genoa and foils

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matelot

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All the boats I've owned have been fitted with roller reefing so they have all had the Tesco shopping bag problem when well reefed. So I keep wondering how practical for family cruising is the alternative of 3 different sails using a simple foil system.

My impression is that provided the sail is hoisted suitable for current and foreseen conditions, there is no disadvantage other than the in port sail changing itself. And lets be fair - with decent weather forecasts and no great ambitions to sail as fast as it will go, then its not difficult to chose the correct sail for the next 12 hours.

Furthermore, I found with my last boat (sadly now gone)that I could reef the main down to no3 and still keep up a full genoa without balance problems. In fact I've won the odd race like that.

So I guess I'm coming to the view that roller reefing one big genoa is not the way to go. What do you think?
 
You can probably guess what I'm going to say.....!

When running or reaching the shape disadvantages of a half rolled genoa are pretty minimal, it's only when beating that the rubbishness of a half rolled genoa really shows.

The big dissadvantages of having multiple headsails from a cruising standpoint are - the faf of changing them and the space they require to be stored, especially when wet.
The big dissadvantage of roller furling is that one sail designed for a 0-30 knot+ windrange will never be as good as it could be in any wind strength. In light winds it's too heavy, in strong winds the shape is rubbish.

The problem with selecting jibs is that you do change jib more than you think, I'm sure we've all had days where you motor out of harbour in a flat calm, then by lunch time you're beating in 30+ knots before arriving at tea time in nearly no wind. With multiple jibs that could be 4 or 5 changes, no problem with a full crew, can almost be a good thing as it keeps them busy! But not ideal with a cruising couple.

Quite a good compromise is to keep the roller furling and select the jib most suitable for the day, then roll a bit away of that if necessary, still leaving the ability to change jibs at sea if necessary.

An interesting sidepoint in this (from the context of a cruiser racer) is that the most recent breed of IRC inspired boats (X34, Elan 380 etc) have non overlapping jibs, and carry the same size jib up to 30 knots in racing trim (although obviously in different weights and cuts). What this means from a cruising stand point is that there will be less sail changing, as could probably get away with 2 sails, changing over at about 20 knots.
 
Our boat came with a very old baggy 150% genoa. (She's masthead rig and very much headsail-driven.) One of the first things we bought was a heavy weather No. 3 at just about 100% size. Much better performance on windy days and not too difficult to pick the right sail for the day. We have a twin groove headfoil and two halyards so have occaisionally set two headsails and dropped the main for long downwind legs. We've now got a fairly new 135% No. 2 genoa as well and hardly ever use the old 150% sail. The new sail can be carried un-reefed in much stronger winds than the old full-size one and when we do need to reef it there aren't as many rolls around the foil. But we've just about given up expecting good light wind performance.
As we generally sail two-handed these days a pre-feeder at the bottom of the furling gear is worth its weight in gold allowing me to set up the sail on the foredeck and then go back to the cockpit to hoist it. We always remove the headsail and pack it away when leaving the boat. This is partly to protect the newish sails and partly to avoid prejudicing the choice of headsail next time we set off. Most of the sail changes are done in port; I have occaisionally changed them at sea but the stiff new 135% sail is a bit of a struggle to handle in rough conditions.
One big problem is finding space for the sails down below. We've gone from no headsails stored below to three! Overall perfectly feasible to have more than one headsail and many times we've been glad that we've got the smaller sail on a windy day.
 
I grew up on boats with multiple headsails and was quite proficient when changing them even when up to my waist in water. However, modern boats generally don't have the storage space to keep a range of sails available for different wind strengths. In addition to this don't underestimate the difficulties in handling sails when the going gets rough. SWMBO certainly wouldn't be able to lift our genoa (which wouldn't be that much bigger than yours) let alone change it from another.

We have a nicely cut Sanders tri radial with a foam luff which will reef down to less than half size and still allow us to go to windward. It has done 9 seasons and after a new sacrificial strip this winter will last a few more (in fact a lot more than Peter Sanders suggested).

