Plastic Classic Forum

My wife and I sail our North East 38 on the Chesapeake which is often near calm in August. We have used the spinnaker a couple times and it is a bear for me to rig and deploy while my wife steers. The pole is long, heavy and clumsy; there's a lot of spinnaker to go astray. The last time we had it up, it took something like an hour of intemperate language to rig, deploy, un-hourglass, gybe and gybe again before we got a half hour of ever-increasing speed and wind. My wife informed me that she wanted me off the boat if I was going to be so expressive! Got down to Bloody Point, gybed again, hardened up to a reach, wind increasing, Tilghman Point ever closer. I went about getting the thing down, uncleated the halyard and all 270 lbs was lifted off the deck. This time my wife asked that I stay with the boat!

Anyway, do I want a blooper or a cruising spinnaker? I'm planning to buy a used sail so that the decision is not fraught with financial angst.

Bloopers, as retro-cool as they are, are not cruising spinnakers. Certainly not something I'd like to fly shorthanded.

Full keelers like ours make their best VMG going dead downwind under a big-shouldered symmetrical running spinnaker, but that (if you're doing it right) makes for little or no aparrent wind, which makes for a sweltering time on deck. Not fun cruising.

It sounds like an asymmetric cruising spinnaker in a sock is exactly what you need. You'll need to stay 30degrees above DDW to fly it, but you'll have some breeze across the deck so the extra time will pass far more pleasantly.

My personal pet peeve with spinnakers: Please buy a sail with a dark (ish) panel of cloth at the luff. Your trimmer's retinas will thank you.

I've also heard of folks having their symmetric spinnaker recut into an asymmetric cruiser, but I've never actually seen one of those in the air.

You DO NOT want a blooper. That's a big cranky cantankerous sail set opposite and under a full spinnaker on the same side as the main sail. Takes a full time constant watch to keep it full and flying. even worse than a full spinnaker.

What you want is exactly what Figment described

Something else to think about if your solution involves the use of a pole: It sounds like perhaps you keep yours on deck -- I've used a pole that's mounted to a track running up the forward side of the mast, and it's nice because you're never actually handling the entire thing, and it's always attached to something.

Basically the track needs to be a bit longer than the pole, because to stow the pole, you run the mast end of it all the way up the track until the pole lies flat against the mast, with the sail end of things down near deck level, and you secure it like that.

Then to use it you (obviously) undo the sail end and the upper part comes down the track and can be attached to the sail in a controlled fashion (rigged with lines), with little of the actual weight being handled by the operator.

Rachel

If shorthanded sailing is the norm (2 people on a 38' boat is "shorthanded" in my book), I'd think about losing the pole altogether and just tack the spinnaker to the stem with a pendant.

Oop, maybe I mis-spoke. I was referring to using the pole on the clew of the sail, but maybe I was thinking of a different type of sail.

Quetzalsailor wrote:I went about getting the thing down, uncleated the halyard and all 270 lbs was lifted off the deck.

You've got to spill the air from the sail before releasing the halyard. With our symmetrical spinnaker, we typically do this by sheeting in hard on the sheet (bringing the sail in behind the main) and releasing the guy so that tack of the sail flys off in front of the boat. Helm steers to keep the sail behind the main. Then you can gather the foot of the sail together (under the boom and in the wind shadow of the main) and only then let go the halyard.

But it sounds like what you need is an Assymetrical Cruising chute in Spinnaker Sock as others have suggested.

Gee, I thought a blooper was a big baggy genoa and simply a happier sail for downwind in lighter air.

We normally tack downwind for less adventures with the boom and more stability in the set of the sails, as well as for coolth and comfort. The LeComte NE 38 is a substantial fin-keeler, not a full keel, but I don't get the connection between full keel and happier dead downwind.

If forced to go downwind, we normally boom the genny out with a Forespar telescoping whisker pole and sail wing and wing. We have also boomed the thing out when sailing, say, 30 deg away from downwind.

As for Rachel's storing the spi pole against the mast: while it's handy, and some people have one for each side, it seems to me that the windage and high weight, and that we're not making passages downwind, makes the idea less desirable/necessary.

I suppose you'd be forced to sail an assymetrical on the same side as the main under most courses. Otherwise it's not likely to float out that 25' to windward.

Answering Tim's comment about sheeting flat and collapsing the thing, I did; we were on a reach by then, it was mostly collapsed but caught a puff and filled inopportunely. The idea was to collapse it and get it aboard in the lee of the main. Perhaps a sock for it would be dandy! There's 43.75 feet of sail to grab.

lol- Here's a link to an article that talks about Bloopers.

http://sailingmagazine.net/fullby0505.html

I used to crew on an offshore racer and we flew one once in a while- every thing he has to say is true- they are beastly sails to keep flying, plus the spinnaker needs attention at the same time. We had difficulties keeping both drawing and this aboard a fully crewed up 35 footer.

By the way- the real trick is to completely slack the guy so it CAN'T fill, and bring it in QUICKLY.

Sounds real easy when you say it like that doesn't it?

A spinnaker can quickly become a handful if it gets away from you, particularly short handed. Best left for lighter air days until you are totally comfortable with it- For our boar, we're getting an assymetrical *grin*

And just for fun, here's a link to some photos of bloopers flying-

http://www.sailingscuttlebutt.com/photos/04/0819/

Quetzalsailor wrote: We normally tack downwind for less adventures with the boom and more stability in the set of the sails, as well as for coolth and comfort. The LeComte NE 38 is a substantial fin-keeler, not a full keel, but I don't get the connection between full keel and happier dead downwind.

"coolth"... I love it!

I didn't say "happier DDW", I said "best VMG"... faster.
full keel, substantial fin keel, tomato, potato, my point was that it ain't a lightweight sled boat that can really see the performance advantage of an aparrent-wind-generating asymmetric spinnaker.
That's not to say that there is no advantage, rather that the advantage is in ease of handling and crew comfort, not in performance.

I was able to cut my standard spinnaker down to a decent reaching sail. I raised one clew to where it looked ok and then I flattened the whole sail by taking out a central wedge section. if you do not flatten a regular spin it will not set well. I am not a sail maker, I liken myself to dr. frakenstein.

r

What do they say about a Blooper? "You gain half a knot when you put it up, and half a knot when you take it down"...something like that anyway.

Yeah, what you want is a cruising Asym. Probably with a Sock (Though they sell furlers for them now I think a sock is easier) There is something called the "ATN Tacker" that fits around the forstay and allows easier flying of the Asym.

I run through the same labors. So I think it might be best to have both onboard. We don't have the heat problem so often use our symetrical spinnaker dead down wind, the only sail that does that efficiently. But I need to cover more than an hours worth of miles to get inspired.

Interestingly, someone posted a solution on another board. They simply rigged their symetrical like a cruising asymetrical with a short pennant to/ for the guy. This of course allows the spinnaker to move aft a bit (the person used about 5' for the guy pennant). But it worked well in the narrow area off the wind he needed to cover some miles without the hassle. I plan to try it this season at the optimum, about 30 degrees off DDW.

The caveat is, he had no main up. Many think this is a problem but we often sail the spinnaker, pole and all with no main. Our dousing means going onto a broad reach and pullng the shackle on the guy(pole end). Then it's not simple to douse not that much of a chore to lower the halyard while the foot is gathered as the sail flutters unloaded to leeward.

But it's times like this(below) a spinnaker and pole shine, it can be trimmed for best performance at an infinite angle off the wind.
Here we're sailng our heavy 1.5 oz smaller symetrical through the Fox Island Thoroughfare. (No we couldn't turn the corner ahead)