Gennaker/Code 0 Furler

[JebLostInSpace]

So I have a gennaker (almost like a code 0) on my 41' Hunter. It's on a (I think) Harken furler. The luff is a small steel cable, the top is on a swivel, and the furling can is at the bottom. I hoist it in light winds, pull the sail out and love having the extra canvas. The trouble comes with furling it up. If the winds are a little fresher than when I pulled it out, or if I keep a bit of tension on the sheet as I furl, I will quite frequently run out of furling line on the can before the sail is fully rolled up. But when the sail is out, the can is totally full of line. If I try to add wraps on the furling drum, it will jam up. The line is already so small that it's painful on the hands to furl up, so I don't want to go smaller.

Finally, I'm at the point where it's time to maybe open the wallet and improve my life.

From what I've read, this is not an uncommon problem with this type of gennaker/code 0 for 2 reasons. First, the foot of the sail is just really long, so it takes a lot of wraps to furl it up. Second, the fact that the luff just rolls up on itself, rather than around a wider drum like my jib also means it takes more wraps to get it furled up.

The options I see are to either get a bigger furling drum, or switch to a continuous-line furling system. I don't love the idea of a bigger furling drum. As it is, the gennaker's drum is practically touching the jib's drum. I could shift it further forward (the drum attaches under my bow roller via a big aluminum bracket), but then it would interfere with the anchor. This would force me to pack the sail up before anchoring every evening.

I don't know much about continuous-line furlers, but it sounds like just the thing for my situation. The problem is, the cost a darn fortune! I see they make them for small boats as cheap as $250 or so, but the larger ones go up to the thousands...

So, does anyone have some advice on getting this sail under control? Any clever hacks I haven't thought of? Are the continuous-line systems worth it?

[dougweibel]

One idea comes to mind. Figure out approximately the breaking strength of your current furling line. Buy a length of dyneema of equal strength or stronger - it will be much smaller diameter assuming you have something typical for your current furling line. This length of dyneema should be the length of your furling line from the drum to where you grab your furling line in the cockpit to furl routed through the normal blocks, etc. Splice the dyneema to your current furling line or an equivalent piece of line to form a new furling line where the first section is the smaller diameter dyneema line and the second section is the easier on the hands line. Now you've got a furling line that will be more compact on the drum but still easy on the hands. Depending on your boat's layout you may even be able to upsize the working section of the line.

You can find instructions online for splicing dyneema to double braid polyester online, for example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aohGiTNCMQE

. It is not hard but if you've never done it before you might practice on some spare bits first.