Installing BRe Cunningham

[Jonathan Stuart]

My boat went back to the yard last month for a few mods. One was to fit a main sail cunningham to allow the luff tension to be properly set and also to make raising the sail easier. So far the change seems to be working really well and is recommended. I have written a Library article about the setup and included a few photos. Here's a link to the page:

http://www.swallowyachtsassociation.org/?page_id=867

[Jonathan Stuart]

I tested this setup for the first time on the water at Rutland Water last weekend and it works beautifully. No downsides, the sail can now be fully raised with ease and the luff tension set (I'm not worried about performance too much, but the luff was sometimes unacceptably baggy).

I definitely recommend that anyone buying a BRe should ask the yard to make this modification. For the cost of a few hours labour it is well worthwhile.

[Rob Waller]

Thanks for this, Jonathan. I've really struggled to get the mainsail all the way up, and have taken to loosening the outhaul, tightening it when the sail is up. This sounds like a very good solution.

It was actually quite a problem in my first season with the new boat. I'm almost always single handed and am used to motoring clear of moored boats and drifting while I get the sails up quickly. Last year I kept having to tie up to mooring buoys because it took so long, with resulting crises when the tidal current kept pointing me in the wrong direction.

Matt had also suggested silicone spray to lubricate the track, which I'm about to try. Another contributing factor, which I failed to notice until the end of the season, is that the slots on the BRe spray hood are misaligned, so the halyard rubs quite badly. But I think your cleats are differently positioned from mine so it might not be the case on your boat.

Can I ask why the Cunningham, or downhaul as I have always called it, needs to go through the boom, necessitating v accurate drilling, rather than around it... I say this without checking my boom, of course.

Thanks again for sharing this idea.

[Jonathan Stuart]

Rob,

Definitely use silicon spray. Raising (and dropping) the mainsail on our BRe was a pig until the track and sliders had a good spray of silicon. That transformed the process and 1 year on the silicon hasn't yet needed re-applying. Also, there is a joint in the mast track. On my boat there were some rough edges on the inside of the track where the two sections meet and the sliders would catch on that. A little rub with emery paper fixed that.

We also release the outhaul before raising the sail but it never helped that much whereas the cunningham has really made a big difference. BTW, I call it a "cunningham" because that's what Matt calls it!

The cunningham's setup is Matt's design so he decided to drill through the boom. I suspect that he feels the drilling does not adversely affect the boom and it is neater than going around the boom. The reefing lines are already routed through pulleys on each side so having the cunningham there too may be difficult. Also, the design places the rope at a really convenient place to easily pull down on it and cleat it in the Clamcleat. I spoke to Matt this week and think this setup may become standard on future BRes.

BTW, you may spot from the cunningham pictures that my boom also has a additional strip of wood screwed to the top. This is another Matt-modification because the original boom bends on the BRe - you can just about see this in some of the PBO photos, e.g.

http://www.swallowyachtsassociation.org/wordpress/wp-content/gallery/pbo-bre-test-sail-06-11-2012/p1000780.jpg

I don't think that this is a big issue, unless, perhaps, you push the boat hard, but Matt is strengthening booms on future boats so he also did this while fitting the cunningham.