Can you fail RYA competent crew?

JumbleDuck said:
However. I don't think it should be the YM candidates' role to teach things to the lower orders, or at least if it is the lower orders should be paying a lot less for their week.
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I would have no qualms at all about doing another course with people at different levels.

I did my Coastal Skipper (long ago) with one other candidate for that, and two more experienced sailors doing prep for their imminent Yachtmaster exam. It wasn't their role to substitute for the instructor, but I certainly learnt a lot from them, particularly in relation to managing the ship and crew. The two of them (and the other CS candidate) had very different styles, types of experience, and methods of doing particular things. It was great finding how many different ways there were for skinning any particular cat. It was confidence building, too, to find that I had knowledge or techniques that others more experienced than me were interested in learning.

One of the key benefits was observing how one very laid back YM candidate would inspire confidence and somehow have everything running smoothly and everyone knowing what their role was, seemingly without having said or done anything much at all to make it happen, and how he took any surprises and mishaps in his stride; while the other, over-confident braggart of a candidate, would be rushing round ordering this, that and the other, and then would get in a terrible flap at the slightest thing that didn't go according to his plan.

The young instructor was great, and as well as teaching and guiding us directly, encouraged and facilitated us learning from each other, and to try things out and learn from them going wrong as well as turning out ok.
 
dgadee said:
We'll, course is over. She has her certificate, instructor was told off for smoking, and he's forgiven for all his other faults.

She seems to have learned a goodly bit and certainly felt under loads of pressure the whole week. Has had to obey instructions without arguing (I hope that continues). She said, I never knew how much you did on the boat and how little I knew. Result!

But she is knackered.
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She was happy and enjoyed it after all. All ends well
 
prv said:
If you were to do the Yachtmaster assessment with your usual very experienced crew, such that you didn’t really have to tell them what to do beyond saying something like “we’ll spring the stern out for this one, chaps” and leaving them to get on with it, how is the examiner to know whether you’re any good at giving clear and comprehensive briefings to people who aren’t so familiar with your normal methods? A yachtmaster is supposed to be able to sail any reasonable boat with any appropriate crew, not just their own vessel with their usual mates or partner. That’s why you have to provide crew for the assessment even if you normally sail singlehanded, so that the examiner can see how you manage them.

(Not saying you have to have a gaggle of comp crew candidates to boss around, but you do need someone and if they’re too experienced then I can imagine they might have to “play dumb” a little at times during the exam.)

Pete
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When I did my Yachmaster exam my crew was a bit more experienced then me, a Jester challenger who was also my yachmaster theory instructor :)
We all agreed that I would simply give him clear and concise instructions as if he had just passed competent crew. He played the part beautifully, asking for clarification or playing dumb if I wasn't clear enough.
 
Uricanejack said:
She was happy and enjoyed it after all. All ends well
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Yes, happy it's over. But still argumentative - claims the school boat led their sheets through jammers.

What appeals to her now is learning skills under engine. Absolutely no way would I teach her that.
 
dgadee said:
Would never do it myself. Too likely to get caught up in an emergency. If I'm wrong maybe I need to do a course myself.
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Just wondering and certainly no right or wrong here. That said, modern boats are generally light on winches, with 6x, or even 4x increasingly specced on non-spi boats. Such setups inevitably require some jammers, esp on racing central-pedestal boats.

That said, my pet hate are those spring-cam jamming fairleads through which some boats lead their jib sheets; for as you say they keep jamming when tacking, reefing, etc. I usually take the cams out when sailing.
 
dgadee said:
Would never do it myself. Too likely to get caught up in an emergency. If I'm wrong maybe I need to do a course myself.
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AFAIK there are 3 common ways to secure a sheet-jib or genoa sheet on a cruising boat.

Self tailing winch-both my last two cruising boats have worked this way.

Our previous boat, a Gibsea 96 did not have self tailing winches but special "jammer" cleats where the back of the cleat was tapered to lock the sheet. A normal cleat would no doubt work as well.

Our steel Hartley 32 does not have self tailing winches either, but each sheet has a Lewmar cam clutch a few inches in front of the winch. As the clutch can be easily lifted under load, I cant see a problem.

It works really well-tacking is easily achieved by backing the genoa, lifting the live sheet clutch and taking the new live sheet slack through the opposite closed clutch.

Simples- and safe.
 
rotrax said:
AFAIK there are 3 common ways to secure a sheet-jib or genoa sheet on a cruising boat.

Self tailing winch-both my last two cruising boats have worked this way.

Our previous boat, a Gibsea 96 did not have self tailing winches but special "jammer" cleats where the back of the cleat was tapered to lock the sheet. A normal cleat would no doubt work as well.

Our steel Hartley 32 does not have self tailing winches either, but each sheet has a Lewmar cam clutch a few inches in front of the winch. As the clutch can be easily lifted under load, I cant see a problem.

It works really well-tacking is easily achieved by backing the genoa, lifting the live sheet clutch and taking the new live sheet slack through the opposite closed clutch.

Simples- and safe.
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Yes, there are options. I suppose I meant a standard set up - big headsail and two sheets with two winches.
 
dgadee said:
Yes, there are options. I suppose I meant a standard set up - big headsail and two sheets with two winches.
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But what sort of winches?

