[Rhodes22-list] First Time Out

[KUHN, LELAND]

Michael,

I'm sure your story sounds familiar to a lot of us.  The Rhodes22 is an
incredibly easy boat to sail in winds less than 10 knots.  It's an easy
boat to sail in winds between 10 and 20 knots, if you've had a lot of
experience sailing it in those winds.  After 20 knots, it becomes more
work than fun if you want to try to sail upwind.

"Wind was 5-10 mph."
The more I sail, the less sail I use.  On a beam or close reach, at 7-8
knots the 175 Genoa will start to create too much heel for optimal
speed.  If you're heeling more than 10 degrees, you will probably be
able to go faster with less sail.  Once you've heeled over so far that
most of your rudder is out of the water, you start approaching a broach
and don't have enough speed and control to head in or out of the wind.
Having the centerboard down does help to a point.  Too much sail can be
fun, but it certainly makes things more difficult to control.

"We let out the
sheets to steady the boat."
You knew what you were doing.  You can't furl that big Genoa back in
unless you take the pressure off of it.  If you can't do that by heading
into the wind, you need to loosen the sheets.  Ideally you want put
light pressure on the sheet/sail while furling it in so it wraps tight
enough that the UV protector covers the sail.  In an emergency, just
furl in the flapping sail and worry about perfect furling later.

If you have a new CDI furler, the instructions state that you should
have the furling line wrapped about 5 times around the drum when the 175
if fully deployed.  You really only need it wrapped around once so the
thing will turn when you pull it, but yours obviously wasn't wrapped
around at all.  If you have the CDI furling line that comes with the
furler, don't wrap it more than 5 times or you won't have enough furling
line to allow your 175 to fully deploy--the bitter end of your furling
line would need to be let out beyond your cam cleat.  Stan gives you a
much longer furling line than the one provided by CDI, which alleviates
this problem.

My furler is set-up to wind the sail back in clockwise, and furls back
in slightly better on a starboard tack.  As Art stated, you can set it
up to furl either way.  However, UV protection is sewn on the port side
of the sail, which means you need it to furl back in clockwise.  Either
Art doesn't have UV protection on his counterclockwise furling Genoa, or
he is thinking like a Navy man (go Army!).

Good luck and don't let this minor mishap take the fun out of your
sailing.  If you're like me, this won't be your last exciting challenge.
I don't know who coined the phrase "sh** happens," but it must have been
a sailor.

Lee
1986 Rhodes22  At Ease
Kent Island, MD   

-----Original Message-----
From: MichaelT [mailto:mticse at gmail.com] 
Sent: Sunday, June 29, 2008 10:09 PM
To: rhodes22-list at rhodes22.org
Subject: [Rhodes22-list] First Time Out


Hello All,

After working on the boat for the past several weeks and taking down the
mast for the 1st time to add a new pop-top slider, windex and pre-wiring
for
a vhf I was finally set to go. Replaced my first impeller on the 20 year
old
yamaha 8hp, hiking stick w/ coaming box, all the wiring/lights tested
and
operable as the former owner never had a battery installed. And a solar
panel from GB to boot.

So I went out for the first time for the season yesterday this being my
first boat, first season. Everything was going swell. Wind was 5-10 mph.
2
hours later the wind picked up a notch and still all was well. When it
was
time to go home, we lost our bearing and realized we were downwind and
started to beat the wind. The boat started to heel and heel a lot. So
much
we the jib started touching the water and scooping water from the
gunnels. 

The wind picked up even more and this when the problem started. I
decided
that it would be best to take down the sails and just motor in. We tried
to
head the boat into the wind and couldn't. Boat still heeling. We let out
the
sheets to steady the boat. Tried to furl the jib in. Furling jib is
stuck.What to do? While the boat was heeling, wind is now 20+, I go
forward
to check the furling unit and noticed that there was hardly any line in
the
spool. I had to hand wind the sail itself and was able to roll in about
2/3's of the jib. The 3rd still flapping. I grabbed the boom, lifted the
topping lift, released the outhaul which just flew away and pulled hard
on
the main sail furling line and thank goodness the main sail furled in.
Motor
down, motor started and we now were heading into the wind motoring, the
jib
still flapping. I noticed that my mast stay turnbuckles on the starboard
side was being turned loose from the flapping jib. Turnbuckles was
reinstalled w/o cotter pins by our marina guy. Which way to tighen?
Counter
clockwise ok. Settled down the jib on the mast stays. Swells were
building
up and we would hear the motor wining when it caught air.

As we started heading into our channel at Cedar Creek, our point of sail
was
now a beam reach and the 1/3 of our jib sail started to heel us over and
now
the motor was all air wining. Placed the motor in neutral while we
sailed
and instructed my partner to throttle the motor when the boat flattened.
We
finally made it into our marina, in our slip without fanfare as the
marina
was sheltered form the winds in the Barnegat. It started raining cats
and
dogs the moment we were gathering our things to pack up. Secured the
dock
lines, lifted the motor and rudder off the water. We just left the boat
amd
went home.

What do I do now? I might have broken the furling jib when I physicaly
hand
wound the whole unit. Where do I even start to figure out why there
wasn't
any line in the spool. Is it possible when the mast was taken down that
it
may have gotten unwound? How do i get the furling jib back in order?
Other
questions linger...Why couldn't we head into the wind? Center board was
down. We're we just having fun heeling and seeing the jib touch water or
were we already in danger?

Thanks for listening and appreciate your input...

Michael
Rhodes 87', Silverside

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