Hi Folks,
Bought a used Wave and it's great. It even came with a jib kit and that's kind of fun--except that the jib rigging seems, shall we say, odd.
What's apparently been done (and I don't know if by the prior owner or someone else--and that doesn't much matter, I guess) is that there's a short pigtail cable with swedged loops in each end that attaches to the mast tang along with the shrouds--so far so good. There's also a crossbar across the front of the hulls (which seems like it could be typical since the class rules say you can leave the crossbar in place).
What appears to have been the original forestay has been permanently attached to the end of this pigtail cable (the lower swedged loop goes through the loop at the top of the forestay wire). And the forestay wire itself runs through the luff of the jib and ends in the forestay adjuster (hence my suspicion of it's origin. There's nothing remotely like a jib halyard other than a bunch of string that's been wrapped through the wire loop and the grommets at the tack and head of the jib to keep it moderately tight along the luff edge. The string has been handsomely secured by many turns of electrical tape. There's no adjustment of the luff tension at all.
The bridle and forestay have been replaced by a pair of forestays that are attached to the lower end of this pigtail cable (bad term, but don't know what else to call it) by a quick-link (as in what's used for hooking chains together--sort of a low-budget carabiner). These forestays' lower ends are eye-bolts that go through the crossbar near its ends and are fastened on with a pair of nuts under the crossbar.
Since the forestays connect to the standing rigging below the head of the jib, they can get in the way of the jib and certainly don't look like they'll contribute to long life for the fabric near the head of the jib.
This set-up is awkward and seems really odd. In general, there's almost no tension on the forestay wire that runs through the luff of the jib unless you leave the eye-bolts quite loose. (And when you do that, the leeward shroud has what seems like an rather surprising amount of slack....) And surely there's got to be a better way of attaching the port and starboard forestays than laboriously spinning nuts onto an eyebolt....
Moreover, the tack of the jib appears to me to be too high--it seems like the jib needs to ride lower. (It's got this 9-hole adjuster plus the string mess below it's tack, so the tack's at least a hand-span or so above the crossbar). The result of this is that the jib sheets end up putting tension on the clew of the jib at what seems like a really awkward angle (the jib sheet cleats are located at the middle trampoline cable brackets and the sheets end up at this very open angle with the clew grommet and it seems like it's very hard to trim the jib with any kind of finesse because the anles too open). My impression is that if the jib itself rode somewhat lower on the foreward rigging, that the sheets would have a shallower angle (at least when the jib is sheeted in tightly on a beating tack) and you'd have a better range of sheet ajustment.
At any rate, if any of you Waver's who fly a jib when not participating in class-sanctioned events would be so good as to give me a careful description (or, even better, post a diagram) of your set-up, I'd be most grateful.
Also, just for my info, does flying a jib make the Wave more suseptible to burying the lee hull and capsizing? It seems like it'd almost have to given that the force on the jib is out there in front of the main. Am I just making this up? (But hey, I was impressed at how easy it was to right [and so was my eight-year-old daughter who fortunately was wearing a wet suit]. My ol' 14 tends to bury its masthead in the mud of the shallow lake I sail in most often after a capsize [very hard to right without help when that happens]. The Wave's Bob is most welcome!)
Thanks much!
John (who's wishing he were on the water now)
