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swinging poles |
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Rockhopper 
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Joined: 16 Nov 07 Location: Eastry Online Status: Offline Posts: 642 |
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 Topic: swinging polesPosted: 14 Oct 08 at 8:57pm |
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right in my 4000 i have a swinging pole the problem is when do you swing and when dont you.its on the sea with up to three knots of tide some days mostly 1.5 to 2 knots to go across or against. the problem is i just cant work out when to swing or not so any ideas please. andy |
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Retired now after 35 seasons in a row and time for a rest.
2004 national champ Laser5000 2007,2010,National Champ Rs Vareo |
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ratface
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Joined: 07 Apr 07 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 686 |
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Posted: 14 Oct 08 at 9:03pm |
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sailing my friends 4000 we go by, if crew can wire downwind with boat planing or just planing then we centre the pole, if he cant wire or the boat wont plane then we pull the pole to windward sitting on the sides
you coming to the inlands at rutland this weekend? |
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Rockhopper
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Joined: 16 Nov 07 Location: Eastry Online Status: Offline Posts: 642 |
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Posted: 14 Oct 08 at 9:22pm |
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no i cant make rutland this yer i hope to do some of the opens next year fitting round the vareo first. we have an open at our club (broadstairs) every year for the fours so a good choice in buying one. we just cant seem to beat the 2000s on handicap just not quite getting far enought in front of them.thats why the swinging pole question which is quicker cause i still have not worked it out yet ! andy |
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Retired now after 35 seasons in a row and time for a rest.
2004 national champ Laser5000 2007,2010,National Champ Rs Vareo |
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Jamesd
Far too distracted from work 
Joined: 01 Feb 08 Online Status: Offline Posts: 377 |
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Posted: 14 Oct 08 at 10:07pm |
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Crank it to windward all the time. gets you sailing deeper and on a better VMG. Leave it central in stupidly windy conditions so you dont have to worry about it in the gybes. If its a tight kite leg then drop it down until you get a better slot between mainsail and kite. Also having it in the middle when going downwind in chop and alot of wind seems to help lift the bow a bit and decreases the chances of nosedives and general fill your pants moments.
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laser4000
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Joined: 02 Aug 05 Online Status: Offline Posts: 589 |
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Posted: 14 Oct 08 at 11:10pm |
Frankly most of thats bollox, aparte from the last bit... Once the crew is on the wire comfortably downhill, then put in the centre and leave it there - this is a lot less than 'stupidly windy' and is faster than having it to windward. remember that as you go faster the apparent goes forward, so you don't need so much kite projection. If you're not planing then it's a judgement call..and you can probably only figure what works by racing/comparing against other 4ks. Sometimes central(ish) can help, sometime cant is better. I borrowed a 4K nat champ crew for a light-wind event once and I was surprised at how keen she was for me to keep the pole central when I would have been bringing it round the front and this was probably in 4-8 knot conditions. As for dropping it to leeward then just don't do it, it makes you lean over. If you need to point (briefly) to lay the mark then sheet it flat and blow some of the halyard |
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G.R.F.
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Joined: 10 Aug 08 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 4028 |
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Posted: 15 Oct 08 at 12:04am |
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I didn't realise you could move the pole on laser 4000's.
