Favorite rough weather technique

Discussion in 'Sailboats' started by gonzo, Nov 10, 2009.

  1. kistinie
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    kistinie Hybrid corsair

  2. capt vimes
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    capt vimes Senior Member

    this is the perfect summarization and the only valid 'technique' their is...
    just recently i stumbled over an important aspect of modern fin keelers...

    while long keeled boats have motion damping from its keel at 0 speed already, fin keels develop a sufficiant reduction in roll movement only at higher speeds!
     
  3. gonzo
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    gonzo Senior Member

    Any fin produces roll reduction. The deeper it is the more leverage and therefore reduction it produces. Also, saying that avoiding bad weather is the only valid technique shows complete ignorance of life and conditions at sea.
     
  4. Fanie
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    Fanie Fanie

    Hi Mike,

    That sounds about right to me. I will be using a drogue when required.
     
  5. RHough
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    RHough Retro Dude

    There is a range ... :)

    Set off with complete ignorance of the weather forecast and rely on rough weather technique/equipment to handle any rough conditions.

    or

    Set of with complete ignorance of rough weather technique/equipment and rely on weather forecasts to avoid any rough conditions.

    IMO there is a middle ground between the extremes. Each vessel and master finds the combination that suits them. My safety/comfort zone is avoiding rough weather as much as possible making use of the best weather information. This includes flexible sailing schedule, passage planning based on historic data and local knowledge, and having access to the most current weather information on board. It should be much easier to avoid the worst weather now than it was even 20 years ago. Even a 5 knot boat can cover 120 miles in 24 hours. That allows a great deal of weather avoidance if the information is available.

    I certainly do not assume that all rough weather can be avoided so I have prepared as best I can whilst practicing learning about weather prediction in hopes of never being "caught" in extreme conditions.

    IMO having the best equipment you can find/afford on the boat including weather data for the passage is good seamanship. Ignoring avoidance as a primary tactic makes no sense to me. Not being on a fixed schedule alone reduces the probability of ever needing the rough weather gear I have.

    I think "be prepared" just about covers rough weather techniques. :)

    To be prepared you have to know what works for your vessel and what situations require what techniques. I submit that much too much time is spent talking about what to after you are in extreme conditions and not enough time is spent looking at how much easier it has become to avoid it in the first place.

    Just my opinion.
     
  6. BeauVrolyk
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    BeauVrolyk Sailor

    Wow... long

    Mike,

    Thanks for all the comments on my post. I'm simply going to summarize, as opposed to going through things point by point; for the sake of others here. I'm happy to communicate directly if you'd like.

    First, you are right that my thinking is generally flavored by racing boats and not cruisers. This is because my experience is that whilst cruisers can (and certainly should) choose when to make a passage and exactly what craft to make it on, racing sailors can not. As a result, my experience of many many years has been that racers find themselves in serious heavy weather much more often than cruisers. Some here have said that avoiding a storm is the best technique, something I completely agree with. But, that isn't possible for most racers as starting times are fixed, or even worse one leaves when a front is arriving to make a record attempt precisely because of the arrival of the storm and heavy winds. I think you'll find that many, if not all, of the examples given of what happens to boats have been from races like Fastnet and the dash to Hobart. Perhaps that's because the cruisers didn't survive to tell the tale, but I doubt it. As a result, I think that a significant amount of the "experiences" cited in this thread are based upon information and experience gained in relatively light and fast sailboats which were not heavily loaded with gear.

    Racing sailboats, just like racing cars, yields experiences that reasonable normal cruising sailors will probably (hopefully) never encounter. We can learn from those experiences, but one must really be careful when trying to extend what we know to radically different craft. For example, the general perception that racing boats are made weaker due to a quest for light weight and that they are damaged more easily in storms. Anyone who has sailed a IOD two tonner made of alloy from the '70s will tell you it's massively stronger than the vast majority of cruising boats, it is also much less stable in almost every way due to its shape. Similarly, the current crop of Volvo boats are quite strong, but nothing like the older generations that included things like New Zealand Endeavor, which is built like a tank. The difficulty in translating racing experiences into cruising designs, IMHO, is that people don't realize that the primary difference is crew. I have never bumped into a cruiser with the quality and size crew of a racing boat. Thus, many of the best race-boat survival techniques, like running off fast and enjoying the surfing, may not apply. More on this later. The point is that the entire package: Hull, Rig, Sails, Engine, Crew Strength, Crew Size, Duration of Storm, etc.... needs to be included in deciding what sort of strategy one is going to take to survive a storm. In a BOC race boat one can simply beat into it far longer than in a Island Packet. With 12 able seaman aboard, one can keep sailing far longer than when I'm with my girlfriend.

    Second, my personal experience of many decades in every kind of craft from a 24' clinker built model of a Danish coastal cutter which I sailed extensively as a child, through a 103' LOA Alden gaff headed schooner which I served as skipper of, a 65' steel Wyle ketch, and including almost every kind of racing sailboat built, has lead me to believe quite strongly that while there are certainly good reasons to be conservative in the design of sailing yachts, we are generally far too conservative. Generally, we fail to adopt obviously better equipment and designs which have been made possible by advances in technology.

