New cruising chute - advice on rigging?

eastlands said:
Agree that I wouldn't try flying solo on a busy Solent weekend, but last year one of my best sails was a dawn departure from Weymouth, rounding Portland at sunrise and flying the assymetric all the way across Lyme Bay to Torquay. Wind picked up above 15kts apparent, so close to 20kts true, but I held on knowing the forecast was for lighter winds by noon. Right on time, the wind dropped and I was accompanied into Torquay by a pod of 20+ dolphins.
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Perfect. We had our best run with ours last year between Vulcano and Filicudi islands, alas no dolphins but sailing into a wonderful sunset and 20 odd miles in just under two hours. It's those times that make the fancy sail seem really worth it.
 
Hi have you looked at last years thread on this subject , I single hand & wouldn't consider life without snuffer ,then knocked up copy atn tacker, living with chute just went from cautious to a pleasure. no more struggle to unclip tack swinging around infront of foresail and pulpit. Just unclip tackle from tacker &snuff chute
://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?492703-Cruising-Chute&highlight=cruising+chute
 
I bought my chute second hand via eBay last year and it has been a joy. It’s a jecyls with snuffer. 90% of the time I secure the tack to a strop about 1.5 m long secured at the bow and lead a single sheet aft to a block at the side of the pushpit and back to a sheet winch. If the wind is dead aft I use two sheets.
The sheets are 10mm braid on braid,
I use the chute up to the top end of F4. If it’s strong when I am hoisting the I use the engine to reduce the apparent wind and ease back the throttle and stop the engine once things are set up. This may not be to the tastes of purists and racers but it works and reduces stress
 
Halo said:
I bought my chute second hand via eBay last year and it has been a joy. It’s a jecyls with snuffer. 90% of the time I secure the tack to a strop about 1.5 m long secured at the bow <snip>
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I did something similar to start with, then i rigged the tack line back to the cockpit, it really does make a difference being able to adjust it, i'd suggest giving it a try.
 
Lots of useful tips, thanks - obviously I need to experiment. One question - if one rigs it with two sheets as opposed just one as per Crusader suggestion, how long do they need to be? Twice boat length or more?
 
eddystone said:
Lots of useful tips, thanks - obviously I need to experiment. One question - if one rigs it with two sheets as opposed just one as per Crusader suggestion, how long do they need to be? Twice boat length or more?
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Length of foot of sail plus boat length. In reality 2 x boat length more than enough.
 
greeny said:
Length of foot of sail plus boat length. In reality 2 x boat length more than enough.
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Surprisingly, 2x can be a bit tight.

If spi is taken to aft cleats, the length required is: luff + boat length + distance back up to spi winch/block + couple of turns on winch + a decent tail.

Can add up depending on boat geometry.
 
RupertW said:
Gybing can go wrong, snuffing won't.
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My snuffer lives in the garage loft where it belongs.
It is the most dangerous bit of kit on the boat.
I sail single handed & going on to the foredeck in a big sea is never fun.
But looking up, getting dizzy, whilst trying to grab a line 4 feet out in front of the boat on the wrong side of the sail & trying to pull a load of cloth that has pushed itself into a folded wad that will not release then trying to get it down over a wet sail is simply beyond a joke.

Having to do it so that one can gybe to miss an approaching fishing boat that has suddenly decided to play darts with you, or a ship in a shipping lane, is far from fun.

Yet a quick bear off. drop it under the boom; down into the cabin ready to bag up when I want or just shove up on the side deck when I want it up again seems so much easier to me

What is hard about a gybe? Just run down wind, Release one sheet & pull in the other. Job done.
But then i spent 10 years on other people's fore decks handling their spinnakers in offshore races.
Now gybing a 1500 ft2 blooper + spinnaker!! Yup!! that can have consequences:encouragement:

But then mine is only 64 M2 so bigger ones might be harder

To each his own I suppose
 
i always had mine clipped on to the bowsprit, never thought about it, reading this it just occurred to me, should i be able to release it quickly and be using a block/line instead? i never needed to, but is this a disaster waiting to happen (that I haven't come across yet)
 
mattnj said:
i always had mine clipped on to the bowsprit, never thought about it, reading this it just occurred to me, should i be able to release it quickly and be using a block/line instead? i never needed to, but is this a disaster waiting to happen (that I haven't come across yet)
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If you mean you are just clipping the tack line to the bowsprit then i think that's wrong. You need to be able to adjust the tack line. If the line is led back to the cockpit you have full control of the sail without going forward and you can easily release the tack if you had to in an emergency.
 
Reading some of these replies I may be guilty of over simplifying the rigging of mine.

Spinnaker halyard at head, jib downhaul at tack. Both running back to cockpit via deck blocks.Two sheets. I use it like a conventional genoa except that I pull the sail around using the lazy sheet a bit slower. I have a snuffler but have never used it.

Not had a problem gybing but I only use it in relatively light conditions.
 
Spirit (of Glenans) said:
My take on it, for economy in the rope-buying department, would be to have length of sail-foot plus distance back to sheet winch plus enough for easy handling in the cockpit.
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Just don't forget to include the sheet blocks on that run, esp if behind the winches!
 
I’ve got a Jeckells chute and snuffer. I use it with a simple strop to the bow and twin sheets. The sheets are 2.5 times boat length and provide enough length to gybe the sail outside the rolled genoa. I don’t sail single handed so gybing is done with one person on the sheets, one on helm. Helm starts to bring the wind over the stern, let fly the sheet
so the sail goes right forward, then bring in the other sheet as the sail crosses over in the wind. Don’t rush it and it works a treat: try rushing it and you’ll wind up with a baggy mess of sail and sheets....
That said, we mostly only rig a single sheet as we know we’re going to stay on that tack until we get to our destination. If it became apparent that we will need to gybe, then it’s easy enough to rig the second sheet with the sail still flying.
 
Just a little warning. We have a Bavaria 36 with a pulpit that has a walk through step, so there is no tube across the top. Most of the mass produced boats of that era are similar. This gives you a "pointy" bit of tube on each side which when gybing the cruising chute can catch one of the flapping sheets! I notice all the new boats have the pulpit front sloping backwards, probably now that chutes are more popular?
On the occasion the sheet got wrapped around the pulpit we were heading for the shore! and ended up with the chute pulling us over. We had to go closer into wind to sort out the mess which took ages.
What's the solution? I hope that closing off the pulpit with rope, which I have done, will solve the problem?
However the other main member of my crew has made me by a snuffer. The last time I used it, it got stuck at the top!!
I am beginning the think that pulling the chute down into the companionway, under the boom is safer.
If your pulpit is not like mine the warning will not apply to you.
 
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