Replace mast with inmast furler.

[RichardElliott]

Chartered a Beneteau 37 in New Zealand with in-mast furling. I found the loose footed main intolerable when trying to beat in heavy weather.

[maxcontax]

In my experience, reefing mainsails, which are unbattened of course, are hard to trim when reaching. The nice thing about fixed reef points is you can go to that same sail area with certainty -- and you get used to it. If you are going to felt-pen the mainsail to get exact sail areas to balance against your headsail, then stick with dutchman reefing or whatever on a battened sail and (a) know hou much laundry you have out and (b) get decent sailshape.
It is a long long day close hauled with a loosefooted unbattened main. Think about spending the money on a fully battened main with two reefpoints, lines led aft. Sweet.

[tweetybd]

Instead, why not consider an in-boom furler, which enables you to use full battens, won''t jam under excessive wind (if you have it like we do in SF Bay), and you can always drop the sail manually if the furler should jam?

Schaffer makes an in-boom furler that is significantly less expensive than other brands (Catalina uses it as a standard option -- is that an oxymoron?) and has had a lot of success with it.

regards,
Jon Arck
Catalina 34 #1346 "Tweety Bird"