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Adding a Bowsprit #79912
07/11/06 03:06 PM
07/11/06 03:06 PM
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 35
Lake Norman. NC
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Matt_Z Offline OP
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Matt_Z  Offline OP
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Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 35
Lake Norman. NC
The Reynolds 21 restoration project rolls on.
I'm thinking I need to add a bow sprit to my boat. I've searched and read all the posts I could find here on the subject. Most of the discussion centers on the effects various modifications would have on light, fast beach cats. But I'm dealing with a 900 pound boat, so perhaps the aspiring (and maybe actual for all I know) designers among you could give me your thoughts on these questions. I'm on a lake where there aren't many cats. I see a few around but never noticed one with a sprit, so I don't have anything to swipe ideas from.

1) The boat has 3 cross beams. I plant to mount the sprit from the front beam, pass under the forestay bridle and out into the beyond. The front beam is 69" in front of the mast. The bridle is 93" in front of the mast, about a foot back from the front of the hull. How long should the sprit be? My guess would be 6', leaving about 4 feet to gybe inside the forestay. Does this length sound right?

2) Should I invest the effort to make the sprit articulate left to right? I've read this doesn't benefit the light speed demons, but that's not what I have. There is currently a reacher that attaches to a line bridle 6" in front of the forestay bridle. This can be moved left to right, but the 6" doesn't allow flying the reacher and jib at the same time. I'd like to fly both since we mostly have light winds here.

3) Am I correct in assuming that as long as the ascending angle of the sprit doesn't look hideously wrong it will work OK, or is there some critical science behind this?

4) Where on the sprit should I attach the lower front bridle wires, behind, at, or in front of the tack?

5) I plan to use aluminum tubing for the sprit, since weight isn't much of a consideration (Boat 900 lbs, crew pushing 400, sprit could probably be cast iron at this point). I'm planning on using 2" diameter tubing with a 1/4" wall thickness. Could I use a thinner wall?

6) Last one - Am I going to tear my mast off, and do you want to see the pictures afterwards?

Thanks in advance for time spent in reading and possibly answering these questions.

Matt

-- Have You Seen This? --
Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Matt_Z] #79913
07/12/06 08:37 AM
07/12/06 08:37 AM
Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 975
South Louisiana, USA
Clayton Offline
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Clayton  Offline
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Posts: 975
South Louisiana, USA
Do you have a mast head halyard to hoist the sail from? If so, you will need running back stays or something to keep your mast in column. If your halyards are fractional (don't go all the way up) then you shouldn't have a problem. Articulating pole? I think its more hassle than the advantage. On my Stiletto we use the cable across the bows forward of the bridle to attach the reacher and Spin. This has the port/starbord adjustments. For just cruising around and light racing its fine. It all depends on what your crew wants to screw with as far as adjusting lines while sailing.
Good luck

Clayton

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Matt_Z] #79914
07/12/06 09:14 AM
07/12/06 09:14 AM
Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 778
Houston
carlbohannon Offline
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carlbohannon  Offline
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Posts: 778
Houston
The first thing that strikes me is 6' long 2" dia 1/4" wall is too short and too thick a wall. Plus around here tubing comes in 10' lengths I would probably use 10' long by 2.5" dia OD ~2.3 ID (Forespar Spinnaker tubing).

If you are going to fly a reacher and a jib, you don't want much overlap. With attach points at 9', 8',7, and 6' from the crossbeam, you can test the best attach point for your reacher.

I would put bridle lines at 4' and 9', to start with.

Mount the tube to the beam so it can at least move up and down. That way the tube is only in compression.

I would expect the spinnaker tube to break long before your mast falls down.

Above all, get plenty of experience in 5-10 kts before you go out in 15 kts.

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Matt_Z] #79915
07/12/06 09:34 AM
07/12/06 09:34 AM
Joined: May 2002
Posts: 3,114
BANNED
MauganN20 Offline
Carpal Tunnel
MauganN20  Offline
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Posts: 3,114
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Matt_Z:

Get in contact with Trey Brown. He's up here in Raleigh with me, and he'll be able to put together an effective spinnaker pole/rig for your boat that you'll be more than happy with.
You can PM him at NCSUTrey.

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Matt_Z] #79916
07/12/06 12:33 PM
07/12/06 12:33 PM
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 121
Hollister CA, Plano TX
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avalondarlyn Offline
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avalondarlyn  Offline
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Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 121
Hollister CA, Plano TX
1. on lenth i would make it long to start. the lenth will be determined by the sail cut. and the the attacment point on the mast "head". overlaps and such.

2. my opinion is no "keep it simple"

3. i would use a compresion post from the pole to the apex of the bridle wires. you will be able to adjust the angle of the pole by shorting the lenth of the post.

4. if you use a stiff enough pole and a compression post. you use two simple guide line to keep the pole centered undet the post. i attached these to the bridle wire tangs.

