luffing
Printed From: Yachts and Yachting Online
Category: Dinghy classes
Forum Name: Technique
Forum Discription: 'How to' section for dinghy questions and answers
URL: http://www.yachtsandyachting.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=9554
Printed Date: 07 Aug 25 at 11:20pm
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 9.665y - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: luffing
Posted By: gbrspratt
Subject: luffing
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 1:49am
| Can i luff down wind> |
Replies:
Posted By: SoggyBadger
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 7:41am
|
Yes.
------------- Best wishes from deep in the woods SB |
Posted By: gbrspratt
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 8:02am
|
Argument ssorted ta! ------------- |
Posted By: Do Different
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 8:03am
| I guess "true course" rule has been long dropped. |
Posted By: JimC
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 8:28am
|
There is, and never has been any rule requiring a right of way boat to sail a "proper course". For some reason its a particuklar area of confusion for some sailors.
But there are circumstances in which a right of way boat is limited in what it can do. One of those is if a leeward boat establishes an overlap from behind (Rule 17), in which case she may not sail *above* her proper course. She's quite entitled to sail below it if she so wishes. |
Posted By: NickA
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 3:31pm
|
IE you can't sail underneath someone and then push them up, but if someone sails down onto you, then you can push them up. Yes? ------------- Javelin 558 Contender 2574 |
Posted By: alstorer
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 5:30pm
|
Yes, with caveats. And note that regardless of how the overlap is established, it is the proper course of the leeward boat. So in the case of an asymetric boat sailing an angle that brings them into conflict with a symmetric (or non-spinnaker) boat sailing the rhumb line, the asymetric can continue to sail her hot angle as long as she gives the windward boat sufficient time and room to keep clear. Note that no allowance has to be made for the windward boat being idiotic and bleating about their proper course or the overlap being established from behind, as long as no contact is made.
------------- -_ Al |
Posted By: Rupert
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 7:00pm
|
Sailing a proper course which involves another boat changing course isn't the same as luffing, it has to be remembered. Hence the Assy reachy boat being able to come from below and behind and still force the other boat to change course. The problem I have is where the assy boat has cought a gust, and is sailing lower than the ordinary boat, and goes behind and below. The wind then drops, and the proper course of the assy boat then changes by 70 degrees, or some such, as it now wants to luff up to keep the kite filling, so forcing the ordinary boat which it has just ducked to massively change course too. The rules have no problem with it, as far as I can see, and I guess it is just another peril of handicap racing, but it seems wrong, somehow. ------------- Firefly 2324, Puffin 229, Minisail 3446 Mirror 70686 |
Posted By: JimC
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 8:32pm
| 70 degrees would be quite remarkable Rupert... I don't know of an asymettric boat that can usefully gybe more than 100 degrees on the run even in the lightest of air, so very unlikley to be more than about 20 or 30 dgrees difference in angle between strong gust and lull. |
Posted By: Rupert
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 9:34pm
|
Maybe I'm picturing my angles wrongly, but the scenario where an assy boat goes from sailing from well below to well above the line of the boat going straight is pretty common on a small lake in gusty weather.
------------- Firefly 2324, Puffin 229, Minisail 3446 Mirror 70686 |
Posted By: SoggyBadger
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 10:44pm
|
The rules are clear enough Rupert. The (presumably overtaking) assy boat in you scenario has no rights over the windward boat until it has sailed through its lee and broken the overlap. This is basically how its always been for boats overtaking to leewards. The big change in the rules compared to the Golden Age of dinghy sailing (when it was allowed to be fun) is the situation for an overtaking boat passing to windward which now needs to break the overlap to deny the leeward boat luffing rights compared to the old "mast abeam" rule.
------------- Best wishes from deep in the woods SB |
Posted By: RS400atC
Date Posted: 30 Jun 12 at 11:13pm
Twaddle! |
Posted By: r2d2
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 2:42pm
+1
|
Posted By: JimC
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 3:15pm
Obviously not clear enough: because I'm afraid that's not the case. The windward boat is still the windward boat and must keep clear of the leeward boat. Its just that if the leeward boat establishes the overlap from behind she may not sail above her proper course. |
Posted By: Rupert
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 7:01pm
|
What she can't do is "luff" - ie change course with the intent to force the other boat off course. If the intent is to sail the course she would sail in the absence of the other boat, then there isn't a problem in the rules.
