Installing a Winch

[Reg Barker]

I am going to fit a small winch on my BRe to help haul up the mainsail; I seem to have difficulty with the last couple of feet.  I did notice a comment from someone else that they had a hard time pulling their mainsail up. Has anybody else fitted a winch? Can anyone see any flaws or make any useful remarks about securing the winch? I intend to put a reinforcement plate to the underside of the cabin roof.

[Graham W]

Reg,

I'm not sure what blocks the BRe uses to get the main up - possibly just a cheek block at the top?  Would it be possible to use two blocks to gain mechanical advantage - one at the top of the mast and one attached to the head of the sail? I'm thinking of a gun tackle type arrangement http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Polispasto2B.jpg  You would need a lot more string for when the sail is fully lowered but it would avoid making holes in the boat.

I use this arrangement for tightening my jib halyard and for giving me greater control when lowering the mast.

[Reg Barker]

Thanks Graham

 It's an idea but I don't know how much clearance I have between the top of the sail  and the top of the mast. This I will have to check. I notice I have some bunching of sail at the Tack. Hence I have been tying a line making a temporary cunningham arrangement. Therefore I am not to sure whether I am reaching the furthest point in the sail track.

[Julian Swindell]

Have you tried lubricating the track to ease things? I have a full height Bermudan sail on my Baycruiser, and I woudn't think of installing a winch. The last few inches is a bit of a tug, but not that serious. It was getting harder at one time, and a spray of silicone freed it all up. I have also got a cunnigham tackle at the foot, which I use to tighten the luff if I didn't get it right up. There is no room on my mast for a tackle at the top, the sail goes right up. I really don't like winches if I can avoid them. Things get caught in them, the go wrong, and they tempt you to haul away at somethiing which is jammed, with potential for breakage.

The other ting is do you have a topping lift? Pulling this up fairly high takes a lot of the weight of th sail off the layard, and all the weight of the boom.

[Jonathan Stuart]

Reg,

Does your temporary cunningham not help? I would see a winch as a last resort because I don't think it is fixing the root cause of the problem. That is, it is like installing a bigger engine in your car because the hand brake is stuck on!

The effort to raise the sail should be fairly constant all the way up and only increase slightly towards the top. If the sail track is well lubricated (silicon) and the outhaul and tack not pulling against you then the sail should easily go to its maximum height. I suggest you spray the track and sail slides with silicon and then try raising the sail with nothing on the tack (obviously just as an experiment, not to sail like this!) and see how much difference that makes.  If it does the trick then convert to a permanent cunningham that is long enough to have no tension when the sail is first raised.

[Rob Waller]

Reg

I've posted in the past about this, and actually haven't managed to sail yet this year because the problem was so bad. The Cunningham solution assumes you can get the mainsail to the top of the mast, and just have some wrinkles to smooth out. It does not help get the sail up the last three feet or so, which was my problem, and sounds like yours.

Nick Peters, the new South Coast representative of Swallow Boats, was recently kind enough to look my boat over, and he's been doing some mods to help cure it. He reports it is OK now, although I haven't managed to get to the marina and try it because of a family crisis with an elderly relative.

Silicon did a lot, and is obviously an essential part of the solution. It restored things to where they were when I took delivery last year... Ie, I could get the sail up with extreme effort, one time cutting my hand on the halyard. Nick spotted that the block at the masthead looked misaligned, so as the sail approaches the top the halyard is pulling at an angle. He has moved it around now.

We also spotted that the slots in the spray hood are not well placed, so the halyard has been rubbing.

And he has also installed a clutch type cleat, to allow you to rest as you haul up the sail. And he has shortened the lazyjacks a bit to take more of the weight as you haul the sail up.

He reports that this combination of mods has helped a lot. I will report back when I get on the water this weekend.

Nick has also worked on the rudder uphaul and jib furling problems. I am pleased to say that Matt at the yard heard my crie de coeur and arranged for all this to be done.

It feels like we are helping to test the design. Hopefully it will evolve in response.

[Jonathan Stuart]

Just to be clear, the cunningham was for this very issue. When we first took delivery of the boat the sail was generally hard to raise & lower. Silicon took care of everything other than raising the final 3'. Of that final 3', it was very, very heavy/difficult to raise the first 2' and it was impossible to raise the final 1'.

With the cunningham the sail flies up to the top of the track. I know you would expect it to only help with fine tuning luff tension, etc, but without the cunningham you are beginning to pull against the tack when there is still a few feet to of sail to lift. With the cunningham there is no counter pull and the sail is lifted with the big folds and creases present. They are pulled out with the cunningham, which is easy with its 2:1 advantage.

That is what worked for me anyway and if others have the same issue with the tack tension then I think making other changes will just be tinkering around the edges. It is easy to test whether this is the issue because if you raise the sail with the tack shackle removed then you will be simulating raising the sail with the cunningham installed.

