A Few questions + photos

i am 16 stone and 6'5 so i have to be a bit liberal in spilling the wind out of the main. On a broad reach though it is a truly amazing expeience. I had her planing to the centreboard case. Also as mine is a very old (1961) boat, the jib is more forward (as it has no chute) and seems to be a bit less powerful than if it had a good overlap with the main as my last one did.
The moth is a magnum 5 and has a high boom- the plan is basically when the wind gets too much for me to take the other heavies out I can go nicely with the moth. Anything over a 4 is fine. If it was a narrow one - then i would be definately too big for that! lol
As far as being fluid with singlehanding the 5o and the FD- it needs a bit of practice but i can tack and gybe it quite well now. Just takes a while to get sorted back out on the wire. My FD doesn't have the continuous system which i think makes it a bit easier. IMO the FD does seem to be a bit more forgiving than the 5o!! Not nearly as tippy in irons.




Edited by Thunderchild

it is a sort of J hook attached to the trapeze line which has a peiceof elastic to the other side. The plan is that you never unhook off it as the elastic pulls the J hook onto your harness when you transfer sides. It is supposed to make it easier for the crew to get out on the side quicker and with less hassle.

photo for you

no worse than being attached with a normal system- you still use a regular harness.

Originally posted by sailorguy i was wondering that... but if anything goes wrong doens't it mean you are always attached to the boat: for the better or for the worse

The Only thing different about the harness from conventional trapeze to continuous is a little piece of elastic that you lift over the end of the hook to retain the the trapeze gear in the harness hook when there is no weight on the trapeze, while crossing the boat etc. It is easy to release. (I use the punch it free method.) At an FD event with measurers they can technically ask you to demonstrate that you can release youreslf whole sale from the trapeze system within a short time. ( I think either 5 or 10 seconds but I'm not sure.) The only people who ever get asked to do this would be someone with a wacky trapeze system or a shoulder harness (There are stil some about.) 

I had to jury rig a conventional trapeze system to an FD the other weekend because one of the J hooks failed. And trust me with a Genoa the size of an FD you just barely have enough hands to sheet it home and bang out on the wire in a reasonable order.   

 

I learned to trapeze on a really old FD (I mean old in 1974) which the owner often sailed/cruised to the IOW singlehanded! What a lovely boat it was too. They were considered hard to sail fast/up to handicap even in those days, though! Very easy to sail, you understand, but to sail them as fast as Rodney, for example,; that was another matter!