------------- Firefly 2324, Puffin 229, Minisail 3446 Mirror 70686 |
Posted By: SoggyBadger
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 8:46pm
I prefer to think of it as the product of a fertile imagination  Plus a rake of beer ------------- Best wishes from deep in the woods SB |
Posted By: Presuming Ed
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 9:00pm
The rules aren't about intention. They're about what boats actually do. Altering course to windward is luffing. From the RRS: Terminology A term used in the sense stated in the Definitions is printed in italics or, in preambles, in bold italics (for example, racing and racing). ‘Racing rule’ means a rule in The Racing Rules of Sailing. ‘Boat’ means a sailboat and the crew on board. ‘Race committee’ includes any person or committee performing a race committee function. A ‘change’ to a rule includes an addition to it or deletion of all or part of it. ‘National authority’ means an ISAF member national authority. Other words and terms are used in the sense ordinarily understood in nautical or general use. From the Oxford dictionary website: luff Pronunciation: /lʌf/ Sailing noun the edge of a fore-and-aft sail next to the mast or stay: if your luff is flapping, pull the sail towards you to fill it with wind verb [with object] steer (a yacht) nearer the wind: I came aft and luffed her for the open sea obstruct (an opponent in yacht racing) by sailing closer to the wind: he can luff you, but must leave you room to get clear The limit on how high a leeward boat can luff is provided by RRS 17. 17 ON THE SAME TACK; PROPER COURSE If a boat clear astern becomes overlapped within two of her hull lengths to leeward of a boat on the same tack, she shall not sail above her proper course while they remain on the same tack and overlapped within that distance, unless in doing so she promptly sails astern of the other boat. This rule does not apply if the overlap begins while the windward boat is required by rule 13 to keep clear. The limit on the speed of the luff is 16.1. 16 CHANGING COURSE 16.1 When a right-of-way boat changes course, she shall give the other boat room to keep clear. |
Posted By: SoggyBadger
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 9:24pm
Sadly I don't think that's quite correct. The problem comes with the definition of "proper course" (see ISAF Case 14). Even within the restrictions of rule 17 (which I think covers the scenario we're discussing here) the leeward boat can still change course as long as she gives the windward boat the opportunity to keep clear. ------------- Best wishes from deep in the woods SB |
Posted By: Rupert
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 9:52pm
|
OK, clear this up once and for all then, please? Is the boat to leeward entitled to sail her proper course however she got to her position, or not? And if not, when isn't she?
------------- Firefly 2324, Puffin 229, Minisail 3446 Mirror 70686 |
Posted By: r2d2
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 10:16pm
| yes she can but she must give the other boat room to keep clear |
Posted By: Presuming Ed
Date Posted: 01 Jul 12 at 10:21pm
|
If a boat establishes an overlap to leeward within 2bl, she can sail her proper course but no higher. If she establishes an overlap more than 2bl away, she can luff to HtW. If a boat establishes an overlap to windward, the leeward boat can luff to HtW.
All alterations of course by a RoW boat must comply with 16.1.
|
Posted By: Rupert
Date Posted: 02 Jul 12 at 8:39am
|
So it does become about intent, whether the rules mention it or not. Luffing someone to stay ahead of them is sailing above your proper course. Luffing someone because that is where you'd be going if that boat wasn't there, isn't. Therefore, convincing a protest committee that your proper course changed because of outside factors which had nothing to do with the boat you luffed become all about intent. ------------- Firefly 2324, Puffin 229, Minisail 3446 Mirror 70686 |
Posted By: gbrspratt
Date Posted: 02 Jul 12 at 11:00am
This sounds like a sensible understandable answer (if its correct) Out of curiosity how do you prove you are or are not sailing your proper course? or is that a whole new can of worms? ------------- |
Posted By: JimC
Date Posted: 02 Jul 12 at 11:34am
|
If you carried on sailing the same heading for the next quarter mile after the overlap was broken that's pretty good evidence for the PC you were sailing a proper course. If on the other hand you changed back to the original heading as soon as you were clear then its pretty good evidence that it wasn't.
For what little my opinion is worth I don't agree with Rupert at all about intent - or quite a lot else on this thread. |
Posted By: Rupert
Date Posted: 02 Jul 12 at 11:43am
|
Maybe we are thinking of slightly different meanings to intent, because what you have described fits mine - the intention was clear in both your examples. Intent becomes less clearcut in other circumstances.
------------- Firefly 2324, Puffin 229, Minisail 3446 Mirror 70686 |