Genoa furler jammed with rising winds - *&$^* thing!

Cardo

Cardo

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You'll all need to forgive my newbieness but I am still very much at the learning stage!

So yesterday we sailed downwind from Lymington back to the Hamble. The trip was rather pleasant and I was able to play around with rigging up preventers, playing with the whisker pole, etc.

However, I hit a bit of a snag when we arrived in Southampton Water and I tried to furl the genoa. The bugger furled around a foot or so but then would not go any further in for love nor money. It didn't help that the wind was picking up and starting to gust over 20 knots (yeah, ok, maybe not that much, but it gets a tad hairy when you're not that experienced! :P).
After busting a gut giving the winch all I had I realised it wasn't going to work.
I ended up realising the furling line had managed to jam itself in the furler and winching had only tightened this up. So I let all of the genoa out again and had SWMBO sail us along whilst I unjammed the furling line. Once this had been sorted, the genoa rolled away easily.

It would appear when the genoa was let out in the first place, the furling line instead of being fed out was left to run loose and had not rolled up neatly in the furler.

So, the reason for this thread it this: Can you give any advice on how to deal with this?
Is there a better way to deal with this kind of problem?
In our case, the wind wasn't so strong that we couldn't simply sail along with the full genoa out whilst sorting it out. What if the wind had been blowing 30+? There was no way of unjamming the furling line without unrolling all of the genoa and taking the tension off the line.

At least we managed to sort it without any damage and got back ok. So I still call it a successful day out :D
 
Best advice is prevention.

When unfurling keep tension on the furling line. When furling keep tension on the jib sheets. This should stop Jams occurring.

If a jam does occur as you say don't keep pulling it makes it worst. If possible bear off down wind to blanket the jib and set about de-tangling the mess.

It happened to be a few weeks ago, luckily not so windy. I managed to sail to a bay drop the anchor then the jib. I found it much easier to lower the jib to free the drum.
This is not possible if you already have furls in the jib.
 
Cardo said:
You'll all need to forgive my newbieness but I am still very much at the learning stage!

So yesterday we sailed downwind from Lymington back to the Hamble. The trip was rather pleasant and I was able to play around with rigging up preventers, playing with the whisker pole, etc.

However, I hit a bit of a snag when we arrived in Southampton Water and I tried to furl the genoa. The bugger furled around a foot or so but then would not go any further in for love nor money. It didn't help that the wind was picking up and starting to gust over 20 knots (yeah, ok, maybe not that much, but it gets a tad hairy when you're not that experienced! :P).
After busting a gut giving the winch all I had I realised it wasn't going to work.
I ended up realising the furling line had managed to jam itself in the furler and winching had only tightened this up. So I let all of the genoa out again and had SWMBO sail us along whilst I unjammed the furling line. Once this had been sorted, the genoa rolled away easily.

It would appear when the genoa was let out in the first place, the furling line instead of being fed out was left to run loose and had not rolled up neatly in the furler.

So, the reason for this thread it this: Can you give any advice on how to deal with this?
Is there a better way to deal with this kind of problem?
In our case, the wind wasn't so strong that we couldn't simply sail along with the full genoa out whilst sorting it out. What if the wind had been blowing 30+? There was no way of unjamming the furling line without unrolling all of the genoa and taking the tension off the line.

At least we managed to sort it without any damage and got back ok. So I still call it a successful day out :D
Click to expand...


You have answered most of your question yourself. Any bitter end of rope under tension must be eased out with care. If it is just left to run, it will tie itself in knots. The second and probably the most important point is that, once you know your gear, you will realise if something is jammed. Full power on your winch will only break something. Very dangerous and expensive.
 
You were right in your diagnosis that it was the furler running free that caused the line to load slack and override when you tried to furl. We tend to haul out enough sail on the sheet so it starts to work, then control the rest of the sail going out with the line.

The worse thing to do is use a winch! All you'll do is tighten the line on the drum.

Indeed, you should never need to use a winch to furl a headsail. If there is no power in the sail, you should be able to furl by hand.

