Freestanding

Sooner or later those pretty cleats on the stern quarter are going to cause you some irritation. King Neptune and those other ornery sea gods have decreed that the mainsheet will tangle in any and all such seemingly necessary devices just when it is most important to let the sheet go free.

 

"Damn your eyes man". Thanks Messabout. You know I am disproving my theory: "awe, I don't need a designer...I can do it myself".
Obviously nobody will like this idea either. I was thinking I would run the spinnaker sheet through the open cleat base, if and when I try to fly a spinnaker.

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I have a traveler track that dissects the cockpit forward. I will get a picture and show you guys.

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Now that you mention it the cleats do look like they were intended to snag lines. As an amateur I realize we tend to finish out our boats with odd/goofy details. It is part of the charm? But I am most definately asking for anyone's advice or comments. Thanks so much.

 

Argh! You are setting the bar too high. Now, I'll never get my boat done.

Great work. Messabout is right about your workmanship. I've run spinnaker sheet through those chocks before. It should work for you. I've also had my main sheet snag on those chocks before too. Centerline sheeting helps to reduce the fouling. Are you going to sheet your main in the cockpit or on the afterdeck?

 

Thanks, glad to hear the chocks worked somewhat.

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I don't know what centerline sheeting is. I think this is what you mean?

 

How did you get the only garage in the neighborhood?

 

That should keep things clear of your cleats. I have a horse on my after deck for my main sheet that would let my sheet block travel about three feet back and forth. There was a tendency for the sheet to foul the aft cleats. I limited the main sheet block to centerline to keep it clear of the cleats.

 

That's a mighty fine looking traveler in the picture. (it looks e x p e n s I v e) It befits the quality of the boat however.

If you use it in the position in the picture you can rig the sheet in a number of ways. It can be two part, 2, 3, 4, 5 part as you might want. With a sail the size that you might use, the three part rig will probably be sufficient. In light airs a two part rig will do.

To take maximum advantage of the traveler influence, you will probably not want the sheet bitter end attached aft at the transom. All the parts would be somewhere near mid boom. That means that all the boom load would be somewhere near the middle. The boom can be tapered in both directions but the fattest part would be, at or very near, the sheet attachment point.

If you attach the bitter end of the sheet to the transom and lead forward through some turning blocks, to the traveler location, then you can mitigate the load on the mid boom somewhat. But now you have part of the sheet flirting with those cleats. If not attached to the transom the sheet will not be likely to tangle in those aft quarter cleats and the traveler pull down influence will be better. You could use a yoke traveler line on the transom and let the bitter end slide freely. Then the mid traveler would suffer less. One more set of pesky decisions to wrestle with. Are we having fun yet?

Keep on keepin' on, you're doing great.

 

Thanks people. A little encouragement really helps me move the project along without getting "stuck" on one problem for too long. Hang with me because I can see I will need to make another boom (and how do I design it?). At the moment I am painting the small deck. I want to be done with the hull so I can get back to the sticks in a week or two.
The garage is at my house but I built the boat in that little shed. The nose of the bow sits right up against that little window in the door.

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The traveler was expensive but mostly because I chose the "windward sheeting" components. Harken Co. was great about the custom bend. I ordered a track and gave them the bend/chord I wanted. They charged maybe $40 for the custom work. I want to mount the track where it is shown. I moved the track location about 4"-5" aft (from plan) so I would have a comfortable width crew seat in front of the track. As for purchase, I was planning a 3/1 main sheet, mid-boom, with the traveler also at 3/1.

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I am going to machine a larger radius tapering "round-over" to the mast edges. I will make a larger boom that looks a bit better I hope.

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I expected to get a feel for finishing by the time I was done with this boat but it never happened.

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Bondo, your finish work looks excellent - really top-notch workmanship. Can you give us a description of your process?

 

Before you change the mast and boom, you could just see how she sails first.

 

No special process that I know of. I was able to proceed as slowly as I needed. Painting on the other hand has been a challenge. Canracer, the boat is miles away but the spars I can build at home.

 

What's up bondo? Almost a month now since we've seen an update. I know you're building something.

 

Bump. Anything going on, Bondo?

 

New thread: Freestanding