Twin headsails - Roller furling

[beneteau_305_553]

Michael Perhan suffered from chaffe of the single genoa halyard and both headsails came down. He had roller furling so presumably had both sails on the furling tube?

Whats the best way of rigging double headsails when runing before the wind?

 

[KellysEye]

I guess the best way is twin forestays, Profurl furling gear, matched headsails, two poles and associated uphauls, downhauls.

We use twin matched headsails sewn together with one luff rope thus using one foil groove, one halyard plus two poles.

Cheapest way would be to use your current genoa, buy an old sail of a similar size (sail shape doesn't matter too much), fit a wire luff rope and free fly it using the spinnaker halyard and tack to the bow roller.

Since you rarely sail dead downwind at least one pole is necessary.

If set up properly none of those options should chafe. Once you start using two halyards on a twin luff groove then you get into swivels and chafe issues - it can be done but I wouldn't bother.

 

[michael_w]

Having sailed with twin athwartships forestays on my father's boat, I consider them an unmitigated POS. Difficult to get equal tensions, the hanks cross over and get tangled. The idea that you can leave sails hanked on all the time is soon dispelled as the first decent sized wave washes down the deck.

I did the ARC 2003 with two genoas of equal luff length hoisted in seperate grooves. The regular sheets where left attached to the clew of the "best" genoa, for fore and aft use. The spinnaker guys where used as working sheets for both sails, which lead neatly under the guardrails. The only chafe suffered was where the sails rubbed against the pulpit.

Having twins on a furler was just like having a hand throttle. Just the right amount of sail up at all times.

The drawbacks are the rig is limited to about 30 degrees either side of dead downwind and in our case, being fractionally rigged we needed at least 10 TWS for it all to work.

 

[Guest]

My race boat had twin forestay ... but in reality we used to alternate the hanks on stays or clip both stays into the hanks for a single sail ... to get more tension on the luff.
Best would be a dual groove foil .. which are available for some of the medium to larger furling systems.

I rather like the idea by another poster about not using the luff groove and free-flying the second headsail. In fact I have thought about doing similar with second "behind" the main furling genny ... sort of free-style cutter !! Haven't had the guts to do it yet though !!

 

[RupertW]

You can get a similar effect with a main with in-mast furling. By keeping the boom in the middle but letting out the (whatever the name of the rope is that hauls the sail aft along the boom) gives you a free footed main that acts like a aft genny. No boom slamming and no need to fix the boom on one side or the other.

 

[Guest]

Any loose-footed main surely ?

But then you are too far aft with the CoE of that sail .... maybe incurring a "tripping moment" to the hull ?

My original idea was based on liking twin headsail arrangements of cutters ... but my boat has no second cutter stay (or Babystay as some call it).

Back to original post - twin headsails can be a liability particularly if you have sail head twist that increases the rolling effect of the boat ... you could end up in an ever increasing roll situation difficult to get out of .... maybe ...

 

[mormargh]

We used to use a twin foil on the furler to allow you to race if necessary and then set the second headsail flying if required. If you can haul the tack of the second headsail inboard (e.g. on a block on a spectra/dyneema strop between the forward cleats) you can three sail reach as well which is good news if you don't have enough people to use a kite when it is lumpy.

 

[santeana]

Anyone practical experience of the "twistle" arrangement? Seems to have the advantage of twins with perhaps less twisting/rolling. What are its limitations? Sail area?

 

[KellysEye]

>Twistle

Yes we used a twistle rig down Portugal and initially over the Atlantic. The universal joint was attached to the spinaker pole lift with a downhaul led forward and to a block tied between the bow cleats.

It was brilliant and seemed to reduce rolling - the sails move without the mast/sail sail/mast push of poles attached to the mast. Then we hit light airs but with big swells and the sails were alternately collapsing and filling - the mast pump in the middle of the mast was mind blowing and we quickly changed to fixing the poles to the mast. From my perspective the jury is out on twistle rigs, they're great in good winds but...

The sail area you can carry will depend on the size of your foretriangle/pole length, our twistle poles are slightly shorter than our spinnaker pole and about two thirds the diameter (they don't have to take serious compression loads)

 

[Gunfleet]

For those of us who are not familiar with the expression what is a three sail reach? Do you mean three sails on a Bermudian rig? Like a cutter?

 

[john_morris_uk]

[ QUOTE ]
For those of us who are not familiar with the expression what is a three sail reach? Do you mean three sails on a Bermudian rig? Like a cutter?

[/ QUOTE ]My understanding is that this phrase now normally refers to Main, Genoa AND spinnaker being flown at the same time. With the wind to far aft, the genoa interferes with the spinnaker, but occasionally its worth leaving the genoa up on a reach. Depends on your boat, sail shape, and the windspeed!

 

[michael_w]

505, 3 sail reach, nothing else like it; International 14 accepted. /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif

 

[Gunfleet]

Thanks. What a lot of string! I'd pull the wrong one, doubtless.