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setting up trisail tracks


Romany

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Merry Xmas to all...

 

Does anybody have thoughts on the best way of setting up storm sails? Specifically - trisail & track and storm jib?

I have none of that carry on.

 

Currently have a simple, single speader Fosters tree trunk, deck stepped, sails all mast head, #1 genoa with slugs ("kiwi slides" from Reefrite I think they are called) on furler, #3 also set up to go on the furling spar with slugs(- both 1 & 3 are full hoist), slab reefed main with 2 reefing points - not sure of the size of the reefs, 3 halyards (spin/main/genoa). Mast has at some time in the past had an inner forestay - the fitting is still on the stick but nothing on deck. So questions are; 1) do I need a track for trisail? Is there a better way (ie is a wire luff an option or is that just a bad idea)? Assuming a track required, slugs or a 'car' type

2) should trisail have its own halyard ie one with an exit block at the appropriate hoist height - or should it also be masthead? 3) assuming I fit an inner, should the stay be continued through the deck (maybe not continously) to the keelson? Once again the festering wound of being landlocked for too long is breaking out. This time the top is being scratched by the upcoming 3 Kings race.

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So questions are; 1) do I need a track for trisail? Is there a better way (ie is a wire luff an option or is that just a bad idea)? Assuming a track required, slugs or a 'car' type

 

YES you NEED a track or some other method of attaching the trysail to the mast, parral beads or rope lashings. Dropping the mainsail securing the flogging luff and then loading the trysail can be very exhausting work in a "storm", and this would normally be just at the start of the storm when you are still warm, fit and well.

 

A trysail with a free standing wire luff is a bad idea, and the trysail will become an uncontrollable spinnaker in anything above say 40 knots e.g. it will be virtually impossible to hoist in 80+knots IMHO.

 

You will need STRONG metal slugs but longer slides would be even better.

 

Having a seperate trysail track allows the trysail to be fed into the mast at say 30 knots but remain in it's bag until needed at say 60 knots. (Many cruising boats do this.)

 

2) should trisail have its own halyard ie one with an exit block at the appropriate hoist height - or should it also be masthead?

 

Most boats for ocean passages would have 2 main halyards in case one breaks.

 

Having the trysail halyard ending half way up the mast may seem a good idea but fails the test as a replacement for the mainsail.

 

In any event having yet another exit hole in the mast at the "middle" of the bendy bit (Deck stepped - masthead) would weaken the mast at a critical stage, and when stressed in say 90knots of breeze.

 

3) assuming I fit an inner, should the stay be continued through the deck (maybe not continously) to the keelson? Once again the festering wound of being landlocked for too long is breaking out. This time the top is being scratched by the upcoming 3 Kings race.

 

Yes something needs to be load bearing!!

(Raised deck features may knot be admired by those sleeping below)

 

YES: fit an inner forestay and running backstays for extended ocean voyages.

 

:think: :think: :think: :think: :think:

 

Q1. What is the strongest breeze you have sailed in :?:

 

Q2. Was that a cold and wet night with lightining flashing continously, zero visibility and with 2m solid green dumping on the boat and then with the mast below horizontal to let the water off the deck :?:

 

Q3. Was that on the 3rd or 4th day of the storm :?:

 

Personally I do like the trysail stowed on deck, in its bag tied to the base of the mast, just needing a halyard and the sheets led aft.

 

Setting a storm jib on the forestay is hard, especially when the yacht is jumping out of the water and the crashing down 20+feet.

 

I suggest the storm jib on an inner forestay is a better way; certainly safer to set than going all that way out to the forestay carrying a sail in a bag. ( :think: Could you practice this on the Rainbows End roller coaster whilst blindfolded on a wet stormy night :?: )

 

Packing your storm jib. IMHO it is wise to fold the jib on the LP Line (Luff Perpendicular) rather than along the foot.

The sail will be:

a). Smaller in length (on a bunk down below as well)

B). Have all the hanks at the top of the bag so one can "hank on" WITHOUT taking the sail out of the bag.

c). Threading a short lashing through the hanks to keep them all together is helpful.

