One of the guys at our YC converted his smaller RF jib to a self tacking 95% jib last year. He put a wire-cable traveler on his housetop just in front of the mast. The jib is still a furler.
He single-hands his boat, a Catalina 30, a lot more than he ever did before.
So far he is delighted with the change. Certainly he has given up some light air performance, unless he goes to the trouble of changing headsails before heading out for the day. On the plus side, we generally get an afternoon breeze of 12 to 15 knots in the summer.
Our sailing venue, being a river, is pretty much a "windward leeward" sorta place to sail, so we can always put up the chute for the downwind part...
I have been thinking about this for a long time, and really like the idea of tacking by just putting the helm over.
Anyone here done this changeover on their boat?
I can visualize that the "trick" way to convert would be to put some sort of ($$$) curved SS traveler right behind the forehatch. This would be kind of like the sailboats that come here from Northern Europe all the time.
Comments? Ideas?
Thanks,
Loren in PDX
Olson 34 #8
He single-hands his boat, a Catalina 30, a lot more than he ever did before.
So far he is delighted with the change. Certainly he has given up some light air performance, unless he goes to the trouble of changing headsails before heading out for the day. On the plus side, we generally get an afternoon breeze of 12 to 15 knots in the summer.
Our sailing venue, being a river, is pretty much a "windward leeward" sorta place to sail, so we can always put up the chute for the downwind part...
I have been thinking about this for a long time, and really like the idea of tacking by just putting the helm over.
Anyone here done this changeover on their boat?
I can visualize that the "trick" way to convert would be to put some sort of ($$$) curved SS traveler right behind the forehatch. This would be kind of like the sailboats that come here from Northern Europe all the time.
Comments? Ideas?
Thanks,
Loren in PDX
Olson 34 #8
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