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Hi,
We are two cruisers on s\v Elegant’sea, an Islander Freeport 36’ sailboat. Our boat does not have the lines led aft. To do sail handling, my wife goes up on deck and raises, lowers or reefs the main. We have a 135 genoa for a head sail.
At this time we are anchored in Barra de Navidad, Mexico. We are on our way to Hualtulco , Mexico.
I have a pinched nerve in my back so my wife does the sail work on the main. We sail all day if possible and then because there is just the two of us and of my lack of nerve, (he he) we only have the main up at night. This proved troublesome when going around Cabo Corrientes from Puerto Vallarta this time as the seas were rough and the wind died so the sail and boom were banging around. About midnight we dropped the main. That means my wife went up on deck (tethered) and did the sail handling. Of course it was dark, for lack of much moon\cloud cover and we were heading into the seas. Not what we would like to do.
We would at some point like to start sailing at night also and we are hoping for this to happen on one of these multiple overnight legs. It, so far, seems to be lack of wind and also sail handling gets hard on us when we are splitting the watches etc. - we get tired. (I know this sounds like a whine.) Anyway, we want this to be fun and we are not on a schedule and we want to keep it safe.
So, we were thinking “why not use the head sail or part of it”? We could reef to say a jib and use it as a steadying sail and maybe get some push for the boat to boot? We could pull it in with just the person on watch or the two of us and it would not take going up on deck.
So far the only down side we have thought of is the Garmin underdeck auto pilot. Would the head sail create problems for the Garmin underdeck auto pilot? I know that the autopilots like to have the sails balanced. This would not be a balanced sail plan. We could just steer the boat by hand but then again this gets old after so many hours\days at sea.
Any ides on this and recommendations for this head sail option? Good idea, bad idea or other ideas?
Thanks,
Chip
We are two cruisers on s\v Elegant’sea, an Islander Freeport 36’ sailboat. Our boat does not have the lines led aft. To do sail handling, my wife goes up on deck and raises, lowers or reefs the main. We have a 135 genoa for a head sail.
At this time we are anchored in Barra de Navidad, Mexico. We are on our way to Hualtulco , Mexico.
I have a pinched nerve in my back so my wife does the sail work on the main. We sail all day if possible and then because there is just the two of us and of my lack of nerve, (he he) we only have the main up at night. This proved troublesome when going around Cabo Corrientes from Puerto Vallarta this time as the seas were rough and the wind died so the sail and boom were banging around. About midnight we dropped the main. That means my wife went up on deck (tethered) and did the sail handling. Of course it was dark, for lack of much moon\cloud cover and we were heading into the seas. Not what we would like to do.
We would at some point like to start sailing at night also and we are hoping for this to happen on one of these multiple overnight legs. It, so far, seems to be lack of wind and also sail handling gets hard on us when we are splitting the watches etc. - we get tired. (I know this sounds like a whine.) Anyway, we want this to be fun and we are not on a schedule and we want to keep it safe.
So, we were thinking “why not use the head sail or part of it”? We could reef to say a jib and use it as a steadying sail and maybe get some push for the boat to boot? We could pull it in with just the person on watch or the two of us and it would not take going up on deck.
So far the only down side we have thought of is the Garmin underdeck auto pilot. Would the head sail create problems for the Garmin underdeck auto pilot? I know that the autopilots like to have the sails balanced. This would not be a balanced sail plan. We could just steer the boat by hand but then again this gets old after so many hours\days at sea.
Any ides on this and recommendations for this head sail option? Good idea, bad idea or other ideas?
Thanks,
Chip