Newbie with recently bought Nacra 5.2!!

Hey everyone,
Just thought I would pop in here and say hello. I am from Maryville, Tennessee and I just bought an older Nacra 5.2 for my family and I to sail on the many lakes and rivers local to my area. It is in decent shape altho it appears to have had some decent repairs done to the hull. I intend to enjoy it for a little while and then this winter take it down and re-gelcoat the hulls or paint them with whatever you fellas recommend. The hulls did not appear to take on any water after we had it out on the lake for about an hour today. I have not a clue as to how to rig the jib on this thing altho I managed to get around using just the mainsail today and back to the boat ramp. There was like ZERO wind out there and it was slow going altho there was a quick gust or two that kinda gave me a little idea about how fast this thing can be in real wind. I grew up sailing a Hobie 14 on the lakes near my Grandfather's home in Lake Worth Florida. The boat appears to have had a new tramp put on recently and it is a mesh blue tramp in good shape. SOme of the rope lines could use replaced and I bought some new nice life preservers and lines from Bass Pro-shops today. I am quite sure there are some more specific lines available for this boat but I hope to learn from you salty dogs here about what is what and how to do it right. I have fond memories of flying the hull on that 14 on the lakes with my girlfriend way back when and hope to be able to share the same exhilaration with my kids and wife now. The boat appears to be large enough for my wife and I and two small kids but not much more than that. It has been equipped with two trapeze on it and I hope to get some harnesses or make some harnesses for it. It needs some shock/bungee chords to keep them from flopping around. I simply tied them off when I test sailed it. I love the shape of the hulls and their knife edge profile. We are planning to move back to florida soon and I am optimistic this will be a great boat for the Intercoastal Waterway and the ocean once I get more familiar with it.

Anyways, I am glad to meet all of you and hope to learn how to properly rig this boat and get it ship shape and ready to enjoy. It sure is light and looks fast even standing still!!! Peace


Pete

Pete, you can look online for the online Nacra owners manual, which will tell you all about rigging your jib.

Try this link:
http://www.thebeachcats.com/index.php?module=pictures&g2_itemId=35217

Have fun!

Todd

basically with the jib you should have a line running up from the jam cleat on the lower left side of the mast, up to the small block/pulley at the front of the mast just under the mast hound and then down to where the bow wires and forestay join together.

zip a few inches of the top of the jib to the forestay, then clip the nylon webbing loop to the stainless schafer? clip on the jib halyard.
pull on the jib halyard down about a foot to raise the jib and zip that foot, repeat...
when the jib is fully up attached the brass grommet to the the stainless twist shackle on the little stainless at the forestay chainplate adjuster.

then tension the jib halyard at the mast and lock it into the jam cleat. loop up the 20 odd feet of loose halyard and stuff it into the tramp tube sleeve. if no tramp tube sleeve there may be a mesh bag on the tramp to hold it.

there should be 2 harken ratcheting blocks, on wires, on the tramp to control the jib sheet, and a sheet that runs forward to a pig tail with 2 small blocks and a clip.
the clip goes on the back end of the jib and the sheet from the jib blocks runs around the small blocks and then back to the blocks where it gets tied off

