Stupid question time

[nnelson1]

Please bear with me...

My Mac/Ven 22 had been modified to a cutter rig by an owner a guy a couple of owners back. Kinda unique, I guess.

My question is this; unless I am using the smallest jib on the inner most forestay, I have a heckuva time tacking and have to run forward to help the sails (larger jib or the genoa) across. They won't fit on the inner stay, so it becomes an obstacle to them when tacking.

Am I doing something wrong? Should I undo the inner most stay when I use the bigger sails? Should I just convert the boat back to a standard sloop rig?

Any insights/opinions would be appreciated!

Fair winds,
Nick

[Harry van der Meer]

The inner stay should be used with a small jib in heavy wind conditions. This should be a better set-up than a partly furled genny on the main forestay because of the usually poor sail shape of a partly furled genny.

In light wind conditions, you would use the genny on the main forestay and the inner forestay should be removed if possibe. If you cannot remove the inner forestay, you should be gybing instead of tacking through the wind. When gybing, you would release the windward sheet of the genny allowing the sail to come around in front of the boat. This is not unlike gybing with a gennaker.

Also, in light wind condtions and on a broad reach, you could fly both sails at the same time.

[Chip Hindes]

There are two common ways to tack a sail with a short slot.

For a hank on sail, you run the sheets around forward of the forestay, and tack the foresail forward of the forestay as well. I believe it's called tacking by the head. Not easy I would imagine, but at least you don't have to go forward to yank the sail through the short slot.

For a roller furled sail, you roll up the foresail on the "old" leeward side, tack the boat through the wind, then unroll it on the new leeward side.

Probably both of these are better used on larger boats, where you can build up enough momentum to get the boat through the wind with enough speed to continue on the new tack once you get through putzing around with the foresail.

[waternwaves]

Only use the baby forestay on long +2 hour tacks........ make that baby removable, feed through a new large ring clipped to mast base with bungee on the end of the stay to the boom ring/pin.