On Thu, 16 Aug 2007 16:27:53 -0400, "Wilbur Hubbard"
wrote:


wrote in message
.. .
On Thu, 16 Aug 2007 09:39:25 -0400, "Wilbur Hubbard"
wrote:

He bragged about the fact that he installed an outside-the-mast,
wind-up
mainsail.

Actually I didn't think I was bragging about my system. If I had have
been I'd probably have mentioned that I designed it myself, calculated
all the loads and stresses, Sized the material to allow a 50% safety
factor, cut and welded it myself, and if I do say so there isn't a
warp or wrinkle in it. Installed it myself and designed and
manufactured the reefing and furling systems myself.


And that made it impossible for you to cruise for maybe half a year.
Exactly what you wanted, wasn't it?


A half a year? Who's doing your work? You really need to find some
better quality craftsmen. It took me about a week to fabricate and
install the complete furling system. While I was doing the fabrication
and installation my wife was recutting and sewing the sail so we were
about a week, maybe ten days, from removing the original goose neck to
the shake down cruise with the new system.


Everybody knows this is the worst of all systems. Any real sailor
would
have a conventional mainsail that was hauled aloft on track or groove
sliding slugs.

Willy, Know what a staysail schooner is? Know what a fisherman
staysail is? Know what a jib is, or a genoa or a yankee staysail?.
With the exception of the mainsail on the schooner all of these sails
are set on stays - stretched cables - and they all sag to windward ...
just like my roller main.

If you don't have a Marconi rig then you're less a cruiser than I
thought.

I guess that means poor old Joshua Slocum, the first man to sail
around the world alone, was some kind of wimp (gaff rig) All the
schooner fishermen on the grand banks for years were gaff rigged, The
America (maybe you've heard of that boat) was gaff rigged. Literally
thousands of junk rigged chinese vessels were trading as far as India
for centuries. The Clipper ships were not marconi rigged. I could go
on but why bother. You have, for some reason selected a relatively
recent sail form and decided that if an individual doesn't use that
form he aren't a sailor although that sail form has been in use for
such a tiny portion of the period in which sailing vessels have been
in use. Next you will be telling me that stainless is the only
material to rig your boat with even though it has been proven that
properly treated galvanized rigging lasts longer.


A roll-up loses efficiency because of the distance between the mast
and
the luff of the sail. More efficiency is lost because the sail has
added
sag-off. Battens can't be used because they don't roll up therefore
the
sail has little or no roach and is less efficient than it could be.

How much efficiency does it lose? And how much is that loss in
efficiency compensated for by always having the correct amount of sail
out.

Perhaps a 30% loss. A correctly sized for the conditionions rolled up
mainsail will always loose out to a correctly sized for the conditions
(slab reefed) mainsail. Not only that but it will be more dangerous and
more likely to break or unwind.

Willie, you just plain don;t know what you are talking about. Why is
my roll up mainsail more likely to unroll then a rolled up jib and at
least 90 percent of the boats I see have roller furling jibs. Even
your swan 68 comes standard with a roller furling foresail.

Your figure of a 30% loss in efficiency is ridicules. If it were true
then my boat would sail substantially slower then it did with the
hanked on main but in fact it is impossible to tell the difference. In
fact, because I am able to carry the ideal amount of sail for wind
conditions, it appears that passages are actually quicker then they
were with the old mainsail.


f you use slab reefing, on a normal size cruising boat, you reef, say
six feet of sail at a time. Is it too much? If you could have reefed 4
feet would you be going faster?

Real cruisers have three reef points and a dedicated storm trysail on
its own track. That covers all contingencies.

You are right. and the reef points are about 6 feet apart, depending
on how big a boat you have. So you must reef in six foot slabs when in
fact it might be better to only reef 4 feet but because the reef
cringles are at six feet that is the distance you have to shorten
sail. The roller, on the other hand can let in or out the sail inches
at a time and thus can maintain the ideal sail area for the wind
force.

I fully agree with you about the storm sail and have such a track
fitted along with the appropriate halyards, sheets and other gear. I
also have a storm trisail with all of its rigging if required. The
roller system does not preclude the use of storm sails.

With a roller you can reef that four feet.

And it can jam, break, unwind when least expected, jam and flog.

Why in God's world should it jam? Internally it is just a long piece
of plastic pipe rotating on a S.S. cable. As far as flogging I will
guarantee that I can change sail area faster then you can with your
slab reefing and with far less flogging. And without leaving the
cockpit.


There are two batten systems used with roll up sails and either will
give as good sail form as conventional battens and batten cars.

Vertical battens are not as efficient as horizontal battens.

That is a debatable subject as the purpose of a batten is simply to
reinforce the sail material and help it hold its shape. The companies,
and people who use them, both state that the vertical system works
well.


The more Bruce reveals about himself and his boat Further proof is the fact he's stuck at a dock
constantly fixing up his complicated and inefficient systems and goes
nowhere any more.

Yes, complicated systems; lets see? Is it the nearly 30 year old
Perkins 4-107 engine - ah yes, a really complicated piece of machinery
that. I overhauled it in Singapore ten years ago. What else? Oh yes,
the VHF set, now ten years old and looking like another ten before it
dies. Of course we got the 60 amp battery charger that I bought down
at the auto shop five years ago, but that isn't broke yet.

Come on Willy, tell me. What it this complicated system that keeps me
so busy. Is it the roller furling that operates from the cockpit along
with all the other lines?

I don't know enough about your boat to talk specifics. What I DO know is
you seem to sit overlong in one place while claiming to be a world
cruiser. You need to become a little more realistic about your method of
operation. Face it. You are settled in and comfortable. Nothing wrong
with that. You found a good place to live. Just admit it and get along
with your life there. Stop trying to act like a latter day Joshua
Slocum.

