[sailingdog]

I don't use horn cleats for the sheets on my boat. The main sheet uses a cam cleat at the base of the bottom block on a six-to-one purchase. The genoa sheets are held by the self-tailing winch jaws.

There are no clam cleats on the entire boat, with the exception of the clam cleats used for the leech lines on the sails.

I've never had a cleat hitch lock up. If you do it right, I don't believe it will lock up to the point you can't untie it. Of course, if you're using high-tech lines, which are a bit more slippery than dacron or nylon lines, you might have a problem, but I've never had one.

Also, if you do what you're saying, then you can't put two lines on the deck cleats... which are designed to be used for two lines each in normal use. Your cleating method doesn't leave enough room on the cleat for that.

Originally Posted by danjarch

You've probably got clam cleats on your boat, but if you don't, you never hitch the sheets or the halyards. After so long under a hard load, the hitch will lock up to the point where you can't get it off. Instead of a hitch you do multible figure eights around the cleat, usualy three complete wrap in total. This gives enough friction that you don't need a hitch. It also allows you to remove one wrap at a time, by compressing the underlying line while you remove the top line. You do this untill you have just enough friction left to control the release of say the main sheet.

By the way, if you use three strand, you need to make sure that your keeping the right hand lay when ever you cleat off.