How to correctly tension/release the backstay?

[snoozydude]

My apologies BrendanS for hijacking your question- but it is a good one.

What is the correct procedure to tension/release the backstay on a boat with roller reefing headsails?

Should the Jib halyard be eased then crank on the backstay then tension the jib?

 

[MIKE_MCKIE]

Recently renewed the forestay & twin backstays, and the boat has roller reefing forestay. Rigger set it up forestay first, then the backstays untill he got the correct mast bend/stay tension. Then said I could fit the genoa. However he also said that after a few months settling of the new rigging, I may wish to re tension the backstays, and I could do that with the genoa in place, it would not make any significant difference. Personally I will release the halyard before I do any adjustment, but he was quite definite that it wouldn't have much effect one way or the other.

 

[BAtoo]

There are plenty of previous posts on this but for what its worth here goes...backstay and jib tension are i believe independant of each other.
Backstay tension is either to tension the forestay on masthead rig; or to bend the mast on fractional rig where it flattens the main to depower it. On a fractional rig forestay tension is usually achieved by cap shroud tension.
Jib halyard tension alters the shape of the jib - more =flatter.
So on our roller reefed fractional rig I have set the forestay tension quite high with the caps to give a stright luff and then vary the halyard tension to suit the conditions. On my boat the r-r foil sits around the forestay onto which the tesion is applied so its never quite a straight as I think it should be.
I expect others may have different thoughts....

 

[flaming]

It doesn't actually make any difference having roller reefing headsails.

Set your jib halyard for everyday use with the backstay "slack". For normal sailing in winds of less than 10-15 knots this will be how you sail. As the wind gets up, start cranking the backstay on. As has been stated the exact effect this has depends on your rig, but broadly speaking it will depower the rig and allow higher pointing.

I'm not convinced if the halyard tension is actually affected or not. I suspect it is, but not massively.

 

[hairbox]

Hi all
I have read in the seldon manual that the backstay should be fully tensioned, and then the genoa halyard fully tensioned and then mark the halyard with tape at the jammer.

This avoids the risk of the halyard being over tensioned when the backstay is applied as long as the genoa halyard is not tensioned past your marker
hope this helps

 

[cliff]

I usually tension my back stay until the heads door jams then release the tension gradually until I can open the heads door again. - seems to work fine for me..... /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Joking aside, I have not noticed any difference between tensioning with the head sail halyard tensioned or slack although I never put a lot of strain on teh halyard anyway, just enough to keep the luff taught.
--------------------

"Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity"

 

[snoozydude]

Thanks for all your replies.

 

[William_H]

A little late but I have done my waffle on this subject on carannah's post a little earlier than this.
I have found the jib halyard tension while increasing with increase of backstay tension is not significant but is usually in the right direction.
olewill

 

[BrendanS]

Don't apologise. I love learning too, and it's nice to see questions I don't know the answer to!