If the worst comes to worst just head to wind and drop the genny.
 
Well, the initial problem, as you say, was almost certainly due to not keeping up some tension on both lines when you unfurled the sail. If you are sailing two-up, give the furling line to the helmsman (woman?) as you wind the sail out and get them to keep a bit of tension on it. Same applies with the sheets when you furl it - keep a bit of tension on so that the sail rolls away neatly and without excessive slack.

Once you've got it jammed, the solution really depends on how bad it is. You managed to clear it by unfurling again, and that is obviously the best option. On our previous boat it was not so uncommon for it to jam and be too difficult to clear at sea, particularly in a strongish wind. Under those circumstances, you probably need to resort to the way things were done before all these wizzy roller furlers - come head to wind, release the jib halyard, pull it all down into the pullpit and lash it to the rails.

When we did our Dayskipper, I grumbled to the teacher that it was silly expecting us to fight with hanked-on sails when everything in the marina used roller furling. He remarked that we would bless him the first time we suffered a serious failure of the roller furling mechanism - and he was right! :)

As you learned, straining on the winch seldom helps - usually just makes things worse! A few weeks ago, my wife was puffing and panting trying to winch up the mainsail and remarking that she must be getting old - then we noticed the lazy bag (not the wife!) flying near the mast head as a very large pennant... :(
 
Couple more tips.

Make sure there is not too much furler line. There should only be a couple of turns left on the drum when the sail is fully furled. If there's too much then the drum can become overloaded when you release the sail - self-jamming is then very likely.

Take a look at the drum when the sail is fully out. If the drum looks overloaded, despite there not being too much line, then the line is too thick. Swap it for a lighter line.
 
Harken recommend using a ratchet block in the furling line, it adds enough drag to load the drum nicely as you unfurl. It also allows good control without using a winch.
You can still have the problem if you run downwind in waves with the genny right out and the furling line slack, the drum can oscillate a little and eventually one of the turns may over-ride. Prevent this by leaving the furling line tight.
Also IMHO, it helps to have only just enough turns on the drum, and decent quality double braid rope. You only need enough turns for a really tight furl and one turn of the sheets.

I wonder if there are any subtleties about the lead-angle of the line onto the drum, does it load the top of the drum first etc? I would think loading the bottom first must be more stable, but I have not investigated this, thoughts anyone?
 
lw395 said:
Harken recommend using a ratchet block in the furling line, it adds enough drag to load the drum nicely as you unfurl. It also allows good control without using a winch.
Click to expand...
That's a good idea ... ta :)

I have to admit to using the winch on our furler - I _can_ pull it in by hand, but as the turning "blocks" in the stantion bases are a little - er - worn! it's quite a load when there is any wind in the sail - and when there isn't any wind in the sail it furls too loosely and more likely to catch/tear in strong winds.

Using a winch you just have to be aware that you can use a lot of force - so a shorter handle if you have one and don't put a lot of effort into it!!
 
fireball said:
That's a good idea ... ta :)

I have to admit to using the winch on our furler - I _can_ pull it in by hand, but as the turning "blocks" in the stantion bases are a little - er - worn! it's quite a load when there is any wind in the sail - and when there isn't any wind in the sail it furls too loosely and more likely to catch/tear in strong winds.

Using a winch you just have to be aware that you can use a lot of force - so a shorter handle if you have one and don't put a lot of effort into it!!
Click to expand...

One thing I have always wondered is why some boats have so many stantion base blocks. As you say each one is friction, my last boat (admittedly only 24') had several when I bought her.

She now only has one (quality - Harkin I think) well placed one, the line never gets in any ones way and there is much less friction. I often just rolled in 1/2 a turn down wind when it was windy then the furling rope did not jump of even if sail flapped.

Just more thoughts for the conundrum.
 
Cardo said:
That had kinda been the idea. I guess I'll have to show her how to get a better grip! :D

Thanks for all the advice and suggestions, all.
Click to expand...