 

Having the storm jib hanked on to the inner forstay, still in its bag, before the wind increases to near gale (force 7) is a good move.

 

Practice setting the storm sails in rough water e.g. in a strong wind against the maximum tide in Motuihe Channel or even just off North Head. The waves though small can be quite choppy; no where like a real storm but the boat can be tossed around enough to make some simulation.

 

FYI my fastest sailing speed to date was over 14 knots . . . . .

 

under bare poles (in South Atlantic)

 

and on another time in the UK the forecast was:

 

"moderating Force 13 later PERHAPS"

 

and the "perhaps" was the encouraging part :!: :!: :!:

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If you plan on sticking in the southern hemisphere then put the trisail track on the starboard side of the mast.

 

Thanks Pete. Not a consideration I would normally make but a most interesting one. :thumbup:

 

I would normally have suggest the port side so that the yacht is on a starboard tack with right of way when reefing, the trysail bag stowed on the inferior side or perhaps all the cruising books (UK & USA), mast makers and cruising boats we built in the UK just favour the port side.

 

:think:

Does ths mean we need to change MASTS and compasses when we cross the Equator now, just to please King Neptune :?: :?: :?:

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Island Time has the trisail track on the port side. Stops 1/2 way up (with a pin thru the top so you cannot haul it out of the track) and I use the main halyard. Trisail lives in a purpose built bag ot the foot of the mast for offshore or expected heavy passages. Never really been an issue.

 

Storm Jib is a "gale sail". As we have roller furling headsail, and no inner forersay, the storm jib is a bit of a problem. The Gale sail has a salcloth wrap that goes around the furled headsail, and hanks back over to itself. It slides up over the furled headsail. Works pretty well, certainly no more difficult than a normal hanked sail.

 

Used. Only a few times. Worst conditions 80knts, 14 M seas. Ended up on a parachute - I dont beleive any boat can sail safely in these conditions. Real happy if that does not happen again...

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Further to that. If I could without structural mods, I'd have an inner forestay, and the storm jib would be hanked on, in a bag at the foot as well. Easier, and brings the centre of effort back towards the mast which is good!

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Thanks for your replies.

 

Pete;...

put the trisail track on the starboard side of the mast
. Interesting observation, but being that the devil is in the detail, could you expand & explain why? I appreciate PaulR's comment about starboard tack while reefing, but your comment intrigues me.

 

Will a track with slugs create a jambing issue (My minimal experience in frisky weather tells me it is a battle to haul a halyard when main is pressed from abeam or further aft). I would have thought that a track with load bearing cars that would bind less would be preferred - or am I just getting complicated and expensive?

cheers and merry new year..

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My guess would be in the Southern Hemisphere would be that when avoiding Tropical Cyclones, a South Easterly course is recommended. Hence one would most likely be on a port tack away from the centre, so a starboard trysail track would make hoisting easier . . .

 

sometimes :thumbup:

 

However Pete's reply will be interesting indeed.

 

Harden up: Fit two trysail tracks so your boat remains balanced and the mast is strengthened evenly on BOTH sides. :P

 

Further the resale value for Northern Hemisphere buyers is maintained. What a unique special feature :?:

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Island Time has the trisail track on the port side. Stops 1/2 way up (with a pin thru the top so you cannot haul it out of the track) and I use the main halyard. Trisail lives in a purpose built bag ot the foot of the mast for offshore or expected heavy passages. Never really been an issue.

 

The stop at the top of the trysail track is a YNZ Safety Reg. item as well; after a yacht (or yachts) could not lower the trysail when it was all too much. Normally a tapered track stop (so sails wont tear on the trackends) with TWO machine screws tapped into the mast or a solid welding smoothed down worked well.

 

Island Time's "PIN" could be much larger being more a bolt than a small cotter / split pin. I don't know but a photo would be interesting.

 

Many masts on bigger yachts had twin spinnaker halyard cranes plus twin forestay / headsail halyards so making a masthead fitting with 3 fore and aft aligned alloy sheeve holder sides was easy and stronger; making fitting twin mainsail halyards very easy as well.

