Wind damage to rolled jib

[thinwater]

Originally Posted by sandy stone

Would it have been possible to take a spare halyard and wrap it around the furled sail, in the opposite direction of the rolled-up leech? Obviously a last resort.

^^ This. And it is NOT a last resort. In fact, it is very easy and common practice.

[Nekton73]

Even luff/leach tension is the best way I've found to get a tight and even roll. However, if your genoa is low cut it may be difficult to get the top tightly furled, even with the sheet fairleads fully forward.



A way around this might be a furler sock or sleeve. As you have some skill with a sewing machine, making one might be possible.

[Knotical]

Originally Posted by sandy stone

Would it have been possible to take a spare halyard and wrap it around the furled sail, in the opposite direction of the rolled-up leech? Obviously a last resort.

I do this before any forecasted major storm.

[Knotical]

Originally Posted by Nekton73

Even luff/leach tension is the best way I've found to get a tight and even roll. However, if your genoa is low cut it may be difficult to get the top tightly furled, even with the sheet fairleads fully forward.



A way around this might be a furler sock or sleeve. As you have some skill with a sewing machine, making one might be possible.

Interesting idea, a sort of loose sock, maybe 20-25’ in length, cut along the long axis, closed off with twist lock fasteners, raise with the spinnaker halyard and drop with a down hauler. 🤔

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by Knotical

Interesting idea, a sort of loose sock, maybe 20-25’ in length, cut along the long axis, closed off with twist lock fasteners, raise with the spinnaker halyard and drop with a down hauler. 🤔

You can buy these, they are common in Europe at least. They have a pull-string that cris-crosses all along the length like laces in boots.

I think they close with a zipper or velcro.

[Knotical]

Originally Posted by sailingharry

* The high aspect sail makes it very hard to trim off the wind (ease the sail 6" and the top is completely gone -- a Barber haul is critical beyond TWA of 60 or so). This same dynamic makes it doubly hard to get leach tension and tight furl at the top. Perhaps the answer is a man on the foredeck pulling down as it furls (a human Barber haul?).

Hmm, I have a high aspect tri-radial laminate Genoa and my problem is the opposite - I cannot get the leech to open in gusty conditions even with the sheet loose and leech line released, the sail is just very stiff.

[UFO]

Originally Posted by s/v Jedi

Furl it tighter and let the sheets wrap around at least two times.

Yep That's the go

[Nekton73]

Edit: I should have said foot/leach tension... not luff.

[chrisr]

Originally Posted by thinwater

^^ This. And it is NOT a last resort. In fact, it is very easy and common practice.

agree 100%.

in such a problem this (use a spare halyard to wrap up the sail) is your first and best course of action

of course a good wrap should not start to unwrap, but there is a host of advice here on how to get the best wrap

in essence : keep it nicer and tight...even tension on foot & leach...at least 2 turns of the sheets...then good tension on the sheets. last is something sometimes forgotten, which is a well secured tight furling line. if strong winds are expected, pin or otherwise securely lash the drum.

cheers,

[Tin Tin]

Originally Posted by sandy stone

Would it have been possible to take a spare halyard and wrap it around the furled sail, in the opposite direction of the rolled-up leech? Obviously a last resort.

Good thought, spinnaker halyard would do the trick.


When we were expecting strong winds and may be leaving the boat, we would put a mooring line loop with tail on a very long boat hook and push it up the furled genoa way past the clew and cinch it tight - it worked well. The spinnaker halyard could be used in lieu of the boat hook to hoist the loop.

[Jim Cate]

Originally Posted by 5BTM

I will bow to your experience but my plan for this upcoming sailing season, which will hopefully include a partial Down East Circle Route, is a removable Solent stay with hank-on sails with rigged downhauls.

That is a useful rig IMO and it should serve you well. However, use of it is not analogous to dropping and removing a large sail from a furler because the furler sail is free of the foil when dropped, not attached by hanks along its luff (as mentioned above).

BTW, when we first bought our current boat it had a removable Solent stay, just as you describe. Worked well enough, but we found that when voyaging double handed it meant switching between Genoa and Solent jibs required a trip to the foredeck. Our practice was to call the off-watch person before attempting that job, and that interfered with the off-watch getting good sleep time. That was enough of a problem to cause the installation of a furler on the Solent, and there it has remained. And when not on passage it means that tacking or gybing the Genoa requires rolling it up... a real PITA in restricted waters like our present cruising grounds (SE Tasmania).

All this FWIW!

Jim

[Searles]

Heaving seen and been in this situation o few times,if you have a spare halyard at the top of the mast fwd sandy stone has the as close to perfect answer ,here we call it frapping ,an old sailing ship term and trick ,can even be used on a sail poorly furled ,in my opinion all cruising yachts should have double halyards for every hoist ,i e topping lift to double as a spare main halyard,and so on .⚓️⛵️

[sailingharry]

Originally Posted by chrisr

agree 100%.

in such a problem this (use a spare halyard to wrap up the sail) is your first and best course of action

of course a good wrap should not start to unwrap, but there is a host of advice here on how to get the best wrap

in essence : keep it nicer and tight...even tension on foot & leach...at least 2 turns of the sheets...then good tension on the sheets. last is something sometimes forgotten, which is a well secured tight furling line. if strong winds are expected, pin or otherwise securely lash the drum.

cheers,

The wrapping of a halyard is an interesting concept. Easy to execute, and maybe fairly effective. Perhaps a bit hard to motivate to do -- we didn't see the 35 knots predicted as "major." Unless it's part of the daily anchoring routine, it's easy to determine too late that a simple front is the sort of thing you do your heavy weather routine for. It also implies that offshore at night, part of the normal routine after furling one sail and setting the other is to go forward and wrap it.

The "good wrap" is the concern in our event. We intentionally re-furled both headsails as we arrived in port, because the at-sea furls were less than ideal. They were done at night, in rollings seas, and maybe even by one person (I forget). They were a bit sloppy. We unrolled each, and furled with the sheet tended, making a neat furl. Obviously, they could have been tighter (ANY furl could be tighter!). But you certainly wouldn't have looked at them and commented on them being bad.


Two turns (or 10) wouldn't have added any value -- the sail shredded well above that point. The drum didn't unwrap either -- early in the event we double checked the furling lines, and, well, they didn't unfurl.


Even tension on leach and foot is an interesting idea. The tension split is set by the lead angle (which continuously changes as the sail is furled). The only way to control that is to have a person holding the sheet forward of the lead and pulling down -- which in any kind of wind sounds just a bit dangerous.



I'm hoping that the primary take-away is similar to problems with in-mast furling. That a tired and worn out sail is the problem, and replacing sails when they lose their shape (as opposed to when they are tired and worn out) prevents all kinds of problems. Using this theory, my 2 year old sails should last many more years before this can happen!

[Sailer_Med]

Originally Posted by sandy stone

Would it have been possible to take a spare halyard and wrap it around the furled sail, in the opposite direction of the rolled-up leech? Obviously a last resort.

I looked at doing this on our boat. I found that I couldn't wrap the halyard tight enough to make me happy. I was concerned that the halyard would move in the wind and abrade the sail.

[Kettlewell]

If your boat stays head to wind it is not likely to happen with a tightly furled sail. When you head off the wind is when the wind can gain some purchase under the wraps.