Genoa-only rigs?

[H71]

Does anyone know of sailing boats rigged without a mainsail, and with a genoa (or jib)? (It should be possible, since most people lower their main to approach a harbor on the jib.) Any web links to such boats?

Kind regards,
Richard

[rbgarr]

Phil Bolger designed a boat that was rigged with one large jib, but I don't have a link. The mast was stepped aft near the transom with a forestay extending from its head to the stem. IIRC the keel (or centerboard) was also mounted well aft in the hull.

Where do you sail that 'most people lower their main to approach the harbor on the jib'? I don't see that happen around here.

[H71]

@rbgarr: that helps to find the term "mast-aft rig" and interesting sites like these: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mast_aft_rig and http://www.runningtideyachts.com/sail/

Thanks!
H71

Phil Bolger designed a boat that was rigged with one large jib, but I don't have a link.

[wtarzia]

Bolger talks about it in is 100 Boat Rigs book. As he describes it, it is a highly tensioned rig, thus expensive and prone to disintegration when a piece of hardware fails. It wasn't clear to me how much more different this is from a tall braced mast on conventional sloops. I wonder if it scales down well on a smaller boat, perhaps with fewer difficulties? But the smaller boat might be just the kind where the owners trailer it and need a rig fast to put up and take down, so we wouldn't see this rig on them? -- Wade

[Woxbox]

This image is from the reference above. Almost what your asking about. It's also very close to the rigs most Prouts carry, the only difference being that they carry their masts vertical with a small main attached conventionally.

There are two shown in Bolger's 100 Small Boat Rigs. A daysailer with a single sail, and a small cruising boat that also carries a small staysail. He drew plans for another boat similar to the daysailer, but I don't beleive it's the same one. That boat carried a deep fixed keel and was designed to outrun most anything in its class. I do believe at least one of those was built and worked quite well.

http://www.runningtideyachts.com/assets/515profilesailplan.gif

[Ian McColgin]

There have also been a number of bipod masts with one big sail set on a stay. The theory is that you'll get a cleaner air flow without the turbulance in the mast's wake.

All too many modern sloops drifted over a generation of rule induced yacht design as viewing the big masthead jib as natural and best. So we end up with narrow mains, utterly useless anywhere but pinched hard on the wind, and big high load gennys, the need for winches, and amazing stresses fore and aft.

The sails are big enough that the sail area is in a place where the lee helm is not hopeless. Since the sails are combined with roller furling, the degenerating sloop folk (as opposed to those real sailors who like the real sloop rig) act as if dropping the main is essentially first reef and rolling the genny is reefing from there. There are a few roller reefing gennys that actually work a little and destroy the sail only slowly, but most are the sail maker's best friend. They don't sail squat so the degenerating sloopies end up using the iron jib a whole lot.

One of the biggest problems to the real sailor who goes out far enough to per force take the weather as it comes is that a stay-set sail can't take all that much flogging. You can't feather it off in a Gale (Force 8, wind mid thirties) to a luff or partial luff while reefing or thinking and expect it to last very long. And it shakes the whole boat.

Give me a mast with a spar on the luff or (Chinese style) lots of battens.

Perry designed the breakthrough Valient 40 and set the fad moving large fore-triangle boats into the ocean cruising world - great boats by the way - but he once remarked that his personal ideal for combining power and handling was the biggest main and smallest jib he could make work for the hull - a 3/4 or maybe 7/8 rig.

Some contemporary sloops won't sail without their main. (I regret to say that the otherwise nifty Cape Dory Typhoon is among them.) Most of these sloops should be put out of their owner's misery. But most - all those clorox bottle O'Day's and such - will and even with their wee mains it's fun to teach owners new to cruising how much more weather these boats can handle more comfortably with a 100% or smaller jib and a reef or two tucked in the main.

Don't be a slave to old ways, but it helps to understand why many old ways work really really well.

G'luck

[JimConlin]

The Bolger designs were discussed in Boat Design Quarterly #32. (Available from the WB store)
http://www.woodenboatstore.com/images/197032.gif

The boat was reported to go well to windward when skillfully sailed, but was inconsistent in other points.
The high compression loads of stayed sails take a lot of expensive standing rigging to stay upright.

The 'sportfishing catamaran' shown above would give a structural engineer the fantods. Imagine the compression load on the mast and then consider that it's stepped on top of the cockpit canopy.

Another use of the concept was the Aquacat, a singularly poor sailer.
http://www.americansail.com/images/stories/am125_3.jpg

[rbgarr]

A girlfriend had an Aqua Cat and she was having trouble sailing it. The white knight here offered to sail with her... and had just as much trouble sailing it on anything but a beam or broad reach.

A hideous rig.

[James McMullen]

. . . . .most people lower their main to approach a harbor on the jib.

This is due to a combination of laziness due to the ease of using a roller furler, ignorance and lack of seamanship. The way they get away with it is because most recreational sailors don't actually go sailing when there is a whole lot of wind, they just motor or stay home instead. In any real blow, you sure don't want your only sail up to be the one that is least supported and controlled by its spars, is the hardest one to short tack, and is the farthest forward to produce lee helm.

