Whats a Blooper?

M

Mings74

Active Member
Joined
2 Nov 2007
Messages
61
Location
East Sussex
Visit site
Hi all,
Went sailing today off Eastbourne, lovely day, very little wind, less than 5 knots. Had a play with my spinnaker amazingly it went okay. I then remembered that I had got another sail bag in the forepeak marked "blooper".
So I connected it up and wasn't sure what it was. Initially I put it up upside down then I thought it might be a cruising chute but it didn't seem the right shape, seemed to fly all right hooked up without a pole but wasnt really sure how to connect the bottom end of it?, do I need a pole out the front, what is it and when should I fly it?. Hopefully this short video will help. Cheers Ming.

 
IIRC, its a triangular downwind sail, set flying, but trimmed with the halliard. Set opposite the spinnaker, so best when dead downwind.
 
if you can find some old photos from the late 70's early 80's you'll see boats going downwind with a spinnaker and a blooper set on the same side as the mainsail.
Back in those days the IOR rule encouraged high aspect ration mainsails and big overlapping genoas. The blooper balanced the sailplan when going dead down wind with a large spinnaker set out to windward and the pole squared well aft.
Halyard almost full hoist, tack line from the bow and eased out and a sheet from the aft quarter.
Awkward things and rarely added any speed. Became obsolete in the early 80's when the rating rules on sail area started to encourage fractional rigs.
 
Haven't used one of those for many years- swallowed the anchor for some considerable time- but I seem to recall the skipper at the time referring to it as a watersail by which he meant it was intended to scoop up the following wind which found its way around and particularly under the mainsail i.e. it was sometimes necessary to ease off the halyard so much to let it 'see' the wind, thus flying it very low on those occasions.

Edit content: - By the way that K number looks familiar- can't remember the name of the boat I sometimes sailed on, a UFO31, with friend and owner Derek Vaile back in the late 70's/early 80's- wouldn't be the same one by any chance?
 
Gin,
The boats name is Dondra II, not sure who the original owner was but I was told that his Dad used to fly during World war 2 with the RAF in the bay of Dondra in the far east. Thanks for info all. Ming
 
Unless a name change not the same boat and I have no knowledge of the owner to whom you refer- it was a long time ago and I must be mistaken but thanks for responding
 
Hi Gin, I have a UFO 31 with the sail no. 5514 built in 1979 has a pale blue hull and was called Blue Streak, I wondered if there may have been an RAF connection.
The boat came with a "blooper" which we have not yet been able to fly with the spinnaker but sometimes fly on it's own.

Ted
 
A "water sail" is a sail set below the boom, normally on a gaff rigged boat, when running, meant to use the last bit of wind available.
 
Yes, exactly but since most boats are bermudan sloops these days, adopted for such too.

I also recall that when we ghosted along mid-Channel in the dreaded F1-2 variables, we occasionally flew the No.1 Light Genoa, radial head spinnaker,main and the blooper. The latter would be lowered right to the water's edge, to leeward of the main, and gently sheeted to bring it aft a bit and there it would sit scooping up what escaped, as I said before, from under and around the back of the mainsail; the trick was to watch the foot as well as the leech so that we didn't scoope up large gobbets of water too!

Did it do any good? Well, we thought so it- was a fine sight, and a cat's cradle of sheets in the cockpit but the best thing was that it kept us occupied while we prayed and whistled for a breeze, thus reducing the foul language from the crew and imprecations on the heads of any who moved from their positions, rocked the boat and spilled the cupful of wind we were trying to exploit /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
 
That's correct. I had one on a Gaffer once. That's not a Blooper though. The definition given previously is I think correct but I am not sure. I had a little Ecume de Mer once which the previous owner had raced and that had every sail ever invented on it! The sail that was supposed to be set inside the spinnaker and on the same side, was called a "tallboy" Totally f'ing useless thing that added no speed in light winds but when it blew up a bit "unloaded" the spinnaker a bit so you could carry it for longer. Frankly I tried it and dumped it ashore as the poled out genny worked just as well in place of the spinny in high winds anyway.
 
To digress a little, one of the regular contestants in some of our races was the ketch of Lloyds Bank , I think an Ocean 60 or 65.

This boat unlike its predecessor whilst starting races OK would soon be seen heading off elsewhere and it didn't perform at all well even on passage races.

Perhaps one of the reasons was that it had a damned great striped sail which was hoisted fore and aft between the masts and which our knowledgeable navigator (or was he having us on?) told was called a ' Gollywobbler'.

Anyway once that went up we knew we wouldn't see them again as they would be off on a Columbus cruise!
 
Gollywobbler????
Does not sound at all politically correct
(mind you it sounds worse if you transpose the G and W.......)
 
Your gollywobbler sounds suspiciously like a mizzen staysail. If so there was a 50 something foot Swan ketch that used one to devastating effect on broad reaches during Swan weeks.

Wasn't called Dark Horse, that Lloyds boat, was it?

Nice picture - not mine unfortunately

NSAPMY23_LARGE.JPG
 
Dark Horse?- Yes it was.

Mizzen staysail?- Don't think so, I seem to recall it being much more rectangular, reaching near the top of the main mast and looking, from a distance, more like a roman blind which filled much of the gap between the two masts
 
It's called a "collywobbler", but not usually used on a ketch, more on a schooner rig, between the masts, basically a larger "fisherman" a schooners secret weapon when racing! I have seen those sails which are on a roller (luff), between top of main and base of mizzen, sheeted to the top of the mizzen, used a lot on the very big ketches (superyachts) of italian origin. Basically filling the space between mainsail and mizzen mast.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top