Look! No twist!

Ok, so Cia and the kids had to stay home since Cia was to leave for Rotterdam. But Ricard and I anchoring out for the night and everything went great. We even managed to borrow some charts for the area about half way there from Ricards mother and Göran who surprised us with their motor boat.

We were quite proud tacking up into the small cove, where we decided to anchor for the night. The junk rig is sweet that way, you just reef down a couple of panels and everything just goes slower. Too bad we had to start the engine to reset the anchor.

Cooked some lamb for a great dinner. Next morning we wished for bow rollers, while hauling the 45 lb CQR and 11 mm chain up by hand.

We managed to take away most of the twist in the sail by re-reaving the sheet:

Especially it is better when reefed than before. I have some more ideas about how to improve the sheet. Pic by Göran.

Next day I was a bit tired, since I just had to go look every hour if the anchor was holding. We sailed up to Göran and Eva’s place and were treated with fresh crayfish for lunch:

This is how we moor in Sweden in calm weather. No tide here in the Baltic.

One more photo of the boat by Göran:

Weekend sailing?

We are planning to go out this weekend and maybe “camp out” in the boat. It is going to be cold, though, since autumn came this week. Today it blew 22 m/s at the outer weather stations. A bit too much. Let’s see what happens.

Day sailing

Now we are trying to enjoy sailing Linnea as much as possible before taking her up for some more interior construction during winter. It is important to get some energy from having fun with the boat and to learn how she behaves.

Yesterday we went out five adults, Ida, 6 and Joel, 2. Everything went smooth, even though the wind is a bit gusty here in the inner skerries of Stockholm.

The boat worked great with this many people aboard thanks to the large deck space. We anchored out in Napoleonviken for lunch and a swim – the high bow was made to dive from, but Per had to do it from the yard… Ricards mother, Eva and Göran came to take some pictures and video while we headed back.

Lessons learned: None. We were just sailing.

Reaching.

Running.

Anchored.

Ida learns how to climb up the yard.

Ida and Cia. Here is a perfect place for children to sit and have a look out.

Today my parents took the boat by themselves and made about the same trip. I was a bit nervous until they were back at the jetty. Stupid me, they taught me how to do this.

Linnea sailing on video

Most wrinkles gone

So today we moved the sheet, stretched the sail more along the battens, added some bamboo to the boom (lowest batten) and went sailing (third time out now).

It was much better. We tried with downhauls with no reef and with one reef. And it was better. I am not sure about the best place to put it though.

I also think we need a better way to reeve the sheet. We have too much twist while reefed down. We need to have more pull higher up and less lower down.

Here is a picture of the halyard at the yard. You can also see the yard hauling parrell, or Råsling, as we call it in Swedish:

7.5 knots with wrinkels

Today the wind was gusty 5-10 m/s (10-20 knots). We were reaching at 7.5 knots. Nice. Found some bugs in the sail though.

- Wrinkles, we need tighter lashing at the ends of the bamboo battens, so the sail is streched. (And it still hurts when I tie my shoes after lashing the battens the first time…)

- We really need a downhaul (as in the plans).

- We need to move the sheeting aft and up (as in the plans).

- We need stiffer battens. We will temporary lash more bamboo to the lowest batten.

Now we had too much twist when reefed. We re-reaved the sheet afterwards. Maybe it will help some.

No need to use the tiller when on the wind. Just steer with the sheet and running luff parrel. It is possible to hoist the sail with the winch when reaching or running. No need to luff. Probably the friction is so little compared to the weight so you won’t notice…

No pictures today. The sail looked too wrinkled.

Sailing!

This is the first trial sail of Linnea.

Ready to sail

Lashing tha last lashes

Ida took this from ashore. She can come next time, I promise.

My parents.

Running.

Sailing

Mast top

Lazy Jacks etc.

As seen from ashore. 

Conclusions:

- We haven’t got the Lazy Jacks sorted out yet.

- We need to stretch the sail more along the battens.

- It is a bit heavy to hoist. But we have some optimizations left to do.

- We might add a downhaul (as in the plans).

- The sheet isn’t reaved the correct way.

- The lowermost batten is too thin.

- We should cut the battens so they don’t extend past the leach, the sheet can get caught.

- And we have some other bugs to sort out…

We tacked through about 110 deg true, not pointing. and made about 5 knots in light wind. Running at 6,5 knots. Quite good if you consider we didn’t actually try to trim the sail. She tacked without any problems and hold a straight course by herself while we let go of the tiller.

Gone sailing!

We finally made it! Today we went sailing and everything went great. No disasters, no panic, no unhappy faces. Just like I remembered a junk rig sails. Happy people waving from the shore. I’ll come back and post pictures and details later.