a google and youtube search of pics and videos will help to set things up

here's a start

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j55lMDEBmP8

Thanks for all the tips guys... We took her out today hoping for a nice day out on the lake but some sudden violent thunderstorms rolled in quickly on us. I gotta say that having sailed a hobie 14 on my grandparents lake down in South Florida I would be ready for the Nacra.... I was WRONG!! The jib sheet makes a huge speed difference and the whole boat is like a formula one race car in comparison to that hobie. When the wind picked up it took off like a rocket and honestly scared the crap out of me for a few tense moments. I regained control and managed to keep my family and I on the trampoline. I told my poor wife to pull down the jib even tho she did not know how and from the sounds of your description I had it on wrong anyways. She managed to get it pulled down and kinda folded up and sat on it while I tried to get the boat to come about for a tack back towards our boat launch point. That wind was pretty wicked for a little while then it started raining and we were all soaken wet. The kids started crying and to my astonishment my wife was grinning from ear to ear. I kinda had a moment of what the hell has she gone mad and then it hit me.... this was pretty damn exciting!! I aimed the boat for a break between the two thunderstorms and tried my best to sail her into the wind to get there and managed to get us thru the least dangerous area without any lightning and torrential rain. We managed to get it back to a boat launch that was not where we started but I REALLY wanted to get everyone off the boat until the lightning went away. We sat there and a nice fellow drove me and the kids the half mile back to our launch spot and picked up our van and trailer. Drove back to the other launch and picked up my wife and the cat. We were laughing our butts off while we tidied up the mast and lines for the trip home talking about how scared we all looked when the wind really started to rip. I guess we survived it and nothing broke and nobody fell off and we did not perform any boat acrobatics like a pitchpole or anything so all in all it was a great time!!

I got the boat home today and realized that the rudders were not setup right. The fellow who owned the boat basically tightened the crap out of the pinch bolts on each rudder so they would stay upright during trailering. I started looking at the rudders and saw that there is a thin bungee chord broken inside the tube. I removed it and replaced the line that secures the rudders in the down position. The problem is how to keep it up without the bungees in there. I fashioned a keeper from some heavy gauge tig welding stainless wire to go from the other hole in the rudder to the end of the steering arm pivot. It seems like it should work fine and will hopefully keep me from grinding my rudder tips into oblivion while going down the road. Then when I get to the water it is easy to remove them and toss them into the van.

I am also unclear about the dagger board setup. They are long and heavy and wing shaped and they have a large knot in the top to keep them from falling thru into the depths below. They also have a small bungee chord that goes from a little line going thru two slits in the trampoline to the daggerboard. I was under the impression that there should be some sort of tensioner bungee that makes it possible to set the depth of the dagger board via friction? Is this incorrect?

So the jib sheet should be zipped around the forestay steel line that keeps the mast from the bridle in the front then? I was not aware of that( I know I don't know what the hell I am doing). SO you hook the jib sheet to the little stainless pin on the bridle that goes between the hulls and then using the zipper work the jib sheet up the forestay cable using the halyard to pull from the top. Then once it is up you secure the part nearest the mast bottom to that double sided rigging.

SO a block is a pulley on a line, what do you call the little line cleats/one way gates on the jib and main sheet adjustments?

The main sheet on my boat is kinda different looking from the ones I see in those youtube videos. The boom has two pulleys that are not attatched to each other rather they are attatched fore and aft of each other. Then there is the typical block and tackle looking setup on the traveler. It has the large ratchet pulley, a one way gate setup, and above the large pulley is a double row pulley. So far I have tied the main sheet line to the bottom of one of the boom pulleys and then routed it around one of the paired sheives on the traveler and then back up to the other pulley on the boom and then down around the ratcheted pulley and thru the one way gate on the traveler. The traveler has another line that goes from the bottom of the ratcheted pulley actually underneath it and thru the fixed gate on the crossbeam that runs from the front crossbeam to the rear crossbeam. Then I put it thru the one way gate for it. I understand it is to allow you to tack without having to keep changing the settings. The traveler will just rock back and forth as you tack.

I apologise for all the stupid questions and improper terms. I know how to sail the boat just not what all the terms are for everything. The Hobie 14 I sailed did not have a jib sheet tho so that part is new to me. Thanks for all your help and ideas. Where is a good place to buy replacement lines for the main and jib sheets since they kinda look worn out? Peace

Pete

sounds like you had a good time in the wind

sounds also like you need to brush up on a few things like traveller useage

for $5 i bought a 2nd hand copy of "catamaran racing" by rick white via amazon

was so good i then went on to buy "catamaran racing in the 90's"

http://store.catsailor.com/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=6437&idcategory=99

or you could buy it from the author and from this site!

for a few $more the dvd by rick would also teach you more than most of us could impart over forums

dagger side loaders will show if you google 5.2 pics and other 5.2 things can be found searching this site, as well as the web

http://www.catsailor.com/forums/ubbthreads.php

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&...sa=N&tab=wi&biw=1280&bih=835

would try to help more but got to go to work now

good luck

Well CRAP!!