All of the boats I have sailed except our motorsailer which has the Hoyt boom self tacking system have used two winches for the headsail. If no self tailing winch, how do you secure the live sheet? You certainly cannot hold it as you would on a small dinghy.

You need an option to lock the sheets if no self tailers. As you are locking the sheet, there must be a reliable way to release it in an emergency. All three methods I mentioned are reliable in this respect-at least, I have found them so.
 
Lots of yachts have jammers for the sheets.
It's less common these days, but still pretty useful, e.g. if you want to change to sheeting on the outer genoa track.

One of the good things about doing a course is sailing different boats, with different people who do things differently.
 
Sniper said:
This is excellent stuff and sounds very familiar to me as someone who knows a bit about education and who recently thoroughly enjoyed a CS course. You aren’t an ex-RN medic by any chance are you?
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I've no idea who it is, but if my kids want to do a course then ProMariner is who I want leading it.
 
rotrax said:
But what sort of winches?

All of the boats I have sailed except our motorsailer which has the Hoyt boom self tacking system have used two winches for the headsail. If no self tailing winch, how do you secure the live sheet? You certainly cannot hold it as you would on a small dinghy.

You need an option to lock the sheets if no self tailers. As you are locking the sheet, there must be a reliable way to release it in an emergency. All three methods I mentioned are reliable in this respect-at least, I have found them so.
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Yes, no problem with winches or cleats. Jammers were where I thought she was mistaken. On a school boat where they tack and gibe constantly, I would imagine cleats (old school) are the way they go. I may be wrong.

She is not the most accurate describer of boat systems. The instructor was asking her about our boat and I'm not sure what was communicated accurately. I suspect - from what she's told me - very little. However, with her new found realisation that sailing isn't simply helming, things may change.

Anyway, to be honest, our self tacking jib runs through a jammer ...
 
Shows how things change, or how limited my expierience really is. I’ve never seen a jammer on a sheet.
Big old boat with traditional winch. Sheets were cleated, little boat I put the sheets round the winch out of habit then on a cleat.
I though my boat was modern with self training sheet winches.

One thing I probably do wrong. I lead my sheets from the track to the winch instead of back through the block at the stern.
I find they run more freely when tacking. Even my main sheet has no jammer or self tailing so a couple of turns then cleated.
 
lw395 said:
Lots of yachts have jammers for the sheets.
It's less common these days, but still pretty useful, e.g. if you want to change to sheeting on the outer genoa track.

One of the good things about doing a course is sailing different boats, with different people who do things differently.
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Interesting point. I used to teach cruising boat sailing two distinctly difrent ways.
Day sailing at weekends on a multitude of diffrent small boats starting about 20 or 22ft through 26 or 28 ft to 30 to 34ft
Ussualy just in English Bay.

Or of to the islands for 5 days on one 30 to 35 ft boat.

Each had thier advantage. I always though just plain learning to sail, the weekend day sailing worked better. Lots of difrent boats several different instructors.
Yet most sailing schools and programs tend to be multi day week long course on one boat with one instructor.

Not sure for certain but I think the RYA requires a multi day course. Not sure why. I understand it may be more marketable. Some times but it might be nice to do a course split into diffrent weekends days and boats with a variety of instructors.

Although I personally quite enjoyed instructing both. I did my original sailing instructor course on a variety of boats over a few weekends which I quite enjoyed. I also enjoyed going on a more advanced course for a week where we went off the beaten track to the remote west coast of the island. Which is why I went on the course to sail somewhere interesting the course was incidental. Even though I quite enjoyed it.

Other advantage of multiple boats you get the opertunity to use both older hank on sails changing sails and use more modern furling sails.
 
dgadee said:
Would never do it myself. Too likely to get caught up in an emergency. If I'm wrong maybe I need to do a course myself.
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Could be setup for short handed sailing.
Have chartered Jeanneau’s with main sheet led back to port & starboard aft winches along with headsail sheets.

Inevitably the slack ends up next to the loaded headsail sheet.
Real pain to work (I've found anyway) as you have to jam off your sheet in order to free up the winch
 
I've seen someone fail DS so it does happen. I think the instructor could've persevered a bit more though. Worth noting that the DS can get you a CoC as well, if a bit limited.

Isn't there some combination of CC, DS and CS that they aren't supposed to combine?
 
glynd said:
Could be setup for short handed sailing.
Have chartered Jeanneau’s with main sheet led back to port & starboard aft winches along with headsail sheets.

Inevitably the slack ends up next to the loaded headsail sheet.
Real pain to work (I've found anyway) as you have to jam off your sheet in order to free up the winch
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She has now remembered that there was no jammer - just two sheets to two st winches. I would have been surprised if a sailing school had any other setup - chartering probably different.
 
dgadee said:
She has now remembered that there was no jammer - just two sheets to two st winches. I would have been surprised if a sailing school had any other setup - chartering probably different.
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Reassuring...

As a related question, does anyone know a sensible way to re-rig a Jeanneau looped main sheet, which has been run back to the cockpit winches to a single coach roof winch?

We were told the coachroof winches are unable to take the mainsheet load - Jeanneau 409 / Sunsail 41
Really annoying to essentially have a wasted winch, as they have two coach roof winches, and two cockpit winches.

I expect to charter one of these things again in the future.....
 
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