Ideas to modify early 70's cruiser/racer to singlehanded

[Jeff_H]

Modifying a roller reefing boom for slab reefing is doable, but you may actually come out ahead time and money wise buying a new extrusion and building a new boom from scratch using stock components and end up with a much nicer boom when you are all done.

In an ideal world the reef and outhaul lines enter the top of the boom, run internally through the boom, and exit out the bottom of the boom, run to the base of the mast and back to the cockpit. Running through the boom reduces friction, wear and tear on the lines and bending loads on the boom. A round boom does not lend itself as well to adaptation as well as a more modern boom section for which there is standard off-the-shelf boom end and gooseneck hardware. Here are couple examples of what I am suggesting. Kenyon 5072 Boom Section
Kenyon 3756 Boom Section

I would again caution you against trying to modify this boat too much. Boats are operate as a system, and it is not just the rig or deck layout that makes this a mediocre candidate to be a performance oriented single-hander. In fact the hull limits the boat as much as any other aspect. Before you start dumping money into this specific boat, I would suggest that you should be able to roughly calculate what an up-dated single-handing oriented sail inventory will cost, plus the costs to upgrade the deck and rig hardware and pretty soon these costs are more than the whole boat is worth. And if you add even some percentage of these costs to the re-sale value of the boat, you probably could go out and buy a boat that would be a better platform for single-handing right out of the box.

Jeff

[zoomee]

Got a guess on cost for a 14 ft boom using those materials?

Sound advice all. So the new boat search starts. Jeff, your Farr looks close to perfect for me. I've got 6 ft at the dock, did they make a shoal draft?

[Jeff_H]

I have not bought a new boom in a long time but if I remember correctly the last time I saw the prices for a boom, the extrusion was somewhere around $20-25 per foot and the end fitting were somewhere around $150-200 each. That would compare favorably with trying to adapt your round boom to slab reefing because you will need custom end fittings for your round boom and that could easily cost more than the whole boom and fittings.

The Farr 11.6 has been a great boat for me. It is a good light air boat and they have an excellent repurtation as an offshore cruiser. My boat was single-handed in from South Africa in the early 1980's. These boats were built all over the world and there are quite a few variants including shallower and deeper bulb keel versions. The stock version draws 6'-4" when dry and probably closer to 6'-6" in cruising mode with all tanks and lockers full. I looked at a custom built version of the Farr 11.6, which was built in North Carolina and which drew 5'-8".

But the Farr is not the only good starting point out there. There are any number of good solid boats that you can adapt to suit your needs. You can't go wrong trying to find a well designed, good solid boat to start from, and build from there.

Good luck,
Jeff

[TQA]

I am 63 and singlehand a Bombay Explorer a 44 foot IOR hull design with a cruisng interior.

My current setup is a slab reefing main with lazyjacks, roller furling headsail with a genoa of about 120% and a removeable inner forestay with a hank on staysail.

Only the sheets and reefing line are lead aft, I go forward to reef and to raise and lower the main and staysail. I am thinking about Granny bars. I tend to raise the main while anchored and if the winds are forecast to be around 17 knots or better a reef goes in, I am happier taking one out then putting one in when overpressed. .

I have a big assy spi in a sock and a pole which I will only fly in the MOST BENIGN of conditions and only when I can see it being up for a few hours as it is a pain to wrestle up from below deck and rig up. If I had a code 0 on a furler this would get more use.

I have a good electric autopilot with a tack option [ note to self find out how to use it]

All the winches are self tailing.

I fitted a Lofrans Tigres anchor windlass with foot switches by the windlass and carry a 44 lb and a 55 lb CQR each on 200 foot of chain plus 200 foot of rope. I have always liked the option of mounting the anchor windlass by the mast and stowing the chain in a keel sump but am not likely to make the necessary modifications to this boat.

I carry a 10 foot Caribe RIB inflated inverted on the foredeck even with the staysail up.

As a pure cruiser I find that I don't tack that often but on the occaisons when I do have to I will only fly one headsail.

I am pretty happy with the above setup but will add a remote anchor operation so I can raise and lower from the helm. This is an easy thing to do with little cost. Looking at your plans I would forget the open transom mod and the tiller mod.

If you are set on a windvane get a Hydrovane and keep the wheel steering.

If you are planning on lots of long offshore passages then a windvane makes sense but for ease of use an electric autopilot is so much simpler to operate [ If I was planning to cross oceans singlehanded I would have both.]

[PeterSailer]

I can't believe that know subjected to add a windvane self steering systeme.
It would be the first thing I would add to my sailboat.

[Jeff_H]

Autopilots are a lot cheaper, and frankly on the Chesapeake, work fine for the short runs he would be making. BUT if he were going offshore then a windvane steering system would be an important thing to add. I am not sure that a boat like his is a good candidate for windvane steering. Windvanes work well on long keeled boats and boats fin keel spade rudder boats with very light helms. I don't think this boat falls in either category.

[mitiempo]

A good vane will work with any boat that can be balanced under sail. I have yet to talk to an owner with a Monitor or other good vane that didn't work well, full keel like Alberg 30, 35 etc or fin keel. I have a neighbor with a 35' Cheoy Lee from the 60s (all teak full keel) and he uses an original Haslar vane without a problem - and the Haslar isn't a powerful vane by modern standards.

I think there are changes that are relatively easy to make to any boat such as leading lines aft, adding a vane, adding more cockpit drains, adding a Solent stay etc.

There are other changes that make no sense. These include opening the transom or any major hull/keel/rudder modification.

Best to pick a boat that has all your major desires in place and only change the less major ones.

[sailingdog]

I don't believe this is the case. I have yet to see a higher performance multihull or a high performance monohull that has been fitted with a windvane. All of these seem to use autopilots. I think it has to do with the changes in apparent wind due to their higher acceleration throwing the vane off.

Originally Posted by mitiempo

A good vane will work with any boat that can be balanced under sail. I have yet to talk to an owner with a Monitor or other good vane that didn't work well, full keel like Alberg 30, 35 etc or fin keel. I have a neighbor with a 35' Cheoy Lee from the 60s (all teak full keel) and he uses an original Haslar vane without a problem - and the Haslar isn't a powerful vane by modern standards.

I think there are changes that are relatively easy to make to any boat such as leading lines aft, adding a vane, adding more cockpit drains, adding a Solent stay etc.

There are other changes that make no sense. These include opening the transom or any major hull/keel/rudder modification.

Best to pick a boat that has all your major desires in place and only change the less major ones.

[mitiempo]

No, not on a high performance multihull. As far as monohulls, all the earlier Vendee Globe and Around Alone boats had vanes as did the Ostar boats, some of which were quite fast. The faster the boat the worse it gets as the apparent wind moves forward with the gusts. Sme of the more modern fast monos would be better with autopilots as would any boat over 55 to 60 feet.

But the boat in question (the op's boat) is shown below and I think unless it has a serious problem, it can be balanced under sail and a good vane should not have a real problem. Speed bringing the apparent wind forward isn't an issue here.

Now that I look at this design closely though an open transom makes even less sense than I thought.

From Salboatdata.com