Tips for light wind tacking &sailing....

Carolwildbird

Carolwildbird

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I confess that, as a cruiser with a medium heavy displacement boat, if the wind drops below about 7-8 knots, on goes the engine! I realise that I have never practised light wind sailing and its an art I'd like to learn.

I had to practice MOB recovery in very light winds recently and discovered that I'm not very good at it.... how do you "use the apparent wind to get forward motion" (as i was told to do), best way to not stop the boat completely during a slow motion tack (which is what I was doing) etc. etc.

Good sources of advice and tips?

ta!

carol
 
In very light winds you can really only make progress on the wind. Fall off a little from close hauled, use your lightest jib, take much of the weight of the boom on the topping lifting. Be careful not to make large rudder movements.
As the boat gets going the apparant wind will increase and help you along.
If your desired course is off the wind, crank up the iron jib!
 
last year I had a lot of practice in light winds but in a smaller boat than yours (23') I did learn pick up a few things.

If you get caught head to wind if you can hold the boom out, sail backwards to get some steerage then change to the correct tack,sail away.

On a light boat you can deliberatly heel the boat to get some shape in the sails.

The apparent wind is a bit harder to describe, Concentrating helps to keep it in the zone. The pain is that you need you need to sail close to the wind to keep moving but too close and you will stall and it is harder to get going as you dont have an steerage or boat speed to boost the apparent wind.
(did that make any sence at all?)

Got me moving a quite a few days when other boats were motoring along, Having said that a scrub and newer sails helped ;-)
 
Sail trim makes a huge difference.

The first thing is to get the boat moving which is best done on a close reach. The outhaul should be eased to get a lot of belly in the sail. In light airs, the apparent wind is very different at the top of the mast so you need quite a bit of twist in the sails (using the topping lift to hold the boom up as described above is part of this).

The genny can't be sheeted in as tight as normal. The slot between the two sails is very important. If the wind is not allowed to pass between the two sails it'll go elsewhere. Keep lots of twist in the genny. Remember the slot is naturally narrower at the head of the headsail.

Extra techniques that are used in racing include: distribute crew weight to leeward or down below (often right forward to reduce the wetted surface area at the stern). Don't allow the crew on the lee side to distort sail shape. The slot should be a no go area for crew. Movement around the boat should be gentle (thumps help detach the laminar flow of water from the hull & keel causing turbulence and increased resistance).

Once you get the boat moving you can gradually come up to something near a close hauled course. Course and trim changes should be gentle & gradual. Learn to think of the rudder as a brake.

If it is really light airs the sails should be tight. You can get a boat moving by rocking her and paddling the rudder. I once got a 36' cruising boat moving at one knot by doing this when very bored. In a real MoB case with no wind and no engine you could do this. It's banned for racers (Rule 42).
 
The only thing that gives you drive is the wind passing over the sails or the wind pushing the sails. Ignoring the issue of tide, a boat like yours won't hardly be pushed by a very light wind because the faster you go the less the effect of the wind behind you. If you do 2 knots in a real breeze of 4 knots then there is only 2 knots of wind pushing on the sail. Now try sailing into the wind and your 2 knots of speed into a 4 knot wind gives you an apparent wind speed across the sails of 6 knots - ha we are making progress. The faster you go the higher the apparent wind speed and the more drive you get. So setting the sails to best make use of this wind is the trick. Lots of books on sail setting.

Slow tacking is difficult because the boat will stall as it goes head to wind. So you need to tack quickly and make sure there is no backing of the jib and little flogging because the moment you lose speed then there is not enough momentum to keep the boat turning.

Throw into this the effect of the tide and it may be necessary to admit defeat or just use a burst of engine to push you through the tack.
 
Attaining and keeping boat speed up is the key and tack as little as possible, but if you have to then do it in flat water.

Heel to leeward, crew weight forward, sails set for the wind strength which means loose but not too loose on halyards, sheets and outhaul with the main traveller to windward. Probably genoa track forward a bit for the twist others have referred to.

Gently into the tack and gently out with crew weight moving from old leeward side to new leeward side - foot off slightly on the new tack and do the final trim of the sails when the speed has built and then go for height but not too much.

Bit race orientated what I've said there but the principles hold for light weather sailing and manoevering generally - mind you for a MOB I think I would have the engine on anyway (but check for any ropes over the side incase they go round the prop).
 
Also when tacking, if your boat is prone to getting caught in stays, don't release the headsail sheet as you go about. Let the headsail back a bit and push the bow around then let go the (now) windward sheet and haul in the lee sheet. It won't be too heavy as there isn't much breeze anyway, so delaying sheeting in isn't a problem.
 
Re: Tips for light wind tacking &sailing....

