Our rig is a "big genoa / small mainsail" - unlike most modern catamarans. It's a good downwind rig because you can leave the mainsail down and just sail with the genoa and still get decent performance. But it also means that the big genoa is the sail likely to cause problems in a squall. It's the sail I want to depower fast if required. The capsize of an Atlantic 57 catamaran in a squall last year made us think about this topic a bit.
So one recent safety addition to the boat is a big cam cleat at each genoa winch. Instead of leaving the genoa sheet in the jaws of the self tailer, you can put the sheet into the cam cleat instead. You can flick the sheet out of the cam cleat much faster than unwinding it from a self tailing winch. Those extra few seconds gained might make the difference someday.
1 comment:
Indeed they might !~! A few seconds can save a broach sometimes, too.
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