Furling gear problem

ParaHandy

ParaHandy

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Its very, very difficult to haul up my genoa. Way too much force is required. But, it drops like a stone so the luff rope isn't getting snagged in the track. What I'm wondering is if the assembly which carries the sail up is, under the weight of the sail below it and the force pulling it up, slightly bending and nipping the aluminium furling foil? By bending I really mean wear in the swivel joints.

There is also an ongoing difficulty furling and unfurling the genny and I think the problem getting it up is related to the furling problem. Any ideas anyone? Is there a simple cure?
 
Need to know a bit more, such as the make as designs differ. The difficulty raisng the sail could be caused by the lead of the halyard. Many designs require an additional turning block on the mast to ensure a fair lead.
 
As tranona says we need to know make and model of the furling gear. We also need to know your halyard arrangement.

Is it like the standard Plastimo set-up with hlayard diverter doughnut at top to move halyard out a few degrees from swivel ?
Do you have separate anti-twist halyard as on mine ?
Do you have a halyard diverter block on mast front as Tranona mentions ?

Best of course would be some photies !

Before my boat left UK - I was having trouble as you with a Plastimo 609 system. I have two lines for my sail : Halyard to haul it up and a second line from swivel that goes to a block on mast front. This second line provides 100% positive anti-twist to the sytem preventing halyard wrap. So my halyard is a direct straight pull and should be a doddle to haul up.
Watched closely as sail went up and eventually noticed a very small movement in the foil joints allowing the groove to slightly misalign, and foil sections to open up on the joint.
Later when boat was out here in baltic - I finally got round to sorting it. I tried replacing the original rivets but the holes were elongated / corroded and was decided to leave old in place and drill / fit extra rivets inbetween. The whole foil was then back to good order ...
Mast raised and sail now goes up nicely without even need to feed by hand at bottom. Previously I would have raised, pulled doiwn a bit raised again ... repeating it maybe 5 or 6 times to get sail up. Now it goes up in one.

The furling and unfurling ? so many reasons could be from frayed / damaged forestay through incorrect tension to salt / crud in swivels / bearings. I was always advised that warm water poured over lower bearing drums to wash them out and not WD40. I also remember that my foil joints being slack did increase the effort to furl and unfurl as the foils were probably then increased friction on the stay.
 
In addition to Refuelers suggestions, it could be a faulty halyard sheave in the masthead. You could test this by hoisting [temporarily] with another halyard.
 
If your sheaves & bearings seem ok, no halyard wrap, and no raggy bits on the sail luff, it may be simply be insufficient tension on the forestay.
 
So far as the furling/unfurling is concerned I have made mine a lot easier by slackening the tension on the genoa halyard. I had previously had it way too tight. his caused the foil to be in a curve. I guess that the same thing might be happening as you apply so much effort to raise the sail and this causes the groove to pinch the sail. You could tie a downhaul on the swivel and check that it is going up easily on its own.
 
I second MoodySabres comment about halyard tension.
If it is a Facnor system, they are very specific about not haveing much halyard tension or the mechanism starts to bind.
I tension my Genoa halyard only when the sail is deployed (only if racing), and slacken it again before rolling it away.

I dont think it is the halyard sheave, as it probably be quite stiff coming down , but you do say it drops like a stone.

It wont be the foil groove or the bolt rope, for much the same reason.

Have alook at the halyard swivel and check it isnt too close to the top of the mast, and the angle is not too steep to prevent it furling and unfurling. You might try dropping the sail a couple of inches and then trying the unfurl/furl process again.
 
The halyard swivel where it slides over the foil can wear and under load when hoisting 'tilt' against the foil causing binding.

Halyard twist is another suspect if the halyard doesn't have an aft component to the pull, either with a fairlead below the masthead sheave or the sheave itself below the masthead. Halyard twist is a frequent factor in difficulty furling and unfurling.

Halyard tension has never caused me any problems with furling/unfurling but there is no need for it to be excessive anyway. All that is required for a normal set up is to have just enough tension to remove any horizontal creases in a normal full sail breeze on the wind. Often people crank it up too tight which will spoil pointing (too much fullness forward) in the mistaken impression this helps when the sail is reefed. In fact once even one roll is around the foil hayard tension is reduced as there is no direct tension on the 'new' luff. Be careful when setting the hayard tension to do so with any backstay tensioner if fitted in it's 'normal' position too because the two are interlinked.

If sections of the foil are not in line, loose rivets or connectors maybe, the grove could be out of alignment slightly but once hoist the bolt rope straightens it so it drops freely?
 
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It wont be the foil groove or the bolt rope, for much the same reason

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Disagree - when my foil joints opened up that mm or so - it really made the sail bind in the slot hauling up. But dropping sail was fine as foil joint gap closed and all was dandy.

Furling - yes could be halyard tension.
 
I would suspect wear on the bore of the swivel. Hauling up un the halliard would tilt it and brake against the foil.

One way of checking for this is to hoist the genoa <u>temporarily</u> without the swivel. Attach the halliard directly to the genoa head and hoist. If the sail goes up without any hassle, then the problem would definitely be the swivel. If such is the case, then you might want to consider fitting some sort of plastic bush or lining to take up some of the slack between the swivel and the foil.

Re the difficulty in furling / unfurling, the cause is often halliard tension. On my boat I have Facnor gear and, as has been indicated, tension is critical enough to merit special mention in the instructions.
 
Many thanks to all. I'm afraid I don't know the manufacturer. It is mid 80s vintage.

The sail drops instantly which is unlikely to happen if the sail was binding in the groove? I would expect, if that was the case, to have to pull it down with some strength given the force required to lift it.

I did wonder about what you, Jim, Puff & MoodySabre, suggest - relieving the halyard tension. It seems a logical solution irrespective of whether the problem is indeed wear in the bearing surfaces. But, I wondered just how much I could relieve the tension before the halyard started to wrap around the forestay. I'll watch that carefully when trying this.

I had hoisted the assembly, as Puff suggests although not exactly so, without the sail and applied pressure and there was just the beginning of a "stiffness" apparent.

(ps Jim, in all respects the sail and swivel assembly is correctly set to the length of the aluminium foil and forestay)
 
fairly recent thread on my Plastimo RR which suddenly developed the similar problem up and down after raising mast following transport back from France, got new plastic insert for the 'swivel' thinking the old one worn and allowing the swivel to tilt, when I removed the forstay and rr I discovered some of the plastic inserts in the foils were splitting, so got new ones, I then found the foil joints were very slack due to the rivets being pretty loose, so drilled them out, awkward cos they go round with the drill bit, re rivetted and now the thing is solid again, new forstay inserted last weekend now need the wind to drop to fit back up mast, Hopefully the problem will have been cured and the system aas good as new. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif a slack forstay and loose joints could be the problem re the difficulty in rolling her up.
 
Re: Furling gear problem - success

Relieving the tension on the halyard cured the furling. I can do it by hand now.

Many thanks to all who contributed.
 
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