Today was a BEAUTIFUL day for sailing and we tried to take the boat out to the lake to let her fly and had all sorts of issues rigging the boat. Firstly there was a problem where the stanchion wires and the forestay wires got kinda twisted up at the top of the mast which made it impossible to hook everything up to the pins on the hull and bridle. That mast is pretty damn heavy trying to right it up. IS there a trick to it? We were thinking about using the winch that we pull the boat onto the trailer with to pull the mast up. We normally hookup the port and starboard stanchions and then manually raise it until it is vertical enough to hold with one person. Then the other person goes up and connects the forestay.

The real problem came when we got the lines all sorted and hooked up and the mast secured. Then when we tried to raise the mainsail we were carefully feeding it into the slot in the mast and I was pulling on the halyard and all of a sudden it broke when it was about a foot from the top. It has a rope line that is connected to a steel line with an eyelet. That goes up thru the pulleys on the mast top and then down to a splice and then maybe a foot long section of the same steel line that runs into the little twist clip that goes atop the sail to secure it. Well today the line broke right atop that splice piece. What can I do to repair it? I think I can take the end that is split and cut it clean and then take the short piece and cutoff the splice and then splice the two together with one of those aluminum crimp down fittings I have here in the shop. Other than that just going to a strictly rope halyard is all I got here. Any ideas?

I am trying to get the boat all fixed up right here and this operation of raising the mainsail is a real bear, is there a trick to it? Should I wax the slot or the rope side of the sail to make it easier to raise it up? IS there some specific thing to use for this purpose? Sorry for all the newbie questions but gotta start somewhere right... Also is there a Nacra specific forum somewhere? I cannot seem to find one... peace

Pete

re: Stepping the mast

Grunt, lift, push. (maybe in a different order) Have someone walk it up a touch in the back so you don't have to lift with your back, then have them go around front and connect the forestay to the bridles. It gets easier over time.

I get my crew to stand on the Main beam with a foot each side of the mast step holding on to a trap handle in each hand, as you walk the mast up they just lean back like a water skier, you'll be amazed how much easier and safer it is. Once the mast is up they then attatch the forestay while you hold the mast. You need strong non stretch line for the halyard, dyneema is fantastic but expensive, you may have a rough surface in the mast slot if so you can bend a kitchen scouring pad in half with a bit of detergent and go up and down the inside of your mast slot. I spray Lanox on my bolt rope. The other thing making it hard for you may be the amount of prebend on your mast. Have you tried leaving your forestay a bit loose, pulling your main sail up then tightening your forestay? Do you keep your mast slot facing downwind the whole time your pulling your sail up? Pulling the halyard can make the mast rotate which jams your boltrope. I have a loop in the end of the halyard and get my crew to put it on their trapeze hook then walk backwards straight downwind leaving me to feed the sail in. Enjoy your sailing

Okay guys...
Last night I took down the mast from the trailer and set it on some saw horses. I took some lacquer thinner to the paint splotches and stickers and made it all nice and smooth and clean looking. Then I took some green pad and smoothed the slot for the sail and also took some cooking wax and kinda shaped it to fit inside the slot and ran it back and forth waxing the slot a whole bunch in an effort to get it a little easier to raise the mainsail. I also repaired the broken halyard cable. I cutoff the offending bit and re-inserted the clean end into the sail clip and then crimped on a cable crimp. I also re-ran the halyard cable thru the pulleys at the top and made it off to the cleat on the base of the mast and then tied the remainder of it in loops and tied that to a little ring on the front of the mast.

