SSS Changes in 2017

[AlanH]

All the years I sailed with the SSS, in the 1990's and early 2000's...Cal 20, International H-Boat, Santana 3030 and Santa Cruz 27, never had roller furling.

I remember doing a Vallejo 1-2, once. Phil MacFarlanes Sail La Vie, Synthia on Eyrie, and my Santana 3030 all got into the Vallejo Channel within a couple of boatlengths of each other. Then it was time to douse. My douse went just fine, but since I didn't have roller furling, I had to run up to the foredeck and guide/help the headsail into the headfoil as I raised it. Not that it went badly but it was a LOT slower than just unfurling the sail. By the time I was back in the cockpit, my two friends had put 75-100 yards on me. Lesson learned.

So this time, I'm outfitting the Wildcat with furling. I picked up a Harken ESP unit off of Craigslist for about 40% of new. It had been on a SC 27 and was <2 years old. Come to find out that since my headstay has a turnbuckle at the bottom, I'm somewhat limited in how low I can get the furling drum. I wish it were about 6 inches lower, but this is OK. I actually cut down the arms that bracket the turnbuckle to the "medium" size...which apparently you can't buy any more. Now it's just "no arms"...for boats with no turnbuckle at the bottom of the headstay, or the "long" size arms, which would have had my drum about 5 inches higher than it is. That's great for cruising, not so good for racing.

It's not perfect, but I'm looking forward to trying it out. And that's what the Wildcat of Loch Awe got for her News Years Present.

 

[BobJ]

That's nuts. Can you saw off those side plates below the furler drum? On mine the turnbuckle is inside the drum section. Once set up you can't adjust it but you don't need to.

 

[AlanH]

That's nuts. Can you saw off those side plates below the furler drum? On mine the turnbuckle is inside the drum section. Once set up you can't adjust it but you don't need to.

So this is a Harken ESP furling unit, size 0. The first two years of production they were available with three options in terms of the "leg" kit....those arms you want me to cut off, Bob.

The short leg kit is for boats that don't have a turnbuckle at the bottom of the headstay.
The medium and long leg kits are for boats that do have a turnbuckle at the bottom of the headstay.

The issue is that the inside diameter of the unit changes as you move up the tube...well for the first 18 inches anyway. It's fairly large at the bottom of the drum, so the turnbuckle fits in there, easily. Where you transition from "drum" to "extrusion" the inside diameter drops pretty significantly. This means that you can only drop the drum so far down, until the turnbuckle prevents it from sliding down any further.

This unit was installed with the "long" leg kit on the SC27 that it was bought for. When I got it, I did a lot of measuring and looking-up of lengths of this and that online, and it seemed to me that the medium leg kit would work on my boat. So I took the side plates that you want me to cut, to Allan Steel and had them use their fancypants saw to cut about 4 1/2 inches off those plates to make them just a scooch shorter than the "medium" leg. Then they punched the appropriate 1/4 in holes in the plates and I did the install.

I measured and guessed pretty well, as when I pulled the drum down to where the inside of it is resting on the turnbuckle, it only comes down about an inch, maybe 1.5 inches below where it is now. Sitting where it is now, that inch +/- is clearance between the inside of the drum and the turnbuckle.

In other words, with this unit, I can 't get the drum significantly closer to the deck. I could replace the headstay with a fixed-length unit at the class-allowable maximum, which is what the Doyle loft guy who's won 4 National Championships suggests. Some guys in fact, do that. However, that headstay is only 8 months old and I kind of like having a turnbuckle. So I'm gonna live with it.

It'll kind of suck on those days when I'm flying the #2 in a race (I won't single or doublehand with a #1) 'cause I'm going to want to have the foot of the sail on the deck. The rest of the time I think I'll not care one way or another. For one thing, the S2 7.9 is a mainsail-driven boat. The main boom is the length of a 30-32 foot boat. The main is ginormous, and somewhat low-aspect. The J is 9 feet and it's a 7/8th rig. It's a 4500 pound boat and the spinnaker pole is the size of a J-24 pole. You get the picture. So I expect that I'll notice it on those <15 knot race days with the #2 up, but the rest of the time....*meh*.

Now, if I were doing this all over again, I might instead opt to buy the Hood Seaflex unit.

http://hoodyachtsystems.com/pdf files/seaflexdata.pdf

I liked that, what I really liked was the "easy on - easy off" feature. I mean, just in case I ever go crazy and put the boat on the trailer and drive to Minnesota for the National Championships, I can slap the Tuff Luff back on, really easily. The Harken, with it's linked aluminum extrusions and screws set it with red locktite, is gonna be a PITA to take off. Also I like the fact that the Seaflex unit is a streamlined stay. This Harken extrusion is actually round, which is supposed to furl easier but maybe induces a scooch more turbulence at the leading edge of the sail. Both the Seaflex and the ESP are single-groove extrusions, meaning that you can't do inside-outside headsail changes. I tried those a few times on past boats, singlehanded with Tuff-Luffs and came to the conclusion that when I'm by myself, it's faster to take one sail down, bungee it on deck and put another sail up.

I note on the specs of the SeaFlex that the distance from headstay pin to sail tack is 8.85 inches. I think I'll measure mine today. I'm guessing that I'm currently at about 10 inches.

 

[DuraMater]

Alan, would you like to try this one? You are welcome to it. It's only fallen off DM once.

 

[BobJ]

Wait - what have you done with Philpott?

And I'm looking for the white cup hook but can't see it. It must be camouflaged by that peacock print.

 

[AlanH]

Alan, would you like to try this one? You are welcome to it. It's only fallen off DM once.

Jacqueline, my dear, I couldn't possibly accept that, seeing as you could probably sell it on "Antique Roadshow" for a tidy sum!

 

[AlanH]

I will admit that I was somewhat taken aback when I discovered that the installation "with turnbuckle" forced the drum to be higher than I wanted. All the pictures on duh interwebz showed either "high drum" installations or "low drum" installations. The manual says that if you have a turnbuckle, you gotta have the long leg or the medium leg kit.... not that anybody will sell you the medium leg kit and if they did it would be $229 for two pieces of stainless steel. *gag* I mean, I paid $600 for the whole thing. So I figured that a "medium leg" would give me an installation that would work and would be significantly lower than the "long leg" setup. That, it did....just not as low as I'd hoped.

Ah, well....makes the deck-level nav lights visible, and handling any anchoring gear significantly easier. Also, If I ever go to a deck-mounted pole for an assy, it makes that easier to deal with, too.

yesterday I measured the distance from rigging clevis pin on the headstay tang to the tack. It's 10.5 inches, or 2 inches longer than the Hood Seaflex unit. *meh*.

 

[Philpott]

Jacqueline, my dear, I couldn't possibly accept that, seeing as you could probably sell it on "Antique Roadshow" for a tidy sum!

Okay, then. But it works perfectly well, and I have all the parts except the extrusion (I think that's what it's called). Let me know if you change your mind.