Bob Perry was absolutely right when he said that the best handling was with the biggest main and the smallest jib, and we can thank the perversions of the racing rules of the 60's and 70's for causing the unseamanlike status quo today with the exact opposite being now common.

PS: I once "sailed" an Aquacat. It was dreadful. Sub-mediocre performance.

[marcin]

The Stevensons also designed and built a cat called the Valkyrie, that had an A-frame "vertical" spar and 3 staysails, a main and two latteral "jibs".

The article's no longer on their website, but from what I remember they had a real tough time getting a sailmaker to make the sails, and she sailed beautifully tightly to the wind but, get this, could never be made to tack.

In fact the only way they could get her nose...s across the wind was to alternatively flip on the outside electric motors she had installed. Tal about the ultimate "motorsailer" :p

[frank pedersen]

I'm a little weak on my details, but there was a famous racing boat designed to the CCA rule (I think) called Cascade (I think) by Milgram, an MIT NA. You will recall that racing boats evolved to have very large headsails and small mains. That was purely because the main had a strong rating penalty and headsails had a light penalty. So Cascade carried that to its absurd extreme, a boat with two genoas and no main. She was so successful under the rating system that the rules had to be modified to include her. Most people thought she was very ugly too. I don't have one of my design books handy, so I can't check the details.

One other anecdote: I raced an Int. 14 back in the 1960's. In a regatta on Buzzard's Bay with about 40 boats and very heavy winds, we finished 7th in one race sailing on the genoa alone. That was after two capsizes with the main up. I should add that we were the last boat to finish in that race and it drove the committee crazy to wait so long for us.

[I, Rowboat]

Does anyone know of sailing boats rigged without a mainsail, and with a genoa (or jib)? (It should be possible, since most people lower their main to approach a harbor on the jib.) Any web links to such boats?

Kind regards,
Richard

Yep, ditto what Ian and James said. I watch these types come and go from the Kingston marina, and have noticed that they're generally the ones who also leave a full compliment of fenders hanging off the side for the duration of their outing -- a sloppy, unseamanly lot. When the wind does blow, they tend to weave an erratic course alternately punctuated by the flogging genny and short, panicked periods of moderate heeling.

Remarkable.

[rbgarr]

I'm a little weak on my details, but there was a famous racing boat designed to the CCA rule (I think) called Cascade (I think) by Milgram, an MIT NA. You will recall that racing boats evolved to have very large headsails and small mains. That was purely because the main had a strong rating penalty and headsails had a light penalty. So Cascade carried that to its absurd extreme, a boat with two genoas and no main. She was so successful under the rating system that the rules had to be modified to include her. Most people thought she was very ugly too. I don't have one of my design books handy, so I can't check the details.

Some details here: http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1087128/1/index.htm

I saw Cascade when she raced at Edgartown Regatta in the 70s. The ugliest part of her was how far from fair her hull was. It was just as lumpy and assymetrical as you can imagine. I thought she was ferrocement when I first saw her! IIRC she had a minor list also. It was a glaring insult to all the other gold-platers' owners for her to be even moored among them, much less beat them on handicap. :D

(She was a cat-ketch.)

[James McMullen]

Shall we all agree here that "beat on handicap" is not really a true synonym for "beat"? Manipulating the loopholes for personal advantage is not quite sporting, I should say, old chaps. I don't see any actual glory in it, that's for sure. Leave that nonsense to the lawyers and the corporations and the CPA's rather than to humans, eh?

[John B]

There is or there was a local version of that aqua cat called a happy cat and it was a great little beach boat which sailed very well. I had the use of one for a season and it easily performed up with all the other brands available at the time,plus it rigged up significantly faster than the traditional rigs. I liked it and would have one again for a beach house/ beach fun sailing.

[JimConlin]

I saw Cascade when she raced at Edgartown Regatta in the 70s. The ugliest part of her was how far from fair her hull was. It was just as lumpy and assymetrical as you can imagine. I thought she was ferrocement when I first saw her! IIRC she had a minor list also. It was a glaring insult to all the other gold-platers' owners for her to be even moored among them, much less beat them on handicap. :D

(She was a cat-ketch.)
I have a chum who was a grad student in naval architecture at MIT at the time. He tells em that the 'starved cow' fairing job on Cascade was the work of Milgram's graduate students.

[dredbob]

Big overlapping genoas are only "efficient" because they are adding lots of unmeasured sail area to the rig. When all actual canvas is measured, big headsails and small mains come in last. This is shown in the experience of a one design racing class called the Bembridge Redwing, where actual sail area was limited to 200 sq. feet, arranged any way the skipper liked, on one design 27' fin keeled hulls. After a season of racing, the "two consistent leaders had each chosen a mainsail area twice the jib area. The best light air boat of the two had a mainsail aspect ratio of 3.6. But the overall fleet winner was the other, with a mainsail AR of 3.0. And the boat with the big overlapping genoa was the slowest one of all." (from an article by Murray Lesser in _The Best of Sail Trim_)

So the lesson is that if you are not a racing sailor and don't care about rating rules (and how to cheat them), then you'll be better off with a nice big mainsail. That doesn't preclude having a big ghoster genoa for really light air (a cruising man can hoist what he wants when he wants, rules be damned), but for normal working sails a large main and smaller, easier handling jib will be a better combination than the other way round.