5. I used a 3in 1/4 wall square tube. this is open for argument. at 17 ft long with the comprsion post post approx 50% of the distance. i run it un stayed. to the end.. if you use stays you definetly can use a thiner wall.

i run my reacher approx 3ft in front of the comperssion post and the spin anther 3-4 ft out. take a look at these pictures via link. i have made several changes since these photos mainly shorting the compression post to raise the foot.

http://www.thebeachcats.com/modules.php?...=view_album.php

there maybe better ways than this but this cheap light and easyly adjusted. in my opinion. good luck

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: avalondarlyn] #79917
07/12/06 02:33 PM
07/12/06 02:33 PM
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 35
Lake Norman. NC
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Matt_Z Offline OP
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Matt_Z  Offline OP
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Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 35
Lake Norman. NC
Thanks folks for all the advice, I really appreciate it. To answer the questions that were raised -

Clayton - Yes, I have a mast head halyard for the spin / reacher. No running backstays though. But that's how the boat was built. I'll take my chances without them initially since I have an extra mast. I do have a similar cable running across in front of the bridle for attaching a reacher, but it's only 6" in front of the bridle.

Carlbohannon - Since I'm planning on attaching the sprit to a separate crossbeam that sits in front of the beam that the mast sits on, a 6' sprit would put the end of the sprit 11' 8" in front of the mast. I can go up to 7' though, and down to A 3/16" wall, it can always be made shorter. 7' is the limit for UPS I think, there is no tubing source nearby.
I was planning on mounting the tube to the beam with a bracket, a cable straight down from the bridle 69" out, and a cable up from the end of each hull running to the end of the sprit, or near the end. The tube breaking before the mast does is reassuring.

MauganH17 - Thanks but I'm trying to do this on the cheap. I bought 2 boats and hauled one to the dump so I have plenty of shrouds, blocks, turnbuckles, pad eyes, etc. Everything except a pole ($50 at onlinemetals.com) and a Harken 3049 furler which I can't find cheap anywhere. They're too new I guess.

Avalondarlyn - Wow, nice ride... Really nice. Your suggestions make sense but the compression post has me baffled. Is that the white rod running up to the bridle? If so, I was planning on using a cable there to hold the sprit up, and a bridle to the end of each hull to hold it down. Is a post necessary to lighten the load on the bridle at the end of sprit?

Thanks for all your comments and suggestions. I couldn't do this without you folks.

Matt

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Matt_Z] #79918
07/12/06 03:23 PM
07/12/06 03:23 PM
Joined: May 2002
Posts: 3,114
BANNED
MauganN20 Offline
Carpal Tunnel
MauganN20  Offline
Carpal Tunnel

Joined: May 2002
Posts: 3,114
BANNED
Matt Z: He probably wont charge you for strictly consulting. he might try to sell you some components but I only referenced him as a source of knowledge that you could get to possibly look at your rig and get some ideas.

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Matt_Z] #79919
07/14/06 09:44 AM
07/14/06 09:44 AM
Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 778
Houston
carlbohannon Offline
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carlbohannon  Offline
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Posts: 778
Houston
A 7 ft limit does not sound right for UPS. I have had 10 ft lenghts delievered to my house. I think by online metals but try Metals Depot. The shipping calculator says I can have a 10ft pole delivered to my zip code for $16

The reason for the lenght is sail overlap. If you are going to fly a jib and a reacher, you must seperate them. I experimented with a Wave using a jib and 2 larger reachers.

I found that to make a jib and a reacher work I needed minimal overlap (one sail way out in front) or ~4 ft side-to-side. The fastest rig was a tiny jib, on the end of a 10 ft pole, completly in front of a furling reacher.

With the jib completly overlaped by the reacher the performance was mostly worse than with just the reacher.

Personally I would not plan on flying a jib and a reacher. Flying the jib in front of the reacher was scary on a Wave.

Seperate subject, a compression tube. Instead of having wires coming up to hold your pole, you have a tube going down from your existing bridle. If you put a ring on the bottom of the tube just big enough for the pole to slide into, it really simplifies the rigging the boat.

The new rig Tornado uses a compression tube.

http://www.tornado.org/html/new_rig_photos.asp

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: carlbohannon] #79920
07/14/06 11:42 AM
07/14/06 11:42 AM
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 1,382
Essex, UK
Jalani Offline
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Jalani  Offline
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Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 1,382
Essex, UK
All the Stealth F16s use a compression tube as standard. I tried sailing without mine and couldn't get the jib to set properly. I'd definitely recommend using one.


John Alani
___________
Stealth F16s GBR527 and GBR538
Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Jalani] #79921
07/17/06 08:18 AM
07/17/06 08:18 AM
Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 35
Lake Norman. NC
M
Matt_Z Offline OP
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Matt_Z  Offline OP
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Joined: Jun 2006
Posts: 35
Lake Norman. NC
I see, thanks again for the advice. Shows how much I know, I wouldn't have thought of puttng the jib in front of the reacher. I tried it yesterday the other way around, using the existing reacher bridle. With the reacher tack all the way to the leeward hull it was possible to get both headsails pulling, but very difficult to maintain. The wind was blowing and it zipped along pretty good until I snapped a daggerboard in half. But I've had worse maiden voyages and I do have a spare. The load on it must have been tremendous since they weigh a ton and I had considered them over-built.
It sounds like the compression tube is the way to go.

Matt

Re: Adding a Bowsprit [Re: Matt_Z] #79922
07/17/06 11:19 AM
07/17/06 11:19 AM
Joined: Sep 2005
Posts: 1,187
38.912, -95.37
_flatlander_ Offline
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_flatlander_  Offline
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Posts: 1,187
38.912, -95.37
FYI, UPS and USPS have a limit of approximately 175 inches total of length plus widthx2 and depthx2. 10 foot in a 6x6 inch box should be shippable.


John H16, H14

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