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Storm Jib is a "gale sail". As we have roller furling headsail, and no inner forersay, the storm jib is a bit of a problem. The Gale sail has a salcloth wrap that goes around the furled headsail, and hanks back over to itself. It slides up over the furled headsail. Works pretty well, certainly no more difficult than a normal hanked sail.

 

Bud from Doyles Nelson made a diamond shapped storm jib that simply wrapped around the forestay OVER a furled headsail, with sheets interlocking or tying the clews together. I've only ever hoisted one to see it all fitted, tack strop (so sail clears pulpit and allows full vision) was long enough and make a best guess sheet lead position as it was flat calm that day.

 

On the one hand it would be nice to try it in a breeze

. . .

but knot really keen on seeking out a gale or storm just for testing purposes.

 

One interesting feature I thought about is that one could set this vertically ahead of the mast with sheets lead to each side of the yacht, providing a small but stable downwind solution. I would like to try that as well, as it could work and/or with both sheets lead to the tiller, an emergency steering solution as well.

 

:think:

IMHO it would be worth trying out a few ideas, because one never knows until one tries.

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:think:

Merry Xmas to all...

 

Does anybody have thoughts on the best way of setting up storm sails? Specifically - trisail & track and storm jib?

 

Skipped this question before.

 

STORM JIB:

I would make sure the storm jib has a spliced strop on the tack so that the tack hoists up above the pulpit. This reduces chaffing and allows better vision ahead.

 

Height above deck keeps more waves from hitting the sail and laying one over constantly, but naturally one does not want the centre of effort too high in a wild storm. Best guess is to have the tack ending about 300mm above the height of the pulpit and make sure the spliced strop can fit into the snap shackle.

 

Some people used to have a wire strop crimped onto the sail's tack and sometimes on the head as well so the halyard when hoisted came to the same position, which was important when wire rope spices were used, so the wire always came onto the winch drum and the wire-rope splice joint was never overloaded.

 

However having wire strops flying around on the foredeck in a strong gale to storm cand be very dangerous to one's eyes, ears and throat, knot to mention one's beauty spots. The rusty ends of wire poking out of the wire strop crimpings does a lot to damage your nails and manicures as well. :think: :think: :think:

 

Even sucking one's thumb does not work on these occasions :crazy:

 

So I favour a nice heavy rope strop, often a couple of mm larger than one's anchor warp. A simple 3 strand easy to splice soft but strong rope.

 

An added benefit is that the noise of the sail flapping and being magnified for those below by the hollow tube pulpit does not happen as all the sail is above the pulpit.

 

Sheets need to be permanently (spliced) onto the clew (YNZ Safety Reg). I suggest a bright ORANGE / YELLOW colour so it can be easily seen on deck. Blues and greens disappear under any water on deck.

 

I suggest attaching the spinnaker pole down haul onto the sheet to provide a heavy duty barber hauler. Simply snap the snap shackle over the sheet works but creates a chaffe point so attaching the spinnaker downhaul using a snatch block is better.

 

Further when, and you will need to at some stage, you need to alter the sheeting angle, it is safer NOT to leave the cockpit and winching or easing the downhaul a bit is a workable solution, especially when you may be asleep below and others strength is reduced.

 

TRYSAIL.

Again a strop on the tack so the sail ends up just above the dropped mainsail, bunched around the boom.

Lower the boom to the deck, mainsheet in fully, wrap the tails of the reefing lines (or a spare sheet) around both the boom and the sail with several half hitches or better still, several clove hitches along the boom.

Secure the topping lift to the backside of the mast so it won't tangle with the trysail.

 

Once the trysail is hoisted as tight as possible on the halyard, I would then attach the cunningham tackle to the trysail tack to get the luff really tight, then tighten to stop the flapping and vibrations against the mast. It may be OK on deck, but those below will be believing the mast is about to fail . . . immediately.

 

Once again the cunningham is often led aft to the cockpit so any adjustments can be safely and easily achieved.