We only race against one and not that often, I must look at it again. I don't suppose it moves as far as ours, which we use quite a lot now to good effect. If its breezey ad we're planing unless we have a particular tactical desire like approaching a mark deliberately high then coming down low at the last minute having got an 'angle' on the opposition and taken them in too high as well so they have to double gybe to our dead run for example. We leave it alone. In gusty iffy winds it's probably at its most use, times when you can't build up the speed to bring the apparent wind round front to foot off deep, then we crank it high, equally tight fetches when it's iffy we crank it low, but I suspect the greater movement we have is probably more valuable if the l4000 is similar to the RS400 wing wang. I don't think I could endure racing an assym boat in a mixed fleet without it frankly, we don't lose anything like as much as we used to. We also have tide to deal with and occasional crabbing, again it does come in very handy, example:- 2nd reach tide on the lee bow but downwind you need to go low because the tides standing you off, you dont want to go too soon or you'll get covered, so you crank it to weather appear to be carrying off at the same angle but the boats pointing low they all go high then get stuffed again, you soak low and do it in one, they have to gybe then gybe again. Brilliant device - swinging pole |
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redback
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Joined: 16 Mar 04 Location: Tunbridge Wells Online Status: Offline Posts: 1502 |
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Posted: 15 Oct 08 at 1:00am |
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I sail a 4000 too and I think the wing-wangs are more trouble than they are worth. In really light winds you need to encourage flow across the sails and if you wing-wang you get tempted to sail too deep and lose the flow and the kite collapses. In medium winds, and upwards, cleat both control lines in the middle and forget it - you'll be wanting to apparent wind sail so go high get some speed and keep the power on. Being cleated into the middle means you can gybe without worrying about them and concentrate on what is really important. Its just in that lightish winds where your crew has to stand in the boat that you might like to try using the wing-wangs to soak a bit deeper than otherwise possible. But remember the 4000 hull is designed for planing and its not fast off the plane, also being a norrow bow the wing-wangs don't operate through as big an angle as the RS400 so for both these reasons you are not going to sail up to handicap if you go deep. Perhaps that's why the 2000s keep up? However there can be the odd tactical moment where you sacrifice speed for depth. The real reason the 4000 has wing-wangs is that it enables the boat to carry a pole which is longer than the distance from the mast to the bow, ie long - so get it out there and head high and blast and when you gybe back you'll find you are ahead of the 2000s who have had to concentrate on soaking low and going slow. By the way the advice earlier about letting it off to leeward to point up doesn't work, in my experience there is never any advantage in letting the thing go lower than mid-way. The picture below shows the only sort of wind strength where you might soak low. |
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Rockhopper
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Joined: 16 Nov 07 Location: Eastry Online Status: Offline Posts: 642 |
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Posted: 15 Oct 08 at 8:36am |
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hi nice picture well its the first time for me with a swinging pole after sailing a 5000 for six years i thought i had it sussed but this pole thing is giving the hump as i just cant get far enough away from the twos we had 7mins 30 seconds on them the toher week which was stillnot enough so we now we got the speed its just trying to work it all out. thanks to everyone who has given advice i will look at all and try something at the weekend seen as its looking like another light race saturday thanks andy |
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Retired now after 35 seasons in a row and time for a rest.
2004 national champ Laser5000 2007,2010,National Champ Rs Vareo |
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JimC
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Joined: 17 May 04 Location: United Kingdom Online Status: Offline Posts: 6662 |
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Posted: 15 Oct 08 at 9:30am |
1) I'm not convinced that would have been a key design reason , they were very fashionable at the time, and in any case 2) its not so, its very easy to organise a slight offset so that the pole tip ends up on centreline but the pole retracts clear of the mast. But, yes, its an interesting demonstration of the design inputs. The sprit kites were invented because the 18s were sailing with the pole kite on the forestay all the time anyway, and none of the box rule classes that use kites bother to pivot the pole. However in the early days of the things there were a lot of people who thought like GRF. Now sprit kites are familiar I think folk have realised that there is no advantage in having the pivot in one design racing, because all the boats are the same, and no real advantage in handicap racing, since the handicap sorts these things out in the long term anyway, so all you are doing by having the device is to put back much of the complexity that we happily ditched... Mind you if the Merlin class were ever to permit sprit kites I'm sure we could look forward to pivoting pole systems of mind numbing complexity (he said, after watching someone rigging one on Sunday afternoon with a twin pole system...) |
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alstorer
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Joined: 02 Aug 07 Location: Cambridge Online Status: Offline Posts: 2899 |
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Posted: 15 Oct 08 at 10:21am |
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Swinging poles were fashionable when the 4000 was designed? Other than the 400, which was designed by the same guy, what else around then had them?
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