Bob

[andrewe]

I was sailing round Portimão outer harbour and spotted an interesting 3 masted staysail rig boat. On closer look, under her new name was written in small script " Vendredi Treize". IIRR Alain Colas' OSTAR boat from the late 60s early 70s. Set 3 headsails and a little mizzen . Very smart now and chartered, crew in matching rigs. Somewhere around 100ft.
A
Just Googled her and it was '72 and the skipper was Jean-Yves Terlain. Came in 2nd. Length was 42 mtr.

[Woxbox]

That was one great race. The idea behind Vendredi Treize was that the staysails weren't really efficient, but that they could be managed singlehanded. It was thought that the boat's length at 128 feet would make up for a so-so rig. They were wrong, of course. A 70-foot trimaran won. And that tri would be a real slug by today's standards. The results:

Skipper Boat Nationality Class Time
Alain Colas Pen Duick IV http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c3/Flag_of_France.svg/22px-Flag_of_France.svg.png (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_France.svg) France (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France) Tri-70 20 days 13 hours 15 min
Jean-Yves Terlain Vendredi Treize http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c3/Flag_of_France.svg/22px-Flag_of_France.svg.png (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_France.svg) France (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France) Mono-128 21 days 05 hours 14 min
Jean-Marie Vidal Cap 33 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c3/Flag_of_France.svg/22px-Flag_of_France.svg.png (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_France.svg) France (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France) Tri-53 24 days 05 hours 40 min

[Ian McColgin]

Just a note about designers "cheating" when they design to a rule - That's what the rules are for, in a sense. Some rules are widely regarded as having encouraged wholesome craft - the old CCA rule for example - while others - the IOR of pinched bows - seem to do the opposite.

No matter how you define the requirements for a boat, there will be compromises to reach those requirements, maximizing some and placing a lower value on others. Even if you think you have one requirement in mind - a double-handed ocean racer for example - and one limiting factor - 1000 square feet sail area say - the number of ways different designers would sculpt hull form, rig, displacement and all is limited only by the number of designers and even at that one designer might produce two radically different boats for two different teams with different abilities. Or different depending on whether the intended race is Plymouth to Plymouth headed west or Hawaii or perhaps a series of diverse races.

The rule is one set of parameters, for some the most important but still just part of the equation. A designer who designs a racing boat with go-fast features that penalize the boat more than the speed gained is not serving the client.

[tprice]

I have a chum who was a grad student in naval architecture at MIT at the time. He tells em that the 'starved cow' fairing job on Cascade was the work of Milgram's graduate students.
That's the "hungry Horse" look. Cascade was a no headsail boat (antithesis of what we're talking about - except for her staysails). She rated so well because of no rated headsails. I actually liked her because she "put it in the eye" of the status quo. In many ways she was a traditional boat - like a Block I Cowhorn rig - sort of..
Prof. Jerry Milgram's Cascade was a clever antidote to a poor rule. She pointed out glaring holes in the early days of the IOR and proceeded to run right through them. I recollect that they arbitrarily gave her a rating hit and she won anyway - several times! This was the old SORC days when all the Big Guys did that series. She was ugly with a raised foredeck, short ends and high freeboard. She was only fast for her rating. Nothing cheating or improper about taking advantage of loopholes. Wonder if she's still around.
Bob Derecktor, a designer of pretty boats, put Cascade into true perspective. "Any boat that wins," he said, "is never ugly."
For a great story on Cascade go here: http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1087128/1/index.htm

[tprice]

An interesting failure in the Six Meter class was Atriocia , designed by Sherman Hoyt and built by Nevins in 1927. With her mast stepped far aft and a huge headsail only, she was radical and not successful. Could have been difficulty in maintaining headstay tension or possibly the difficulty of off wind sailing with a jib only rig. She did have a jib boom.
A headsail only rig would be slow downwind without some means of keeping the jib extended. On the other hand, having the center of pressure fwd of the CLR would be nice in downwind sailing.

[Rapelapente]

A link to a video showing (sometimes) Vendredi 13 under sails


http://www.ina.fr/archivespourtous/index.php?vue=notice&id_notice=CAC92042455

And another one about a sistership, Friday STAR:
http://www.cmnyacht.com/fr/pageLibre00010534.html

The rig is boomed Staysails based.

[ahp]

At the Museum of Yachting in Newport, RI there was this gastly looking abortion, a genoa only boat out on the lawn in front. I don't remember the details and don't remember anyone copying it or admiring it.

[JimConlin]

If the sail balance is worked out, and it wasn't on the Aquacat, the greater beam of a multihull might allow the jib-only rig to work well.
Traveller track is available in considerable length.
My complaint with the 'sportfishing' number above is that the structural issues of supporting the mast step have been ignored.