My mast has apparently the old style bar under the boom to keep the mast and boom inline. It has a short length of line and a pulley on it that I have no idea what it is used for. From what I understand this is supposed to be used to tie into some line on the boom to keep things straight... There are also two little tension cleats and some pulleys built into the forward crosstie that holds the hulls together. I am unsure what these are for? I know what the mast rigging looks like, I know now how to properly raise the jib sheet with the zipper on the forestay and then where to tie off it's halyard( I think) but the keeping the mast inline with the boom is beyond me right now. When we were out on that lake in the storm I noticed the mast was kinda sideways to the boom. I have been watching videos and looking at pictures of these boats on the net and none of them seem to be the same as mine. Mine is appartently an older late seventies model. It is in pretty good shape despite it's age but I need to get this sorted out so I can go out and enjoy it without causing any further damage to the boat.

It sure is a fun boat to sail and I really want to get it rigged right and I appreciate any help you folks can give me. Thanks and peace...


Pete

Next time you rig it up. Take some pictures of your boat and its rigging. The bar at the bottom of the mast is for the rotation control. It may have positive control if connected to the cleats on the main beam. If you have a grommet in the tramp just behind that point the lines may run to the sides allowing adjustment by crew without having to go to the mast. OTOH, it may attach to the bottom of the boom. Same purpose, reduce/control the amount of mast rotation.

Pics would help a lot.

Clayon

that bar under the boom is called the rotator bar. Because your mast is in a tear-drop shape, you gain better sail shape if you rotate the mast according to the wind and wind direction you are sailing in. Typically, for upwind sailing, you want the mast rotated enough that the rotator bar is pointing at the daggerboard. This induces a nice smooth leading edge entry to the back-side of the sail for smoother (and more efficient/powerful airflow). For downwind sailing, you want the mast at 90 degrees so the rotator is pointed down the beam...or possibly a little more than that. Most non-spinnaker boats will use a positive mast rotator in the form of additional lines near the base of the mast to force the mast to rotate to that 90 degrees.

You sir are absolutely correct....pics WOULD help a lot. I will try to take some snapshots of it. My nice Digital Camera took a bath tho in my wifes pocket on our last outing and despite our best drying efforts it appears to be down for the count. I am right now looking into a nice waterproof digital handycam/video camera to take along with us. THe Canon D10 looks promising right now. I can however take some pics of my rig with my cell phone if you can excuse the quality... peace

Pete

Imo, AHPC has one of the better sites for information. Not the same boat but still helpful.

http://www.ahpc.com.au/

http://www.geocities.ws/f16hpclass/ahpc_taipan_49_how_to_rig.html

I raise my mast from the front for a number of reasons. Since you're still trying to put together a system you might consider it.

His mast-step probably can't rotate past 90 degrees so it's likely not possible to step from the front...and your mast is lighter!

Which brings up another point. The original 5.2 had a non-captive mast base. You pretty much had to have someone keep downward pressure on the ball (or tie a keeper line on it) while stepping. Later versions had a base castings that would receive a keeper pin that would temporarily lock the base casting onto the ball. The pin should be removed later so that should some rigging fail (heaven forbid), the mast will fall and simply pop safely off the ball. If it is pinned and the mast comes down, there will be damage to the ball/pin/mast and there's a possibility that someone could get trapped between the mast and the boat...so take the pin out when sailing - it's not needed to keep the mast on the boat (just make sure your rigging is not floppy when setting up the boat).

