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ROLLER REEFING PHOTOS


Rob Blackburn

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Hello Chaps,

I can understand if you think I have been a bit of the long way around on this but that is what happens when you start in one spot and are too mean to chuck out the sails and masts etc you have made.

Finally got the roller reefing working on the CS 20 and on the weekend had the chance to try it in a gusty NE wind here in Ballina.

It worked a treat.

I have put up some shots that may be of interest to someone. There is a video here too.

http://gallery.me.com/blackburns#100532

The nice thing about rolling up the sails is that it is really neat and tidy and there is no sails in the boat. I just could not come at the mess everywhere getting muddy and having lunch spilled on them etc.. if you have to put them down in the bottom of the boat.  I also like being able to transport/store the whole catastrophe easier.

I think now I will start on getting a lighter set of masts working as the way I have it now it is rather heavy as I have sleeved the bottom 1.5m of both of them due to me breaking the first ones. It really is a two person job to get them up safely.

But over all it is better than the two other bright ideas I have had!!!

Cheers

Rob

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Hi Rob,

Looks pretty neat. I may have missed a previous discussion, but if I may ask, why did you opt for booms instead of sprits? I've heard others suggest that sprit reefing can be rigged to be quick and easy ("jiffy reefing"), though I haven't tried it myself. We have sprits on our CS20 and haven't felt a need to reef. I like the idea of being able to stow the sail neatly though, as it sounds like your setup allows. We always remove and fold up our sails, which is really the only hassle we have yet to eliminate, but it doesn't take up much of our time (about 15 minutes to rig, another 15 minutes to de-rig) so we continue to put up with it.

Wes

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We had sprits all along and they were fine. In many ways they are the best and easiest.  The problem was we got caught out in deeper water by some wind and despite having 2 guys on board and plenty of weight we got a bit of a fright. We got the main away and then were on mizzen alone but we could not go to weather at all well with the mizzen in the middle hole and we had a long way to go. (We got to shore and moved the mizzen eventually) So it made for a long day.

The boat seems to drive well to weather with the masts in their normal spots but with reduced sail better, than the mizzen sail in the middle hole only if you have a load on. Also it is not easy in 25knots and waves mucking around carrying masts about.

It is all fun though, I have enjoyed the whole process but feel that this offers a "Sea Pearl" type solution to the reefing issue.

Rob

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Makes sense. Thanks for sharing your thoughts. We have our CS20 set up with sailtrack and reef points on both sails, so we didn't even bother installing the third (middle) mast hole, as we expected it to be impractical to move the masts at sea under reefing conditions (as you confirmed).

We reefed our boat once when we were sailing the boat for only our second time and winds were 20 mph so we decided to play it conservatively. It was fairly straightforward with the sprits, but a little awkward with the wind blowing so hard. Weeks later, after building some confidence after several sail outings, I went out solo in 15 mph winds gusting to 25 mph, with no reefs in my sails, and I learned quite quickly that she can carry full sail in a surprisingly gusty situation like that as long as you watch the mainsail closely and let her out to spill the wind in the unusually heavy puffs or at first hint of an uncomfortably steep heel angle. But I was really impressed with how quickly I got comfortable with full sail in high winds like that, and also with how much speed you can squeeze out... I think 10.2 knots was our highest measured speed by GPS, but it might have been faster at times, and was planing nicely.

Thanks for sharing the pics of your reefing setup. I envy you the convenience of stowing the sails so easily, as your setup seems to offer.

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