    My favorite example was the arrival of the Cal-40, a wonderful Bill Lapworth design from the early '60s, which was greeted at my yacht club in Los Angeles as a "death trap". The very things which made the Cal 40 a more sea worth boat were bemoaned by most of the "experts", including even her own designer. If you look carefully at the trailing edge of the Cal 40 keel you'll see it is dead straight and at exactly the right angle to accept a keel hung rudder. This is because the first Cal 40 was going to George Griffith who insisted the boat have a balanced spade rudder, yet Bill Lapworth was so convinced that the spade would fail, be too twitchy, etc... that he designed the boats to fixed later with a traditional rudder without too much expense. Needless to say, by today's standards the Cal 40 is vastly overbuilt and her keel, referred to as a dangerous fin, at the time is now considered almost a "full keel". During this same debate supposed experts, without any actual factual data, expressed with certainty that the relatively new fiberglass construction techniques, including the absence of floor frames in the Cal 40, would would result in stress cracks and all manner of failures to occur. Obviously, none did. Sadly, I still find people who will tell me that all fin keel boats, including the Cal 40, are less sea worth and even dangerous compared to full keel boats, clearly not true. As you have pointed out repeatedly the design of a boat is a complex set of trade-offs and the keel is only a small part of what makes up a boat. Cal 40s have now raced across every ocean I know of, one was won the last two Bermuda Races, the race to Hawaii, trans Atlantic, etc... the boats have been driven VERY hard and yet none of the problems the guys at LAYC swore would happen ever occurred. The point being, we as a group of sailors, depend far too much on hearsay and not enough on experimentation.

    Finally, I think the best point you've made, which was also made by others, is that the strategy for survival of a storm isn't a stock standard answer. It will be different in different circumstances. It will depend upon the characteristics of the boat you're on, the skill and condition of the crew, and numerous other factors. The skipper must make judgements based up their experience and the situation that are critical and may have wide variation. Therefore, I do object to the sailors on this forum stating things like: Use a drogue, they always work. They don't and we can cite numerous examples where they wouldn't. The same thing applies to running off, heaving to, and all the other examples given. There isn't "one right solution" just as there isn't one right boat. I know that many folks want to know the "best" answer to a question like this, and would like to figure out the "best" boat for all occasions, but it simply isn't possible. There is simply too much variation in the conditions, crew and equipment to allow those sorts of simple answers. Examples abound in this thread so I won't repeat any of them.

    I think we've probably pounded this topic into the ground, so I'll conclude by thanking you for the time and tutelage. I learned a long long time ago that you can always learn new things from your boat, the sea, and the sailors who sail if you're only willing to listen.

    BV
     
  7. gonzo
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    gonzo Senior Member

    I agree that techniques have to take into consideration location, type of boat, crew, etc. I strongly disagree that it is possible to avoid rough weather at all times. For example, a passage from Bahia, Brazil to Barbados took me twenty three days. Is someone claiming I could have avoided rough weather and made the trip?
     
  8. mark775

    mark775 Guest

    Why did it take you twenty-three days, Gonzo? What do they think of your nickname, "Gonzo" in Spain?
     
  9. gonzo
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    gonzo Senior Member

    It is about 4000 miles.
     
  10. Fanie
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    Fanie Fanie

    He took the wrong way around the continent :D

    You must have had fun fishing that whole distance though :cool:
     
  11. gonzo
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    gonzo Senior Member

    The only way to get through the doldrums is to take an easterly course getting close to Africa. Check the pilot charts.
     
  12. capt vimes
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    capt vimes Senior Member

    gonzo

    is that now better or easier to understand for you or should i take out the sidenote in brackets completely? ;)

    i know quite well that avoiding bad weather is not always possible and especially not on long passages... i am not such a dumb fart... ;)

    and yes - fin keels produce resistance to roll also at stand still depending on draft but not as much as comparable long keels... a fin keel operates a lot better when there is a sufficient waterflow at a certain angel of attack...
    but whom am i telling this - you know that, don't you? ;)
     
  13. gonzo
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    gonzo Senior Member

    Where are you getting the data?
     
  14. Brent Swain
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    Brent Swain Member

    Twin Keels make even better roll dampers. As the keel is the centre axis of the roll, two centres tend to counteract one another, greatly damping roll.
    The distance to a lee shore also determines ones storm tactics.
     

  15. capt vimes
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    capt vimes Senior Member

    no data here - just experience...

    while the moment of inertia will be comparable between a long keel and a fin keel with similar draft and ballast the long keel has a considerable greater lateral area...
    this lateral area is moved sideways through the water when the boat rolls - thus producing drag which adds up to the roll damping...
    a fin keel now has probably 4-6 times less lateral area than a long keel and especially on the tip where it matters most for this sideward movement far less area depending on its aspect ratio....
    on the other hand produces a fin keel good lift when the boat is in motion and thus stabilizing the ship... no speed - less roll damping
     
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