Bermudan vs. gunter rig on BR/BRe?

[maxr]

I'd appreciate it if any of you who have sailed both in either BR or BRe boats could give your opinion on the merits of the gunter vs. bermudan mainsail setups which are available. Is the Bermudan rig faster, easier and quicker to reef, etc? Convenience of storage etc. isn't an issue for me.

[steve jones]

Two replies for the price of one.
  I much prefer a gaff/gunter rig, less efficient than a Bermuden but much easier to de-power shorter,  mast easy to reef, and lower air draft , if creek crawling. The boat can only reach hull speed anyway, so why worry.

 CF mast and spars - get rid (I can hear the screams of disapproval ). Box section wooden masts beefed up around significant points , tabernacle , hounds etc. and a few spacers throughout would be my choice.
I have a CF yard for my gunter rig but have inbuilt broom stick to enable stuff to be screwed to it ,likewise the mizzen heresy I know but then I am an old git, and have no intention of over-pressing my gear especially  at sea.

Steve Jones

BR17   Nona Me

[Peter Cockerton]

I'd appreciate it if any of you who have sailed both in either BR or BRe boats could give your opinion on the merits of the gunter vs. bermudan mainsail setups which are available. Is the Bermudan rig faster, easier and quicker to reef, etc? Convenience of storage etc. isn't an issue for me.

Max

My GRP Bayraider 20 unusually has a leg o mutton main on a wooden one piece mast with a luff groove. Sprit boom with a simple sprung hook to attach to a ring on the mast for the gooseneck.
With the triangle section of the sail below the sprit boom it provides the function of a boom vang.
The main sets very nicely on all points of sail. I have two cheek blocks on the boom where reeling ropes run through upto the cringles on the leech. To reef I drop the main down to required cringle and hook the Cunningham device I have fitted, tension the clew to the new reef cringle and then tension the Cunningham. I have sailed in a GRP BR20 with gaff/Gunter rigged main and the main in my opinion does not set as well, especially when beating hard in a good blow the gaff falls away from the mast and distorts the sail. I seem to remember that reeling was not straight forward either although mods listed on this forum did away with the need to drop the gaff and change halyard attachment points. The shorter mast on this rig does make mast transportation easier than on mine, I have to undo the tabernacle mast swivel bolt and move the whole mast forward to the travelling position. Difficult to comment on whether my boat is faster than gaff/Gunter as I have not attended many rallies where the opportunities arose, when I did sail against another BR20 with gaff/Gunter it was a WE version which was lighter.
With the main dropping down on one side of the  boom the fitting of a sail bag and conventional lazy jacks is not straight forward,I have however managed to use lengths of shock chord fitted along the boom which I hook onto lines fixed to the shrouds when dropping the main. The BRe of course along with the carbon fibre USA BR20 version does have the option of sail bag and lazy jacks. Not sure if the boom vang on USA BR20 prevents the use of the spray hood whilst sailing though.

[maxr]

Thanks guys.

Peter - interesting, is the leg of mutton a bit like a windsurfer or Freedom yacht unstayed rig, with a boom each side of the sail? In the interests of minimal maintenance, I like to eliminate as much treewood as won't look after itself (ie untreated teak left to silver), so I don't much fancy a wooden mast - and they're heavy compared with carbon.

Steve: As I understand it, you can depower a gaff rig quickly by lowering the gaff tip. My Day Skipper instructor achieved the same effect on his Contessa 32 by letting go the kicker and hoisting the boom end up in the air on a strong and regularly inspected (!) topping lift.

Recent reports here of carbon masts splitting, possibly due to internal pressure from expanding wooden plugs (?) do sound worrying, though.

I like to press boats when it's safe to do so (they tell us BR/BRe will plane downhill?), and for me, a source of concern is single shrouds. I guess one could always double up on thin Dyneema shrouds. Another risk when it's blowing is that some smaller boats carry the rig tension on the jib luff wire/rope, without a fallback forestay. Jib luff ropes/wires can break - we broke one on a Hawk 20 by falling off a wave in a gusty 20+ knots of wind, and the dinghy style 'just keeps the mast from falling down' forestay did that long enough to get us home.

Anyone else sailed both gunter and bermudan rigs on BR/BRe?

[Peter Cockerton]

Thanks guys.

Peter - interesting, is the leg of mutton a bit like a windsurfer or Freedom yacht unstayed rig, with a boom each side of the sail? In the interests of minimal maintenance, I like to eliminate as much treewood as won't look after itself (ie untreated teak left to silver), so I don't much fancy a wooden mast - and they're heavy compared with carbon.

Max

Photo attached of my boat taken on one of our Morbihan outings where you can see the shape of the main quite clearly. I now have a new Hyde Sails designed and manufactured main part battened which I'm very please with.

