Several thoughts:

I've never heard your "six times the sail area" formula. The usual
number is to calculate sheet force as .004 x sail area (sq ft) x wind
speed squared (is that square knots?) Your formula gives the same load
as the standard at around 39 knots, but the load at 39 knots is four
times that at 20 knots, and you will certainly have changed headsails
by then, probably twice.

References:
Harken catalogs for at least the last ten years
Oceanography and Seamanship, Van Dorn, Cornell Maritime Press (the
best not too technical text on its subjects by far -- you should add
it to your list)
Skenes Elements of Yacht Design, Kinney, Dodd Mead
also Marchaj, Henderson, and others.

We had Harken 980s (80:1) and Lewmar 65s in the cockpit on Swee****er
and were probably overwinched there. We added the Harkens after
sailing her in the summer of 1994 with old sheets, old sails, and
winches that hadn't been maintained in years. The rebuilt Lewmars
were fine.

Her foretriangle was 850 sq ft (100%) and we usually used an 1100
square foot Spectra genoa on a roller. For passages in windy areas
(the Tasman, etc.) we switched to a Yankee with a very high clew and a
forestaysail on the removable stay. I should add that both of us were
(and still are) 50-something and in the sort of reasonable condition
you get into when you're living on a boat, but not exceptional in any
way.

Remember that you're not racing -- race boat winches are sized to
bring a big genoa in fast when tacking, then do it again and again
without taxing the gorillas -- crusing winches should make it
reasonably easy to bring the sail in, but you can always luff up a
bit.

I think you'll be perfectly happy with 56s, possibly less. You'll find
65s too big (yes, winches can be too big, as they are slower) --
remember Swee****er came with 65s and her foretriangle is 70% bigger
than yours.

And by the way, this assumes you hang one sail up there. You call her
a "cutter" -- if you're never going to hang a single big genoa, then
all these numbers are too high.

As for Harken, they may have changed designs since we bought ours new
in 1995, but the ones we had were much less satisfactory than the 1982
Lewmars that came with the boat (we put new pawls, pawl springs, and
some bearings in the Lewmars). The Harkens required more frequent
cleaning and felt less efficent.

We put an electric Harken 53 on the main halyard (versus Harken's
recommendation of a 48) and the drive gear broke twice -- once in the
Galapagos and once off Malta. Although both were within the three
year warranty period, I paid $500 for each fix. Fortunately it still
worked in armstrong mode.

So, while I wouldn't use any other brand of blocks, and I love their
ball top winch handles, any future winches I buy will not be Harken (I
bought two Lewmar 65s, well used, but nice, at the Beaulieu Boat
Jumble (read "flea market") for Fintry for £400 each). We'll use them
for flag halyards and docking.

Jim Woodward
www.mvfintry.com

Glenn Ashmore wrote in message ...
Armond Perretta wrote:

I don't know your source for this, Glenn, but I have pretty much
always heard the figure of 50 pounds quoted. Then you do the ratio
math from there.

Without looking it up I think Wally Ross has some tables for this (my
sailing books are still in boxes 3 moths after the move to a new
house).


The 35 comes from Brion Toss's book and a couple of articles I found on
the Harkne and Lewmar sites on sizing winches. I thought it was a bit
low myself. That's why I asked. Brion is a big Harken booster and
probably got that number from them but they are out to sell winches so I
guess you need to take their recommendations with a grain of salt. :-)

I believe I am going with Harken as I already have a Harken 44 electric
for the halyards and reefing lines. My choices therefore are between a
56 at about $2600 each and 55 lbs of force and a 64 at $3600 each and 45
lbs force.

The pressure is really on now and the boat bucks are just flying out of
my wallet. Harken usually raises prices in November so I need to make a
decision by the time I leave the Annapolis show.