The Sails
The Mainsail
Maunsail in action with the code zero
Our main is a square topped sail some 74 sq metres or 796 sq feet in size, so it is fairly powerful. It is made from heavy duty dacron cloth which is favoured by the cruising fraternity for its durability and resistance to UV destruction.
Reefing line a little tight on the leech. Ooops.
The sail is raised out of its storage in a “lazy bag” attached to the boom, wrangled into place by lazy jacks in place to guide the sail up or down. We changed all our main halyard to dyneema and in fact all our halyards. Being a cruising an not a performance cat with boards we sail no closer than 45 degrees from the wind direction but in reality 50 degrees is as high as we go because of excessive leeway. Downwind past 160 degrees we are fairly limited by the aft set of the shrouds so we prefer to drop the main and run the parasail or the blue water runner to optimise speed.
For the main we can put in 3 different reefs, each substantially reducing the sail area more. Each I have set up to be single line reefing. This can usually be accomplished by just one person from our helm station.
The Genoa
Not the best image of our genoa but meandering along in just above a drifter.
Our genoa is also made from dacron and is deployed via a Furlex furler which allows for partial deployment when reefing is necessary. Control is fairly coarse so we use tweakers to alter twist and depth. It’s not huge at 49m2 so that’s where the Code Zero comes into its own when a little off the breeze.
For safety reasons we have altered things a bit to ensure all control lines and halyards come back to the helm station except of course for the Parasailor.
The Flying Genoa (Code Zero)
Swan’s colours
Our first new sail for Cooinda is the 97m2 Flying Genoa. It is thus known as it slightly smaller than the Code zero designed by Valeria Sail Design as it accommodates a UV protection strip allowing it to be left “up” with less UV damage between use. It is used just like a Code Zero. This Code Zero can best be thought of as an excellent reaching sail, but is designed for when the wind is coming from 50 degrees to 130 degrees off the nose. It is mounted on the excellent Fountaine Pajot bowsprit and operates off its own bottom up Facnor FX 2500 furler on an anti-torsion rope. It is a sail designed to improve speeds in lighter winds due to its lighter construction and cloth weight with a range from 0-20 kts. It does load up pretty hard and the furler struggles to get it in unless the sail is unloaded and luffing.
The Parasailor
Blue loaner
Our parasailor has had a chequred start. Originally ordered in Montenegro as a 190m2 model under advice from the manufacturer, however on delivery it turned out to be too large for the boat including also the hard snuffer. The snuffer is used to douse the sail when bringing it down and as the sail needs to be stored in the sail locker, the snuffer needs to fit there. Unfortunately ours did not. The manufacturer, Istec, came to the party and provided us with a 170 m2 loaner in blue whilst the new orange one was constructed and delivered.
It takes a bit of getting used to but once up it is surprisingly easy and flexible in its use. It looks great up and is exhilarating in a decent breeze and easy to use albeit a handful to get down if the wind gets up above 15kts true. Whilst a downwind sail primarily it can be used around from 180 degrees to 70 degrees. Think of it like a parachute with a slot that helps to keep shape and alleviate gusts.
From Istec website
The mighty Blue Water Runner
Our favourite, the Blue Water Runner
Designed and constructed by Elvestrom sails, the Blue Water runner is a versatile sail primarily used as a downwind sail from 135 to 180 degrees. It is used without the mainsail to maximise exposure to available breeze. The BWR is easily handled from the cockpit as it furls just as the Flying Genoa using the same furler. and can be partially furled to reduce sail area when the breeze gets up too making the boat more manageable. It can also be deployed doubled up on one side as a screacher. It’s total area is 121m2, so as a screacher deployed to leeward is 60m2, 11 more than the genoa. We went for the 3oz version so it is heavier but hopefully more durable than the lighter versions available. It can apparently be used downwind up to 28 kts TWS which is probably a bit sporting for us.