Single boom which in my case is on the right side of the mainsail, mast is not freestanding, single stainless wire stays. I was very concerned in the early days about something breaking in the wires that hold up the mast but the overall consensus was that if regularly checked for wear, shackle pins "moused" etc,etc the risk is low.

Jib wire doubles up as forestay, many a comment on this subject within the forum, on my mast easy to fit a separate forestay to a bowsprit and due to mast extending beyond the hounds i can get separation of the jib halyard and the separate forestay if i did  fit a bowsprit. Not so easy on the gaff/gunter mast.

[Michael Rogers]

Hi Max

Those who know me (well!) on this Forum will expect me to extol the virtues of junk rig to you, so happy to oblige. With a modern sail (that's important), it'll tick all your boxes, esp easy reefing and good (yes, very good!) performance.

Robin Blain, at Sunbird Marine, 1) was a founder member of the Junk Rig Association, 2) knows as much about the practicalities of JR as anyone else, probably in the world, 3) has Swallow Yachts relevance because he has junk rig on his own BC20! He's a very approachable person. Try -
                                         rblain@sunbirdmarine.com
                                         01329 842613
It really is good, and it's a mystery why more people don't go for it. My own little boat is proof of how well it works.

Michael R (Junk rigged Trouper 12 'Cavatina')
                           

[steve jones]

MAXR, 

The gunter/gaff on the Swallow boats do not have a boom  but use a sprit to shape the sail, it can easily be be de-powered by easing the tension on the sprit and letting the sail collapse.  Another method used on larger boats is to attach brailing lines to the sail and  'scandalise' but only with loose footed mains .  I have a gaff cutter that can be de-powered by dropping the gaff but the topping lift has to attended to as well, ok on a larger  boat, single handed, but not on dinghy like boats such as ours.
 I do not trust the luff wire to hold the mast up, so have attached a bowsprit where the spinnaker pole usually protrudes ( benefit of having built my BR) works ok. 

[maxr]

Thanks all...

Steve - I guess your single piece mast gets round the problem of the gunter spar falling away in stronger winds, mentioned earlier.

Michael - junk rig sounds very interesting, especially for those (like Herself) who don't like sails flogging. My main concern would going upwind, because, as everybody knows, that's where home always seems to be at the end of the day. Articles I've seen in yachty comics suggest junk rigs generally aren't at their best upwind, particularly that they don't point as high as Bermudan, how do you find that?

A slight concern about junk rig is the amount of string involved. I once sailed round the cans with a 30' Freedom yacht which had a wishbone rig and one unstayed mast almost on the bow. On a dead run, each part of the mainsheet was about 25' long. In 15-20 knots, the skipper chose to do a 270 rather than gybe, so he didn't have to reel it all in and out again.

[jonno]

Max

You pose an interesting question – gunter versus Bermudan.  I only have Bayraider experience of gunter.   And I’m not sure.  At sea, reefing is tricky.  I’ve tried alternative ways of getting the yard into the reefed positions (to avoid having to drop the lot into the boat) and different arrangements for reattaching tack and clew.  Results have been mixed.  Also, in a strong wind, undoing the parrel bead strops is tricky.  Against these difficulties, the reduced top hamper of the reefed gunter is nice.

If I was starting afresh, I don’t know which rig I’d choose (easy to prefer the open Bayraider to the Expedition for the open boat’s long, disencumbering, luxurious cockpit).

So I see the gunter as somewhat problematic – although perhaps this is more to do with limitations of this sailor than of the rig.  It would be good to hear from those who’ve experience of reefing the Bermudan and those who’ve sailed both the gunter and the Bermudan.  Does the Bermudan Bayraider have its own vices?

John

[Peter Cockerton]

Max

So I see the gunter as somewhat problematic – although perhaps this is more to do with limitations of this sailor than of the rig.  It would be good to hear from those who’ve experience of reefing the Bermudan and those who’ve sailed both the gunter and the Bermudan.  Does the Bermudan Bayraider have its own vices?