 

The trysail sheets are best lead to snatch blocks on the rail, just past the end of the boom or about 2m from the transom, then through the spinnaker turning blocks, thence to a winch.

 

It is argueable that using the windward winch is safer than leaning outboard over a leeward winch.

 

Remember . . .

 

1). It will always feel worse later on, any you won't want to go out on the heaving deck again, and physically you may not be up to do it anyway. :sick: :sick: :sick:

 

2). If the sails want to come down, they will on their own accord.

 

3). Praying now helps a lot. :thumbup:

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Sorry, not being a snob, just out of contact for a bit. The rationale behind putting the track on the starboard side is that port tack is the best for outrunning or avoiding low pressure systems in the southern hemisphere. Having the track on the starboard side makes sheeting a bit easier and reduces any likelihood of the luff chafing on the main track.

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Thanks Pete, Paul, & Island Time.

the motivation to ask the questions was a desire on my part to reach compliance with cat 3 (in this instance specifically for 3 Kings race cat 3 plus)- although I believe that any well found vessel should have this level of what really is fairly basic equipment.

 

Romany is a Townsen 36 that was built with the intent of offshore work (mid to late 70s) and spent time in the islands I understand. While she may have been compliant (in safety cat) at that time - assuming they checked that sort of thing in those times - she certainly isn't now. There is a whole raft of minor but fairly basic fail points - gas locker/storm gear/covers for windows the size of a high street shop front...

 

My intention is that I want to do more sailing (ie off shore - although 15/14/12 year olds are anchoring that for a while longer) - but specifically a bit more racing of the type mentioned above, and also SSANZ type events. 'Racing' is just an excuse to go sailing really - if I gave a toss about winning I'd crew for someone with an uber big wallet (assuming they'd have me on board), so anybody watching who wants to take the piss out of the idea of racing a Townsen go ahead. Its like water off a ducks back.

 

All that aside - the other reason for the post was to find out if this type of thing is something an amateur should/can set up. Obviously I am not intending to become a sail maker, or a mast builder - but how to do it is as important as what to do. So - my inclination is to go with a 'T' style track & cars as opposed to a slug style. What are the mechanics involved in fitting a track? Is it just a series of carefully spaced, threaded holes, and short machine screws (ie done with mast in place) or does the mast have to be pulled out so that nuts and washers can be fitted? Is a slug track better/stronger and if so same question - how to fit? Mast in or out?

 

Paul/Island Time you seemed to note that I only have a total 3 halyards. It seems to me that every boat should have 2 head sail and 2 main halyards, plus as many 'extras' as you want. To do this I may have to get a custom made mast cap. It is currently a standard Fosters fitting that was renewed a few years ago and at the time Grunter said it would be quite a squeeze to fit extra sheaves. Not saying I am unhappy with his services but is there anybody you'd recommend for stainless work of this type (I haven't asked him about this for a while)?

 

With regard to the inner forestay - what is your opinion about removable stays ( shackled at mast connection but with a lever style at deck)? To be honest - most of the time this stay will be a bit of a decoration.

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Track is doable with the mast in place but be prepared to spent a lot of time in the air. You may have to faff around a bit where the track passes the spreaders if using a T track as they are quite wide but still the best option. I had to do some serious surgery to get mine past the spreaders but it all works good. If you want to keep the trisail permanently in the track, run the track quite low so you can keep it in the bag, well below the boom. I used monel rivets for ours.

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You don't need a separate track to be Safety Reg compliant, for the new 2013-16 Regs kicking in on Monday. I'd spend my time/money on recognising when it's 'a wee ways before the time' you need to swap to a trysail than spend it/them on a track it's very highly unlikely will never be used. I say 'before time' as like all heavy weather stuff if you are saying 'I should have' it means you left it to late and have made life a lot harder, knot to mention dangerous, than it needed to be.

 

For Cat 3 (and 2) you can just whack in a reef that reduces luff length by at least 41%, go a lot more if you like obviously, and you're good to go. Faster, cheaper, quicker and more likely to be used than a extra track........... or 3rd main side halyard.