BTW, good idea to shorten the lazy jacks because, when not sailing, it also makes the cockpit more comfortable and avoids the boom fouling the raised sprayhood. I did find that the shorter lazy jacks badly affect sail shape when running or on a broad reach so I have installed two deck clips on the boom forward of the standard clips and I move the lazy jacks to those when under sail.

[Rob Waller]

Thanks for that explanation, Jonathan - cunningham makes more sense now... I will try raising the sail with a loose tack this weekend.

[Reg Barker]

Thank you all for your advice. I have purchased a can of silicon. The cunningham did have an effect when I used it. I have looked at the pulley and it is off set; therefore there is a definite acute angle when reaching the top of the mast.

I raised the mast with silicon sprayed along the channel, also making sure I had not twisted the main halyard. Raised the main sail with little effort, I think some of the problem was my own fault. I noticed I had left the outhaul loose where I have previously had it tight. Having it tight did not help. I was a bit fed up with the topping lift clips; I changed this by placing camcleats either side of the boom therefore threading the line through the existing eyes. This made it easy to lift the boom higher and for releasing.

I have made a few alterations to the Jib (see library article BRe  Jib Arrangements) adding a topping lift to the jib boom. This was a direct result of viewing Jonathan Stuart’s boat on the Sail Caledonian trip. (Thanks Jonathan for the tip.) I also placed an extra shackle lifting the boom higher. (This was also mention in the forum.)

The conclusion is the jib now swings freely when furled, there is good tension in the shrouds and forestay, the mast is stable.  Having the boom higher and no tension on the outhaul, with silicon sprayed in the track and the halyard tied on the correct side of the main sail and making sure that the halyard was not crossed, it hoisted beautifully on dry land in a field with a slight breeze.

 Thanks again everybody - £4.00 for the spray against a Winch for £109.00 - what a saving!

[Julian Swindell]

Just to add a bit more to this thread. I have done some work on the lazy jack system on my mainsail. Now, when I pull up firmly on them, they lift up the entire weight of the boom. This means raising the mainsail is very easy, as I am only pulling up the fabric. When it is right up, dropping the lazyjacks also drops the boom, and its weight then tensions the luff. No need for a winch at all, it is really quite light.

[Brian Robertson]

I agree that a bit of silicone lube plus a topping lift (and/or lazy jacks) makes raising the main much easier, but Matt put a couple of Barton winches on my BC20 a couple of years back and I love them!  Makes tensioning the jib halyard, which requires a fair bit of tension on the BC20, a breeze - no need for a handy-billy or the like.  It also takes all the hard work out of managing the sheets on the asymmetric.  And an unexpected bonus, they make reassuring solid hand holds when returning to the cockpit from the side deck in rough seas.

[Julian Swindell]

I do use a handy billy to tension the jib halyard. Saves the complication of a winch... But I appreciated the need for extra hand holds. One of the first changes I had made to my BC20 was to add extra wooden and grabs on each rear corner of teh cabin roof. That is just where you rest your hand coming on board off a pontoon, clambering up out of a dinghy or stumbling off to the fore deck. They are also the perfect point to tie a dinghy painter to before you cast off. YOu can just about see them under the folded sprayhood below.

[Sam Levang]

Have to agree with Brian. When we launched our BC 20 last year we started without a winch, but added a small Lewmar 6 and a double halyard jammer this winter and love it. It makes tensioning the jib halyard a snap, no more luff sag in strong winds. And no more crows feet in the main, even without getting the boat perfectly in irons. When taking in or shaking out a reef, we often don't bother to turn up into the wind and seas, just keep rolling and crank the halyard back up with the winch.

As a fraction of the total cost of rigging and hardware, the winch was a pretty small addition and makes many tasks easier and less stressful, so I think well worthwhile. We have also added a topping lift independent of the lazy jacks as well as a single line reefing system led down the mast and aft to the cockpit, and these modifications have made handling the main incredibly easy.

[Julian Swindell]

Hi Sam
I'm interested that you have a topping lift as well as lazy jacks. I just have the latter and have wondered what benefits fitting an additional topping lift would provide. I have thought it might allow the lazy jacks to be a bit looser when stowing the sail and that this would be worth while. Is this what you have found?

I also noticed from your post that you are using the winch for both the jib and main halyard. I hadn't thought of that. The ability to haul the main back up after putting in a reef, without going head to wind would be potentially really useful. I will have to think of that over the winter.

[Sam Levang]

The topping lift runs to the very end of the boom so gives better leverage for lifting it. It also provides a way to slack off the lazy jacks but still hold the boom up, to keep the battens on the main from snagging while raising sail or to prevent the jacks from dragging on the sail when reefing. I was never completely clear how SB rigs the lazy jacks so I improvised on this one. Our lazy jacks are run down the mast and spliced together, then back to a single cleat on the cabin top.