If I had the space and the crew and was more of a racing man, I would have a number of different sails but as I'm not...


Cheers

Piddy
 
Matelot

We (OAP couple) had a twin head foil set up on our Quarter tonner and mainly cruised with the working jib 129 sq ft, though if the wind fell light we would change to the 150% 217 sq ft genoa en route if necessary.

Now we have upgraded to a 30 footer with headsail furling/reefing I expect to mainly use the 164 sq ft working jib on the furler but for light winds I would intend to change to the 302 sq ft genoa. As the above member points out, the genoa is extremely heavy (about 35kg) for an OAP, so how this will work out in practice, en passage remains to be seen. We too use a prefeeder which has made the job of raising the chosen headsail much easier.

The whole point of this is to be able to sail to windward without having to roll up part of the sail. We didn't often have to change the headsail on the Quarter tonner whilst on a passage.

The Quarter tonner had room for the sails and the inflatable only in the forward cabin (not very nice when wet), but the 30 footer (Jeanneau) has a cavernous cockpit locker that easily takes all of the sails and the inflatable and the outboard.
 
My boat had a 150% genoa & when I replaced it I opted for a 130% triradial genny with foam luff(no2).I am a bit slower in light airs but can hold full sail up to 20kn plus apparent & when reefed the shape is much improved from before.I have only had to reef 3 or 4 times in the season whereas before I was reefing in a F3 or I was going more sideways.
 
I've changed plenty of headsails in my time, but no longer relish it. My solution has been to have an removable inner forestay fitted. If the breeze gets a bit unruly I can roll the big genny and hoist a jib on the inner forestay, on hanks. Works well, and also means there's somewhere to put up a storm jib if things ever get ridiculous.
 
We have roller reefing and change headsails, a bit. We sail two handed. One of us is retired (guess which one, bah!)

I have come to the conclusion that we have the sacrificial strip on the wrong sail (the big genoa, same as everyone else)

We are going to have a strip put on the nr2 and make that the default headsail and will change up if the wind is too light, on the basis that changing up in a light wind is easier than changing down is the wind is too strong.
 
Agree with Schmoo. On my last boat I bought a "blade jib" about no 2 size. In up to top end of 5 did not need to reef genoa at all-just the main. But I had a large hanked ghoster to set on a removable inner forestay when it went light. Worked very well. Much better than trying to reef the old 135% genoa when the wind blew up-it sagged too much despite foam luff.
 
interesting set of responses. So it looks like the way to go is roller reefing with a genoa to cover 0 to 25kn over the deck and a smaller sail to cover (say) 20 - 35kn. with the smaller sail normally the default sail. Maybe a cruising chute / asymetric to help things along in light winds / off the wind

It was what I saw on the new Elan and the X yachts that started me wondering Flaming. That and the degree to which I could reef the main in my old Moody and keep the full genoa at least up to 25kn without problem.
 
I'd drop your range to changing over at less than 20 knots, 0-25 is a big range for 1 sail and I don't think you'll get the full benefits of the light sail if you gave a sailmaker that brief.

Something else occured to me, there is actually quite a difference between changing sails on a headfoil and on a drum.
With just a headfoil you only have snapshackles top and bottom and a prefeeder.
As standard most roller furling has conventional shackles to connect to the sail top and bottom. Not ideal if you're changing sails at sea.
 
" When I was a boy" the skipper (father) would stir us out sunbathing/idleness by saying ' Spinnaker hoist' or "Change from no.one jib to genoa". I can't remember the times I've got the Spi bag out of the forehatch and clipped everthing on to set it. The genoa required a change of sheet runs too. More recently, I've used reefing furlers. Not convinced. So the current 'soon to be launched' is a cutter that chooses between the genoa set on the sprit or a staysail set on the stem. Genoa furls only. Off the wind, use both.
A
 
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