 

Note to Pauls comment above about raising headsails off the deck. High cut clews also work well and wire??.... really, wire??.... how 19th century there fella, we use dyneemas and the like now. Stronger and knot so many bruises when it goes bad on you, intentionally or knot..... just ask a cricket umpire :twisted: :lol:

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I agree with KM. You don't use a trisail much. If you have a good deep reef you can usually get away with that. That being said, if you decide you want to, the seperate track is the way. I did mine - and it is slugs - they have to be all metal for cat 1. Easier to get around the spreaders than the t section. Riveted it on with monel rivets.

 

Any decent sailmaker will make you good storm sails, high cut and extremely strong. Wire is antique like KM said, and also harder to store when not un use. Modern fibres don't rust either.

 

An inner forestay is good, if you can have one. The foredeck needs to be designed to have the load... Island Time is not. Removable is a good option for some boats. Runners are a must if using an inner forestay, so it gets more complex - if you don't have them already.

 

You CAN do all this yourself, with a basic understanding of the engineering (or help from someone who does), and some time spent reading the rules. It will save you quite a bit of $ - getting a boat ready for Cat whatever is more expensive every year...

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Ok - so thanks KM, a sep track not required. New safety regs state if a trysail track is fitted. Also the safety reg requirement is either ability to reduce luff by at least 40%, (which I think I can do already) OR a trysail.

 

If you dont fit a trysail track, how do you create a gate into the existing main track that a trysail could be hauled through? Sounds like a pain in the backside to me, bloody main slugs catching on it everytime you raise and lower the main, racing or not...

 

It would seem the issue I need to resolve is that while safety category requirement could be met without a trysail, the organising authority (in this instance RAYC) indicate they want more, which is their prerogative. NOR says "trisail & storm gib must be carried" and I assume they may then enforce the ability to use these items. It would be pretty pointless if they didn't, and stupid (of me) to take the chance on disqualification or god forbid actually needing to be able to use the kit.

 

Thanks for all your comments/advice.

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KM: Yes wire is so old hat 19th Century etc

so I recommended a strong soft rope instead, and 3 strand as it is easier for some to splice, :thumbup: knot being as capable as your good self :wtf: at braided splicing.

 

. . . thoughts on the best way of setting up storm sails?

Specifically - trisail & track and storm jib?

I have none of that carry on.

 

KM: Yes he asked for the "BEST" way and a seperate trysail track IMHO is a better way than just using the mailsail track / slugs.

 

Further removing the mast is best way as it is easier to drill, tap bolts and rivet etc. so you have the opportunity to service all other parts, sheaves, wiring, lights, windex, windex light, VHF aerial not to mention drawing the halyards and removing any halyard twists.

 

TIP: Take photos of the mast head from all angles so you can show crew before hoisting them up at a later date.

 

COSTS:

A cheaper way but you may need to hoist the trysail sooner as the mainsail needs to be removed from the mast BEFORE the trysail can be hoisted.

 

You don't really need a seperate trysail track.

Just drop the mailsail, and lash to the boom BEFORE releasing the mainsail slugs.

Then just feed in the trysail slugs and hoist.

 

Spend the money saved on the trysail & all the other gear.

 

=> Don't bother with a seperate track for the 3 Kings race.

It costs money and you may only use it once.

 

If planning extensive cruising, then I would definately have a seperate trysail track, possibly two tracks following Pete's advice.

 

I agree with a deep reef. We have one older mainsail with 2 reefs and then a third 50% deep reef which we fit for SIMRADs Coastals etc.

 

Best advice is to try your storm sails in say 30 knots and see what is "BEST" for you and your boat.

 

See the Current Active Topic "Storm" thread and imagine you are 250 nm NE of Cape Brett, with the storm passing right over your position. Some one said Kawau shows 69knots forecast this friday.

 

http://crew.org.nz/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=21146&start=30

Page 4 Farrari's Coloured forecast & Battgirl's comments.

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