I think that is correct for my boat. There is a kinda white looking golfball sorta pin and the bottom of the mast has a little deep cup that the ball goes into. I do not see any sort of pin or even a place to put one. For me I think the safest best is gonna be lay the mast across the trampoline kinda sideways and push the cup onto the edge of the ball. Then hookup the port and starboard stanchion lines to like number 2 position from the top. Then I think our best bet is gonna be my tig welding a little pulley onto the vertical part of the trailer that holds the mast when traveling. Then I can take the winch which we use to pull the boat onto the trailer with and run the rope over the pulley which will be like six or seven feet off the ground and well above the trampoline and then hook that hook into the forestay cable end where the pin normally goes. Then I can kinda walk up the back of the boat under the mast until it gets high enough to allow my wife to crank the winch up slowly until the mast starts to get taught against the stanchion cables on both sides. That way the forestay will be right above the bridle at that point and she can unhook the winch cable from the forestay cable and hook it onto the bridle while I hold the mast vertical against the tension of the stanchion lines. We actually lowered the mast this way yesterday altho we did not have the pulley up high like that. I am making that pulley and brackets and I am gonna weld it to the vertical mast support on the trailer before we try to take the boat out this afternoon. Right now I am doing some machine work for my business and some Tig welding for a friends recumbent bike business.

Speaking of welding, has anyone ever made some of the wing seats like on a hobie 18 for a nacra? I had planned to make something like this for my boat at some point from say some aluminum or thin wall stainless steel tube. The configuration of the crossbeams on the boat are hollow tubes essentially and I was thinking I could make something that fit inside those tubes and then a few bends and some crossmembers wrapped in some neoprene rubber wetsuit material type stuff. Anyone tried this on a nacra? It would be nice to have for my wife and kids to be able to kinda fly out there without worrying about getting scared of the trapeze setup.... What say ye?

Also Anyone on here in the US Coast Guard? I spent several years as a puddle pirate...haha peace

Pete

Pete, I use a rig much like you describe, only I use one pair of trapeze lines with turnbuckles on either side of the front beam to stablize the mast horizontally and the other pair of trapeze lines hooked to the trailer winch via a pulley up high on the mast support to raise it. Makes tensioning the rig simple since you can connect the forestay before releasing the winch tension.

A page from the previously referenced assembly manual shows the pin on the mast base on the top picture. Nacra assembly Manual

Your boat probably uses the wire lock system and the wire was originally long enough to reach most of the length of the mast. There would have been a ball crimped on the wire that latched under a fork at the top/front of the mast when the sail was fully hoisted. The wire then got loosely secured near the bottom of the mast and the rope section stowed.

Regarding raising the mast: Once the sidestays are connected and the mast is secured to the ball place the mast on the trailers mast support. If the trailer is placed next to the back beam the support should have the mast many feet in the air already. You could use a 6 or 8 foot ladder to do the same thing. Then the mast lift isn't starting at your feet.

If you do this it will be easier to raise the mast. Tow it backward.

One day the rest of the world will get it.......but I'm not holding my breath. the proper way to tow a cat

I'm convinced that rubs speed off the boat while towing! But, I did try that once and it worked pretty well. The bows hung way off the back of the trailer though. Eventually I got tired of the funny looks and went back to towing it normally.

Peer pressure, Really?

Well guys,
We made another attempt to take the boat out this afternoon. Before I did I took a delrin pulley I machined on my lathe awhile back for another project and fabbed up some steel brackets and tig welded them to the trailer vertical support for the mast when you are trailering the boat. I welded it as high as I could get it without interfering with the mast. When we got to the boat launch today we parked the van on a very slight hill, then I unclamped the mast and positioned it over the little ball on the forward crossbar. Next we tidied up the wiring for the stanchions and the trapeze and whatnot and got ready to raise the mast. Then I took the same hook and line that I use to pull the boat onto the trailer coming from the winch and passed it over that top pulley I made and then put it thru the forestay eyelet. Then I had my wife crank the winch while I steadied the mast as it riased it. It was so freakin' easy to do it is not funny... I am amazed at how well this worked to both raise and lower the mast. Once it was near taught on the stanchions I held it in place while she removed the winch hook from the forestay eyelet and installed it onto the bridle. Raising the sail also went well with my repaired halyard cable for the mainsail and I think that waxing the groove also aided it.

