Hello all
Having recently acquired a Storm 15, I thought I would share the experience of our first sail today. Mid Feb is not my favorite time of year but we couldn't put of testing the boat till spring! Place: Carsington water Wind:12ish MPH with some much stronger gusts. Temperature: seriously cold.
We both (father and I) had very high expectations of the boat and were prepared to be a little disappointed. Not a bit of it! she was lively, easy to sail and far more stable than we were expecting for such a light craft. We managed to record 6.6mph on the GPS with three generations of Crosses on board. (two of them a bit larger than need be)
both granddad and grandson were impressed with the amount of unencumbered room forward. although one of them had to sit on the centreboard when going about to stop it popping up (downhaul mod needed any ideas?).
After lunch the wind picked up a little and my son went to sit in the club house to nurse his frost bitten fingers, Never would have happened without the self-tacking jib, the boy needs ropes to pull!
Overall, we are delighted and only need to tweek a few things before we set off for further (warmer) adventures.
We did not lace the main to the mast (only to the yard) as per photos on this site. Is this normal practice? the sail shape suggested that it would benefit if we had done so.
also, being an unstayed mast, if we had dropped the jib and subsequently capsized, there would be nothing to hold the rig into the boat and should the mast drop out of the step then the resulting leverage would probably take the deck out when the boat was righted. Is this something I should be worried about? I can think of a number of ways to prevent it (pin, retaining clip under deck etc) but is it worth the bother? have any such incidents occurred?
Regards
Paul Cross