If you don;t know enough about my boat to talk specifics then why did
you make the statement " the more I come to realize he has fallen prey
to and is a victim of too many, so-called, modern developments which
do nothing but hinder simple, safe and enjoyable cruising." ,as you
did above. Now you are admitting that you don't know anything about my
boat. So either your statement was simple footlessness or a lie.

Now you tell me that "You need to become a little more realistic about
your method of operation." and if I ask you what are my methods of
operation you will admit that you don;t know anything about my methods
of operation. Is this more idiotic ranting or simply another lie?


I know! It is that damned electric anchor winch. Five years ago I had
it apart to paint the housing and while it was apart I had the
bearings changed. That is it! Two bearings and a coat of paint, that
is the excess maintenance that is keeping me tied to the dock.


With a proper sized cruising boat one never has a need for a windlass or
electric winch. A proper sized cruising boat has systems one man can
handle using the power God gave him. If you can't hand your ground
tackle yourself then your boat's too big for you.


You are an idiot if you really mean that statement and it is not just
your usual bluster. If what you say is true then I assume that you
have no winches at all on your boat. No halyard winches; no sheet
winches; no anchor winch. Nothing but the strength in your arm.

Well, Willie, you just gave yourself away. You've got a 23, maybe 25
foot boat, maximum, because you can't handle genoa sheets on anything
bigger without winches. You use rope to anchor which might be all
right in some muddy creek but won't hack it in rocks and coral like we
have over here.

My out board is almost ten years old and still going strong drinking
its 50::1 mix. Wonder if your 9.9 will last as long?

You mean Capt. Neal's? I'd guess twenty years or so because it's rarely
used. It's already six years old and he says it has less than 200 hours
on it.

I don;t know about Capt. Neil but old Willie Boy was the lad that
bragged about his 9.9 HP, 4-stroke, outboard.. (Unless you are Capt.
Neil in disguise)


But, in a way, I guess this is good. I'm sure Bruce considers himself
and others like him to be the typical modern-day cruising sailor.
Because of this, there are way fewer such people actually cruising.
Instead they provide a good living for marinas. That means I'm not
bothered by them, their problems and their lowering of the cruising
bar
whilst I'm out cruising the proper, tried and true way myself.

What is the "typical modern-day cruising sailor", Willy? Somebody with
a Swan 68 and a 9.9 HP outboard bolted to the stern, or is it somebody
with a trailer-sailter who can't afford marinas so has to anchor out
and haul water and gas and cooking fuel. Or, is it some one who just
gets up and goes whenever he wants to? Let us in on the secret Willy.


The Swan is my coorporate tas write-off yacht. I have a captain and crew
running it. I just go along for the ride from time to time. My Allied
Seawind 32 is my coastal cruiser. I sail that all by my little lonesome.
It's Capt. Neal who's got the Honda 9.9 not me. Heck that's not even big
enough for the Swan's dinghy.

I assume that you are trying to be a comedian here.

Peter is getting ready to leave Central America as soon as the
cyclone season is over and hasn't made up his mind whether to head
straight to N.Z. or stop in Vietnam first. And this is a guy that you
bad mouthed and said wasn't a sailor, talking about essentially a
nonstop crossing of the Pacific Ocean. And he is doing it in a 40 ft.
boat he built himself right down to the cast bronze rigging fittings.

No, Willy you got to let us know what the difference is between people
who go out and do a thousand mile sail when they want to and The REAL
sailors that you so regularly refer to. How are you ever going to get
us to change if you don't let us in on the secrets?

Real cruisers do it themselves. They don't sail by committee. Real
sailors don't try to sail a floating home. They sail a seaworthy yacht
that becomes their home. Their home is attuned to the sea and has
limited systems that only lubbers think they need.


You say "Their home is attuned to the sea and has limited systems
that only lubbers think they need."

Why, if your home is attuned to the sea do you have these systems that
only lubbers think they need? I thought you claimed to be a sailor and
now you are telling me that you have this lubberly equipment on your
boat.

Real sailors leave
port unnoticed and arrive in another port almost unnoticed.

That might be true where you are but try it in this part of the world
and you will find your boat impounded and yourself in jail. You do not
leave a country and enter another country without complying with the
certain formalities. You obviously don't cruise foreign or I wouldn't
have to tell you that.

They don't
have to yell for help or ask for assistance. They don't think one
disaster after another is what sailing is all about. They hate the sight
of and the smell of civilization except for a day or two after a long
passage. They consider a dock the nemesis of their lifestyle. They like
their privacy. The land is only a place to stop long enough to provision
before carrying on. They are happy to be solitary men. They know only a
handful of women in this world are cut out to be real sailors. They are
satisfied that even though they likely will never find such a woman they
just might if they keep doing what they are doing and are honest about
their way of life. But, it does not become a priority or an obsession.
They don't prostitute themselves by trying to attract the wrong kind of
woman who is only satisfied with a luxury condo that floats.

I hope this helps.

Ah Ha! Now I know where you get all your weird ideas, you've been
reading Tristen Jones, haven't you?

You do know that Tristen spent his last years at Ao Chalong in Phuket
so a large number of the locals knew him. He was a pedophile, a
drunk, a liar, and never repaid a debt, and you don't have to believe
me you can ask anyone who was around A o Chafing while Tristen was
alive and you will get exactly the same story. So your hero is not
someone to set up as an image to worship.



Bruce in Bangkok
(brucepaigeATgmailDOTcom)