Winds steady 25 with gusts in the 30's. Started out with just the main
and had to shift just to a 100% jib. Working up wind slamming off the
waves, and a nice cold salt shower with ever slam. Took a couple hours
to work all the way upwind on the lake, found out that my new jib works
better upwind if sheeted around the oar locks about 14" further aft
then the jib block travels. Took about 15 min to run downwind, broke
the top rudder pin grunion just before I made it to the marina.

When you sail and have the option...... do you work up wind first so
you can have a fun rocket ride home, or do you have a blast hauling ass
downwind then work your way home?

Joe

In article .com, Joe
wrote:

Winds steady 25 with gusts in the 30's. Started out with just the main
and had to shift just to a 100% jib. Working up wind slamming off the
waves, and a nice cold salt shower with ever slam. Took a couple hours
to work all the way upwind on the lake, found out that my new jib works
better upwind if sheeted around the oar locks about 14" further aft
then the jib block travels. Took about 15 min to run downwind, broke
the top rudder pin grunion just before I made it to the marina.

When you sail and have the option...... do you work up wind first so
you can have a fun rocket ride home, or do you have a blast hauling ass
downwind then work your way home?

Upwind first, then upwind again to get home, of course. Is there
another kind of wind?

PDW

Joe wrote:
Winds steady 25 with gusts in the 30's. Started out with just the main
and had to shift just to a 100% jib.

?? I guess sail area trumps balance?

... Working up wind slamming off the
waves, and a nice cold salt shower with ever slam. Took a couple hours
to work all the way upwind on the lake, found out that my new jib works
better upwind if sheeted around the oar locks about 14" further aft
then the jib block travels.

You can change that by setting the jib lower on the
forestay, and/or changing the mast rake. Raking the mast
back more will get the jib closer to the CLR, and lift the
bow more.


... Took about 15 min to run downwind, broke
the top rudder pin grunion just before I made it to the marina.


That sucks... had something similar happen to me a few
times. Are you landing at a beach or a dock?


When you sail and have the option...... do you work up wind first so
you can have a fun rocket ride home, or do you have a blast hauling ass
downwind then work your way home?



Peter Wiley wrote:
Upwind first, then upwind again to get home, of course. Is there
another kind of wind?


Unfortunately, yes. If you try that around here, you have a
50/50 chance of going upwind both ways.

Fresh Breezes- Doug King

No way to reef the main, or rake the mast on the fly.
With the main up I was going to go swimming, waters still a bit cold.

The jib is off a snipe and fits the forstay fully, no way to set it
lower or higher. I did have the perfect twist for high winds going
upwind, With just the jib at 20 kts I was cooking upwind and could
point fairly high, and the sail was clean with no flappin anywhere. My
Labrisa's ideal wind speed in 10 to 15 kts, sortta like Bob 35s5 or it
get real tender and prone to get blown over.

Yeah the gunion broke while I was up near the mast using a tiller boom
to get the boat to surf some waves when it broke. It got real
squirreley until I made it back to the stern and grasped the top of the
tiller at the rudder, good thing I have a spring clip on the bottom
gunion or I might have had the rudder/ tiller yanked out of my hand.
I'm going to test the new one tonight. I come in the marina and put the
LaBrisa next to Redcloud in the slip.

Joe

Joe wrote:
No way to reef the main, or rake the mast on the fly.

Not many boats can rake the mast "on the fly" although I
suppose you could say that backstay tensioners have some
effect like that.

However you can always sail a bit, go back in & adjust the
rake, go out & see the effect, repeat as needed to get it
right. I happen to like tinkering with the rig and getting
it right... the difference can be noticeable yet very few
people ever bother... even racers.

Reefing- few small boats can reef the main. Partly because
this adds too much windage, weight, tangles & snarls; and
also because the balance is affected and the boat could be
worse off with a conventional reef. An option is a cut-down
main (flat flat flat, negative roach, no battens) for very
heavy air.

With the main up I was going to go swimming, waters still a bit cold.


Don't be such a wimp (says the guy with 3 wetsuits).


The jib is off a snipe and fits the forstay fully, no way to set it
lower or higher.

Sure there is. To set it lower, put a smaller shackle on the
tack, or even just use a straight bolt w/ 2 washers.

... I did have the perfect twist for high winds going
upwind, With just the jib at 20 kts I was cooking upwind and could
point fairly high, and the sail was clean with no flappin anywhere. My
Labrisa's ideal wind speed in 10 to 15 kts, sortta like Bob 35s5 or it
get real tender and prone to get blown over.


Small boats can get squirrelly in heavy air. But IMHO
there's no finer school for sailing & boat handling.


Yeah the gunion broke while I was up near the mast using a tiller boom
to get the boat to surf some waves when it broke. It got real
squirreley until I made it back to the stern and grasped the top of the
tiller at the rudder, good thing I have a spring clip on the bottom
gunion or I might have had the rudder/ tiller yanked out of my hand.

Had that happen (or something similar) many times. Broken
hiking sticks by the score, broken tillers a couple times,
broken pintles, ripped-out gudgeons, rudder blades that fold
up under stress (actually that only happened once but it was
interesting)... at one time I was the champion of our
sailing club at rudderless sailing... 'necessity' is the
mother of lots of things!

It's one reason I like to carry a paddle in small boats.

I used to race a singlehander called a Force 5 which has a
spring loaded pin assembly for the pintles/gudgeons. This
was held in place by a circular spring clip which would
weaken over time & pop out of it's groove, allowing the
rudder to flop back & forth uselessly on either top or
bottom gudgeon. This happened to me & others several times
before we correctly diagnosed it, often in heavy traffic...
one memorable time at the gybe mark in the middle of a pack
of boats.

Fresh Breezes- Doug King

In article , DSK
wrote:

Peter Wiley wrote:
Upwind first, then upwind again to get home, of course. Is there
another kind of wind?


Unfortunately, yes. If you try that around here, you have a
50/50 chance of going upwind both ways.

Umm, I think that's what I said.

On a very rare day, I can beam-reach off the beach, out into the
channel and across to Bruny Island, then back home again. This is very
notable because of its rarity.

PDW

Here it is easy to run a beam reach back and forth across the lake. Not
much distance and not much of a task.

Joe

In article . com, Joe
wrote:

Here it is easy to run a beam reach back and forth across the lake. Not
much distance and not much of a task.

I live at the western end of a bay that opens onto a channel running
more or less N-S. Winds are W to SW a lot of the time. The days when I
have a nice 10-15 knot northerly, *and* the tide is in, *and* I'm not
in the office or far away from home, are rare.

Plenty of southerlies but taking a 12' dinghy out into the Channel in
25 knots gusting 35+ with wind bullets spinning off the hills is a bit
too interesting for comfort. Doug is right tho, it improves your
reaction time nicely.

Once I get my barn finished I'll get onto the next project - a lot
bigger boat *and* the time to use it seriously. Meanwhile, plenty OPB's
to play on.

PDW

Peter Wiley wrote:
Umm, I think that's what I said.


You're right.
I should get new eyes, these old ones are used up.


On a very rare day, I can beam-reach off the beach, out into the
channel and across to Bruny Island, then back home again. This is very
notable because of its rarity.


If it happened too often, you'd get spoiled and that would
be bad.

DSK

"Joe" wrote in message

When you sail and have the option...... do you work up
wind first so
you can have a fun rocket ride home, or do you have a
blast hauling ass
downwind then work your way home?


If I'm not sailing to a destination, I sail a beam reach out
and back.

Scotty