It should not require a particularly strong grip - in my experience it is not very hard to make it difficult to unfurl the sail. It's more a question of timing - coordinating the effort in the winch with gently easing out the furling line.
 
Cardo said:
That had kinda been the idea. I guess I'll have to show her how to get a better grip! :D

Thanks for all the advice and suggestions, all.
Click to expand...
The ratchet block will give her a better grip.
Don't get an auto ratchet, a lot of these on sale now, brill for dinghy sheets not what you want here.
Harken say in their manual it's OK to winch, provided you are winching against the wind in the sail, not some twist or tangle in the halyard. Lesser makes may have bearings that are not up to it? Please check the manual for your own furler and don't blame me etc! It might not be the same for the smaller harkens either, I don't know. Anything bigger than the one I had and there's hydraulic option come to that!
 
practise dropping the genoa too

I have been surprised by the number of boats we come across that almost never drop the genoa - and don't really know how to either. I would recommend practising dropping and hoisting it in port so that you can do it at sea if you have to: having a big overlapping genny out that won't furl in a suddenly strong wind can be dangerous. But with the halyard flaked it should come down easily even in a blow. If necessary you can pull it down the foils if you stand right forward in the pulpit away from the flapping sail. Then jump on it with a couple of sail ties.

Of course the other thing that can go wrong is wrapping the halyard round the forestay by the top swivel when furling and jamming everything; that's worse in that you can't even drop the genny then. You might be able to let it fly and motor round in circles to wind it up loosely in that circumstance but I haven't tried that.
 
onesea said:
One thing I have always wondered is why some boats have so many stantion base blocks. As you say each one is friction, my last boat (admittedly only 24') had several when I bought her.
Click to expand...
I think there are 3 or 4 on ours - they're not proper blocks either ... just some pully wheel with a bolt through the middle at deck level.

They are "needed" to keep the line off the side tank - they just don't work well, Actually thinking about it it'd be better if they were fixed SS rather than worn out plastic!
 
garvellachs said:
Of course the other thing that can go wrong is wrapping the halyard round the forestay by the top swivel when furling and jamming everything; that's worse in that you can't even drop the genny then.
Click to expand...

The most common cause of this is not enough tension in the genoa halyard. Take the tension off the furling line, make sure the genoa is fully unfurled and try increasing the halyard tension if this happens.

- W
 
Second all the advice to avoid winching the furling line. Literally every time I've done so, it's been against a jam and made things worse. Always on big charter boats; I'd think "well, this boat's 42 feet, not surprising it needs a little more welly, I'll just put it on the winch to get it started". Nope, bad idea every time.

Pete
 
webcraft said:
The most common cause of this is not enough tension in the genoa halyard. Take the tension off the furling line, make sure the genoa is fully unfurled and try increasing the halyard tension if this happens.

- W
Click to expand...

Or too much tension!
Or the swivel is full of square balls and/or bird poo.
If the halyard does not approach the swivel at a sufficient angle it can happen too.
 
webcraft said:
The most common cause of this is not enough tension in the genoa halyard. Take the tension off the furling line, make sure the genoa is fully unfurled and try increasing the halyard tension if this happens.

- W
Click to expand...

There are two different jamming modes for roller furling genoas and you need to be sure which you are suffering. One - which I think the OP suffered - is the furling line jamming in the drum (or one of the blocks feeding it back from the drum to the cockpit) - that is caused either by not keeping enough tension on the furling line and jib sheet as you wind it in or out, or by worn (or incorrect) furling lines that don't coil cleanly on the furling drum. There may also be some kind of adjustable feeder at the drum to help the line lay cleanly and that may need tweaking up a bit.

The other failure mode, as webcraft correctly reports, is when the genoa halyard is not adequately tensioned which can result in the swivel at the top of the forestay rotating with the sail as it unfurls and twisting the halyard round the forestay. Either will jam your genoa, but I've never seen much interaction between the two modes - even though I've suffered from both of them at one time or another.
 
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