John

John

When you say Bermudan even that splits into two variants with Swallow Yachts, as previously posted my main is Bermudan but with the leg o mutton main and a sprit boom.
The USA developed version of the bayraider with a Bermudan main has a conventional footed main with a conventional boom. The shape of my sail provides some in built vang properties to help the sprit boom from lifting when the main is running free. I'm not sure but the USA bayraider i guess has the separate boom vang (kicking strap).
I mention this because in your question on how easy reefing a Bermudan main is varies in my experience with each of the above variants. On the USA model it's going to be very similar to the BRe where the option to have lazy jacks and sail bags exists, obviously facilitating nicely containing the main when dropped to allow the tack and clew to be adjusted, followed by hoisting and slab tidy. If the USA main drops as easy as mine does it can be done without directly heading into wind. Simple tack and cunningham device with sprung locking wichard hooks make for a speed change. pre-strung lines to the slab reefing clew points also make speedy outhall changes, so in essence very straightforward ( as anything can be if the sea state and wind is not too pressing).
On my boat with the sail dropping down one side of the sprit boom the fitting of lazy jacks and a nice sail bag is not possible, so i have rigged three lines of shock cord each side of the sprit boom which when attached to the lazy jack lines each side of the main provide a temporary sail capture of sorts, this i only do when dropping the main when coming back in or putting a reef in. The reason i use shock cord is so that when i disconnect the lazy Jack line for sailing the shock cord pull tight again under the sprit boom and so not in the way.
Tack and Clew outhall are as above for the USA variant.
I did consider at one point changing my main and boom for the USA design but the cost of CF mast, new boom, new main, sail bag and lazy jacks etc was approaching £3k, reasons for, lighter mast, fully battened fathead main option. reason against cost and not being able to use the spray hood when sailing as the required boom vang would be in the way.

Hope this helps.

Peter Cockerton

[jonno]

Peter

Many thanks – plenty of thought-provoking information here.

As you say, yours is not the usual Bermudan rig.  It’ll be interesting to hear also from those with experience of the standard gunter and Bermudan rigs.

John

[maxr]

I wonder whether lazy jacks and single line reefing are worth the effort on small boats. My old Hawk 20, with a much bigger mainsail than a BR, had no lazy jacks. Sail slides rather than a bolt rope at the mast made for easy flaking. It took only a couple of minutes solo to hoist the main, or lower, flake, and secure it with bungees while a line and clamp tiller-mate kept us more or less on course. The Hawk comes with IMHO a somewhat over engineered reefing system including lines and blocks inside the boom. I never used mine as it was old and getting sticky. However a reefing horn by the mast, one strap round the boom to hold the leach reefing point down, and an extra line and jam cleat for the reefing point outhaul did the job effectively and quite quickly, without all the extra string that single line reefing and lazy jacks uses. I'm not sure why small boats with easily handled light flexible sails so often end up with reefing systems originally designed to help those with big stiff heavy awkward sails.

[Peter Cockerton]

Max

Keeping the sail from falling on the deck when dropping or reefing is the main objective, i sail with my two Pointer dogs on board a lot of the time and i don't want muddy paws on my new sail. I have sailed on Dehler's and X yachts with single line reefing and with a lot of the blocks and string inside the boom i must admit it worked well. The single line reefing on SB yachts that i have sailed on has the lines running inside the sail bag and the blocks tend to bunch up together when the slab is fully dropped, the lines do not run freely and manual help to release them is often required from my experience. The narrow boom on SB do not lend themselves to holding the flaked sail, a sail bag is required.

On the Hawk 20 did the bungee secured flaked main sit quite happily over the boom. Could this be done single handed, did you control drop the main in sections so you could bungee from the back to the front without huge amounts of sail bunching at the front and blowing out.

Peter

[maxr]

Peter - my memory is that there are enough sliders on the Hawk main that flaking the sail single handed between each pair on the drop without the folds slipping to the deck is not a problem, and I bungeed from the clew to the mast with 6-8 bungees. I used to do this motoring slowly upwind (using a Tiller Mate with the outboard locked straight ahead) before parking the boat, which lived on a boat lift. The boom on a Hawk is low enough that with the topping lift on, a tallish person can get their arm over it to capture the main while the bungees go on. As the boat was in the Caribbean, I never left the sail like that without covering for more than a couple of hours (to avoid UV damage), but it didn't seem to be in any danger of slipping off the boom. The Hawk has a flat top boom with a bolt rope on the foot, and I made the bungees to be tight, so maybe that all helps. I had a simple drop on sail cover, laced end to end - you see Hawks on moorings like this. The only downside is that when hoisting, you have to avoid standing directly in line with a bungee as you let it go, and let the loop go, not the ball - generally you remember that just as a toggle ball hits you in the teeth... 

The Hawk is a great boat - a bit angular looking now, but it's fast, fun, tough, stiff, and roomy, if expensive. You can depower the main so much with the controls that reefing on the water is a rare event for those who listen to forecasts. Heavy to tow though, hard work to rig (28' alloy mast with no tabernacle, 2 sets of shrouds, backstay, and much miscellaneous string), and they race with symmetrical spinnakers, which I try to avoid 'cos they're not my friend That's why I now need a BR - that and the fact that bringing the Hawk back from Antigua wasn't an option (unless you're French, in which case you buy a baguette and some Perrier and sail back).

[Peter Cockerton]

Max

Sounds like you had all the features and design to make your reefing and main sail control on your Hawk 20 very user friendly. As yous asked you need feedback now on the BR20 (USA) version as i call it to see how that matches up to the Hawk 20.
Never sailed a Hawk20 but have never regretted buying my BR20 it's a pleasure to own.

Peter Cockerton