How do you use a parbuckle to come alongside

Nope, but I'll qualify that, definitely Nope.

Parbuckling is to do with lifting barrels and spars by passing a line underneath and returning it to the hands of Jolly Jack, who is then told "Two, Six, Heave !"

Still, it sounds like a good nautical expression that any self-respecting yachting journalist should be able to trot out to fill a line.
 
IIRC he was talking about getting a dinghy, or perhaps a MOB, on board ? That's a legit use of the verb.
 
tudorsailor said:
Here is the link to the very grainy video that shows a parbuckle. Cannot quite make out what is going on

TudorSailor
Click to expand...

Pretty hard to see on that video, but if one knows already it can be recognized.

There is a line tied to a fixed point, in this case the dock, and have the other end of the line fixed to a moveable object (the yacht).

A pull sideways at the centre of the line multiplies the force acting to pull the yacht toward the dock, at least while the first line is reasonably straight.
 
Parbuckling

Parbuckling is also potentially a good way to recover people from over the side.

Get a spare headsail ( or if needs really must, remove the one in use from foil / unclip hanks ) and attach to side of boat at tack & clew.

Attach halliard to head.

Dump sail over side & float person / item to be lifted on top of sail.

Pull on halliard to 'roll' person up over the side.

Note guardrails will be a problem, they need to be undone / unclipped.

This seems like one of those ideas which requires practice beforehand; also, people have mentioned that even if not giving a swift lift straight back aboard, it keeps the person secure alongside.

I wonder, if the crew had practised beforehand with a storm jib, this might have recovered the skipper of that Contessa 32 at Brighton as he hung onto the side ?

It would take a lot of seamanship - which I think that crew had - and a bit of room - which they may well not have had even when their fun began; a thought though ?
 
TC was writing about a method of getting into a berth in a gale when there is not enough romm fore and aft to drive the boat in against her lines.
 
There are certain terms that have a common currency in boating and then there are those others that are used like the secret handshake of the Masons.
If you don't know you aren't a real sailor, sort of thing.

Journalists love using out -of-date words.
Witness any local tv news show in which the reporter is constantly "donning" his hat , wellies or coat.

TC may be a fount of all wisdom and a demi-god, but in a written article the use of terms which may confuse readers is not good practice.
 
I see no evidence in those old clips of any parbuckling at all. I am sure that Saint Tom would know the difference between the use of a spring and a parbuckle.

Sloppy scripting.
 
It looks like it refers to mechanical advantage gained from the line going around the object. Still don't get an immediate image of what he means in the situation described.

bp-aa-parbuckle.jpg
 
I think I have identified the point of confusion, thanks to Bob P.


On ships where there is no halyard winch, the practice of "sweating up a halyard" is a he describes. You tighten the halyard as much as possible, then pull at right angles to the direction of the line, the sail or yard goes up a few inches, release the line and quickly take up the slack.

It's often used -almost unconsciously - when hauling a boat in towards a marina pontoon.

That is not parbuckling in any proper sense of the word.
 
sarabande said:
I think I have identified the point of confusion, thanks to Bob P.


On ships where there is no halyard winch, the practice of "sweating up a halyard" is a he describes. You tighten the halyard as much as possible, then pull at right angles to the direction of the line, the sail or yard goes up a few inches, release the line and quickly take up the slack.
Click to expand...

You're actually supposed to haul out and down while the slack is taken up at the same time. Just pulling at right angles will cause the sail and yard to go up, then down again before any meaningful slack can be taken in.
 
Parboiling

Not his best idea! Maybe the writer's thinking of parboiling... Which is a rather more interesting topic than faffing about on a deserted Poole quayside in the winter.

Instead of The Blessed Saint Tom de Cun'ff, here's a bit of Nigella Lawson rabbiting on about parboiling potatoes....

According to Nigella, there are three crucial things that make the difference here: ....the size of your potatoes - you want them relatively small, so that the ratio of crunchy outside to fluffy interior is optimised; ....dredging the potatoes ....in semolina rather than flour after parboiling, then really rattling the pan around....
Click to expand...

She also talks about 'dredging' - or should that be 'drudging'......?

( Think I'll go get some breakfast now...) :D
 
Sorry guys - this is an error of ours, not Tom's, that has now been rectified. The page will take a few moments to update but I've now changed it & removed the mention of parbuckling! :o Many apologies for the confusion. And thanks to TudorSailor for flagging it up. I'm not saying any of us here do know more about sailing than Johnny Depp or Keef but that's a mistake we shouldn't have made! :mad:
 
Definitely use of 'parbuckling' technique in the video! Although not in the conventional sense of the word. Just not especially clear in the pictures...

At 0:50...

I've sketched it in paint to illustrate.

The Red line is the warp, the blue the 'parbuckling' line, which is cleated off at one end.

When the blue is pulled you get a mechanical advantage, plus the 'catenary' effect of pulling perpendicular to the warp... which pulls the boat into the pontoon. (As long as you have appropriate springs etc on t'other end.)
 
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