As far as steering is concerned, don't attempt to come straight on the new heading. Go another 10-15° off the wind and allow speed to build up before coming back to close hauled. This prevents the sails stalling and the boat drifting to leeward.
 
Re: Tips for light wind tacking &sailing....

And if you're trying to do it in the Solent on a weekend, forget it. The wash from all the shipping and Mobos make it virtually impossible. /forums/images/graemlins/frown.gif
 
Re: Tips for light wind tacking &sailing....

Practice!
Basic sail trim needs to be worked on to get the best out of light winds. Each boat is a little different, but needing airflow over the sails is always the same.
How quickly and how far to tack is a matter for experiment and practice. Letting the jib back a little can help ensure the bow goes round, but done to excess it slows the boat, and may need more rudder to halt the turn. A heavyish boat should carry its way through a tack without backing the jib, unless there is a chop which stops the boat.
When the boat is through the tack, it will have slowed down, so the apparent wind will be further back. Ease the sails a little from the close hauled position for a while until the speed picks up again, then progressively sheet in. Keeping an eye on the speedo can help, don't point too high if bearing off a little gives more speed.
Downwind, don't go on a dead run, head up 30-45degrees and put a few gybes in.
 
Whilst technique is important, and this advice is no good for upwind sailing, my tip is get yourself a cruising chute...and sail downwind /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif.

I used to be in the same situation, we like you have a heavy cruiser laden down with liveaboard gear, the wind would drop as you describe, and the boat would go dead, and the sails would slat, and on came the engine.

Using a cruising chute is a revelation. Any noticeable wind and you can sail with it from pretty much dead astern (OK guys don't kill me on this and say you need a proper chute) round to 80 deg off the wind. Put the chute up and the boat comes alive again and in 10 knots of wind you will see maximum hull speed! Its invigorating and I wouldn't sail without one now - and they are relatively easy to sail short handed.

Once the wind gets above 15 knots we find life gets too exciting and we reluctantly take it down.

Its a rare day I use my engine now and the Chute has more than paid for itself in fuel saved and fun received . It really puts the fun back into sailing on balmy days:

Fun quotient 10 out of 10./forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
As above really and the key thing is not to stop the boat. For this you will need to enter the tack gradually but positively and then come off gently, allow boat speed to recover and then harden up.

Next point is don't stall the foils - rudder and keel - stall. If you have a stern hung rudder you can observe a stall from the waterflow. How exactly to avoid a stall is different for every boat so as others have said practice and concentration are key.

And finally, unfortunately if you like some cruising boats have low a SAD (sail area to displacement ratio) and older slightly heavy sails, it really won't be possible to tack easily except perhaps in perfectly flat water.
 
One thing that kills your boatspeed instantly is people moving around the boat.If you really need to move creep like a cat.
 
This is all great stuff- thanks!

I'm off out tomorrow to practice (looks like a light wind day in PLymouth sound)...

I do have a cruising chute and a light wind genoa (Hood MP-G) on its own self furler- great for light wind passage making, but no use for short tacking (unless I can find a different way to rig the latter).

My shortcomings in this area were sadly exposed in my YM exam last week- I need to get this part of my act together for the retake in case its the same again. MOB under sail in 5-8 knots of wind on my cutter rigged boat is somewhat of a challenge (well at least for me). But I wasn't really aware of some of the points you've all made above, so now I feel better able to go and experiment and see if I can improve. And I enjoy learning new stuff- all good for me, and why I think the RYA schemes are useful- I wouldn't have bothered if not for this.

Of course it will probably be blowing 35knots on the retake!
 
one more tip; from Stuart Quarrie racing with a pretty novice crew. When the wind was "lost" he made us turn the boat at right angles to the direction we thought it was coming from (that's how little wind there was) and set the sails for a beam reach (main 45deg & jib so it just took shape). The boat would JUST start gliding slowly. Then, very, VERY, slowly start to sheet in so that you take advantage of the apparent wind and will slowly start to pick up speed (requires calm seas as already noted). Once you have some speed, you should be able to turn SLOWLY (of course) onto the course you want. But, as already mentioned, everything has to be done slowly & gently to avoid losing your momentum.

Mind you this was in a Sigma 33 that sailed like a witch compared to my heavy Pentland Ketch! But the principles are good in any boat, it's just less effective in heavy boats or less smooth water.
 
Well, folks, armed with your tips I started to have a go at this stuff today- about a F3 in Plymouth sound and we were one of only a few yachts out (local to us just one yacht drifting and fishing and one school boat!) . But I guess all the grey funnel line boats out there today wondered what we were doing- we were plagued with DSC calls and all ships securite announcements from warship Manchester and other boats.

Many thanks to snowleopard who came out with me and was very patient, and helped me a lot. Perhaps not quite so patient as my MOB fender who was suffering from severe hypothermia by the time he was recovered for the 9th time..
 
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