We got out on the lake at around 6pm and there was not much wind at all but we were still able to get around easily and the kids had a blast jumping off the boat and swimming in the middle of the lake. We made it back just before it got dark and as I said lowering the mast was made super easy due to the new pulley and winch setup. We were also able to figure out how to rig the mast straightener setup and it worked great.

We had so much fun out on the boat that I cannot wait for the next day with some nice sunshine and SOME WIND!!

Anyone have thoughts about the wing seats for the Nacra 5.2? I am seriously interested in making some of these things and I am anxious to get the hulls repainted. I have a good friend who does sign work and I think I can get him to make me some cool Nacra decals for the hulls and I am gonna try to get the sails to look a little whiter and then maybe attempt some sort of graphics on it. Any suggestions on how to do that guys... Peace


Pete

5 pages of ideas in the "sail graphics" thread

http://www.catsailor.com/forums/ubb...aint+graphics&Search=true#Post233831

Wow eric,
your nacra is gorgeous!! I love the tiger design, so you painted that on with enamel paints? Did you have someone print it on a plotter and then paint over it or did you do it freehand? That is some beautiful looking cat. What did you paint your hulls with, mine has some repaired damage spots that need a touch more wetsanding and then I can paint it. I was thinking of using some of that topcoat enamel that is like rustoleum but not sure. IS your boat originally in that condition or did you refinish it? Again nice looking cat. I love the cool cat theme. Maybe I will do a cool cat too but use a cartoon cat like sylvester with shades on or something...haha peace

Pete

printed the original pic as a4 on my printer

penciled over a 1cm grid

worked out 13x by height and 15x by width would be the best fit to the sail, penciled light grid ends onto sail

used battens and 1 square at a time transferred the pattern from a4 to sail with b2 pencil

much the same with the hulls, all paint, no stickers

hulls were badly oxidized and sanded down to satin finish with wet'n'dry. that was a few years ago, they are starting to look chalky again, will need to use 1000 or 2000 to buff them back up



marked the corners used battens to make a sliding grid on the

Eric,
That is pretty clever way to do it. I might try something like that on my sail. I think I am gonna repaint my hulls that gleaming white and then apply some custom decals to the hulls to spice things up. Then I will see about the mainsail. I love that tiger theme man... really cool and from the looks of that video it seems you know how to sail that thing. I especially liked when you came about and you can see the Tori gate on the shoreline. Beautiful place you have to sail in and the wind looked pretty stiff too... SWEET VIdeo man...peace

Pete

Oh yeah,
I thought you guys might like to see that I actually have this boat I am talking about. I posted some cell phone pics of it to my photobucket account. Forgive the quality and the chalky look of the hulls. I intend to remedy that really soon. Anyways, here is the link...peace

http://s150.photobucket.com/albums/s83/matospeter/Nacra%20catamaran%20album/

looks very nice Pete, most of us got them cheap as they looked crap. watch that mast rotator post. i'm pretty sure they moved it from below the boom to above as it was spearing people

Yeah man it does kinda look like a hot poker sticking out there... haha

Mine is in I guess decent shape for the year. I hope to be able to really spiff it up with some new paint and nice graphics like yours soon. Still waiting for a nice windy day to take her out on. I watched a cool video on youtube I thought I would share... check it out!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vh93JMcHPmM

I love that " Giddayup!! " haha that is classic... nice boat too..

Pete

this a good 1 too

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dY8l-Gf_Ns

Yeah that is a good one. Almost looks like off the coast of south florida in some of the video. It is truly amazing how fast, cool, simple, and just plain fun as hell these boats really are. When the wind is blowing you are gonna get wet and have a blast. I just wish I had more wind here. The place where we put in is actually known for having some decent consistent winds but nothing very strong unless there is a storm coming. After that last little storm experience we had I think I will stay away from any sort of foul weather.

I think that boat had a cool name too, geromino!! peace

Pete