my co-worker had to explain that that was a marketing claim about durability, not a "guarantee" which licenses the owner to shoot them at will and then expect a refund when they get scratched. I can't fathom why he would feel obliged to test it, though, unless he bought the glasses out of fear someone might try to shoot him in the face. Of course, at that level of stupidity, I see why he might need to worry about that. 

[wkisting]

Went for my first solo sail today... Weather was sunny, clear, and 53 deg F. Winds were reported at 4 knots, gusting to 18 knots, but I thought they felt like a fairly steady 12-14 knots. I could be wrong... my speed averaged typically from 5 - 8 knots, carrying full sail.

I wore a pair of waders over some sweat-wicking long underwear (Marmot DriClime) and a t-shirt, plus my lifejacket, a rain jacket, and a hat. I was nice and toasty warm all day, and the waders are terrific for launching/retrieving the boat, as you can stay bone dry (and warm) while wading in chest-deep water, if need be.

Wind was blowing perfectly straight out of the launching cove, so I was able to sail right off the ramp today, no motoring.

There was one sloop, probably 36' LOA, flying a huge genoa and main. Either he was screwing around or the CS is really much faster, but I smoked him on a long tack up the lake. I covered a 1-mile distance more than twice as fast, then had the side branch of the lake all to myself as I tacked straight into the wind. I was able to make nice progress (3 knots) into the wind at a 50 degree angle, but fell off just a little further to about 55 degrees and saw my speed jump to 4 or 5 knots fairly consistently.

Stopped on a small island by sailing up into the calm area just downwind of the land... Speed dropped to 1.25 knots, then fell to 0.75 knots, but the boat eased right up onto the shore beautifully (no motor Ray!). Let the sheets go so the sails could swing freely, then tied off to shore and had a sandwich. Couldn't believe how very calm it was on the lee side of the shore compared with just 30 yards over. The sails just swung back and forth lazily with no fuss or flapping, calm as could be.

After 30 minutes, back out to the water. Had a little trouble getting out of the calm area (due to seaweed dragging on the rudder blade), but crawled steadily away at 0.20 knots until I was about 50 yards out, then caught the breeze and ran wing-and-wing for a mile back up the branch to the main open area I had sailed in from. With the centerboard raised fully, in about 6 knots of wind, the boat made 4 - 5.5 knots of speed. Out in the open bay, I found four more sloops, three flying large genoas. The smallest boat was about 25', two others at about 30' (one with the main sail deeply reefed and no genoa), and the largest about 36'. Their sails were huge (the genoa alone on one of them was probably twice my total sail area), but I could match their speed and crawl up on them very slowly on every upwind angle. Downwind, I could pull away more noticeably, especially running wing and wing with the board up. I also gained a little distance on each tack, since I could tack more quickly and take off on the new point of sail quicker too. I'm more and more impressed with the CS every time I sail her.

Given the crap Ray's been giving me about my motor  , I decided to try to sail back up the very narrow channel to the boat ramp. It took about 30 minutes and probably 30 tacks (the channel is only about 40 yards wide, and the shallow banks reduce the navigable area to only about 25 yards of width), but I made it within 20 yards of the ramp. The last 20 yards I needed the motor because I couldn't claw forward any more. The trees were blocking the wind and the wind-current on the water was just starting to make me lose ground. So I fired up the motor and drove ashore. Still, I couldn't believe how capably I made it up that channel. The wind was blowing straight against me, but with enough patience, the CS can pull it off. [Edit to add: Now that I proved it can be done, I'll go back to using the motor to avoid the tediousness of 20 or 30 tacks!  ]

Well, I'll stop rambling, but I always found myself craving more info and stories during my build, so maybe others will enjoy my report. Good news, the sonar transducer which I mounted works very well. For others considering a transducer, I highly recommend mounting inside the aft compartment, offset to one side of the keel batten (offset to the opposite side of the CB) and as close to the aft bulkhead as possible. I was planing, heeling sharply, smacking into 2' waves, sailing backwards, and everything else you can think of, but the signal remained steady and clear the whole time. Very pleasing. And since it's hidden in the aft compartment, I don't even know it's there. I just enjoy having the data on my screen so I can see when it's time to pull the CB up as I approach shore, and also because I'm curious about the bottom shape.

[wkisting]

Well, Ray, you've just got to come down and visit me here in GA so we can sail and I can show you how nifty it is to have a motor aboard. I bet I could sell you on the convenience after only 2 or 3 rounds of rowing and stowing your oars. 

Actually, I'll probably go "motor-less" when we finally get down to the coast. Want to build our skills first before hitting the ocean and dealing with extra variables like currents and tides, but then I'd prefer not to run our motor in salt water, so we'll probably build oars early next Spring for that purpose. I don't think we'll go to the coast until next year, though, when the weather warms and stuff is blooming again in Charleston, Beaufort, or Savannah.

[wkisting]

Meant to ask: Does anyone have general rules of thumb on centerboard usage? I'm learning to tweak the sails, but now I need to learn to tweak the board depth. I tend to put the board nearly all the way down on all points of sail except downwind runs, when I remember to bring it up. But I suppose it's probably scrubbing off speed in some cases. What speeds or points of sail do folks use "in between" settings like 1/3-board, half-board, or 2/3-board? (Hope that made sense.) If I have heavy weather-helm (turning into the wind) but my mizzen is trimmed correctly, is that a good indication that I should be raising the board to shift the CLR of the blade aft? I'm guessing so...