Thread: Lug Rig Heaven Part 2010.1

Hi David, yes that's the thing. The kicker looks very close to the downhaul in the drawing but I think it says 2'? Iv'e not rigged a PDR so not sure how things fit.

Also, I pull on a lot of downhaul and pull from the cockpit when sailing or from the side of the boat when rigging launched by the beach. So pulling upwards up the mast to a cleat might be awkward. Any chance of a cleat on the foredeck, that would also help keeping the mast in the hull during a capsize.

Brian

I can second the notion of the cleat for the down haul on the side of the mast is awkward.... I will be moving mine the the rear of the mast...

Hi Brian,

Thank you for the advice, in the diagram the distance from the kicker to the mast along the boom is 2" ( 2 inches ), as you suggested, which leaves less than 2 inches along the boom from the mast for the downhaul to be attached as well ( this might work better if it is beside the mast ).

I could put both cleats on the foredeck between the cockpit coaming and the rear of the mast ( about 9 inches of space there ), above the mast partner frames ( about 1.75 inches apart ), with both saddles ( possibly beside each other ) just aft of the mast but also just forward of the cleats, this will keep the 2 lines from interfering with each other.

The halyard cleat will be on the front of the mast below the boom height which will keep it out of the way of everything else, but still easy to reach from the cockpit.

Do you know this picture? There is a Matt Layden's "Little Cruiser" (owned by Dave and Mindy Bolduc and famous for many trips from Florida to the Bahamas) with fully batened balanced lugsail (similar to junk sail but it's a "normal" lugsail) - note dawnhaul and kicking strap.



Another pictures:

Originally Posted by dhgomm

Hi Brian,

in the diagram the distance from the kicker to the mast along the boom is 2" ( 2 inches ), as you suggested

Nah, I just checked it says 2 feet, lets agree about 18 inches, or what looks right to give some purchase.

Brian

Hi Brian,

Thanks for the correction, from your post immediately before that one ...
"In fact, from my experience it would pull too hard down the leech. Having the second boom fixing just 6" back from the first downhaul position caused me loads of issues with the leech too tight and stalling the exhausting wind. Boat went much better when I just cut it off."
, I just assumed the 2 feet was an error, but then the other post was about having multiple downhaul attachments to the boom, not an actual kicker.

Is everything else right ?, and 2 feet will work just as well as 18 inches ( maybe better ) for the kicker boom attachment point on a PDRacer, this will make it less crowded at least.

Hmmm. whats with these old measurement systems...

Whats 2 feet in MM? eheheh.....

Cheers!

Hi Nick,

Most people over about 35 in Australia would have learnt the imperial system first, before things went metric, you can still get things such as nuts, bolts, and drill bits in fractions of an inch sizes in Australia, and many other countries.

To convert, 2.54mm = 1 inch ( exact conversion ), and 12 inches = 1 foot, so 2.54mm x 12 will give you how many mm in a foot, then just multiply by 2, which gives 60.96mm = 2 feet exactly.

There is a useful, free computer program called 'Convert' available at http://joshmadison.com/software/convert-for-windows/which is a universal imperial to metric converter, it can convert to and from metric for every conceivable type of measurement so easily you will wonder how you ever did without it !!!.

Originally Posted by dhgomm

Having the second boom fixing just 6" back from the first downhaul position caused me loads of issues with the leech too tight
Is everything else right ?,

Sorry about this confusion in the quote about the 6" second boom fixing. What I was trying to say was that because my carbon boom is so thin walled I was worried about breaking it when pulling hard with my downhaul. So I made a double saddle using two loops about 6" apart, which then were brought together below the boom and a block added. So this downhaul block was supported by two strops rather than just one. It seemed a good idead at the time. I sailed for two seasons with too much leach tension and assumed it was the wrong stiffness of my yard or something. Could not quite work it out.

Then one day my son was sailing behing me in his dinghy and he said the leach did look too tight, so I cut off the two strops, and put a new downhaul loop at the front of the boom where the thin tube is supported by a solid boom end fitting.

I do not like fitting the downhaul there, it's not really the proper place, but many of our Scows do it. The reason it can be made to work is that we have the kicker as well. So we can use both the downhaul and kicker to control the front luff of the sail and back edge leach of the sail.

Brian

Originally Posted by dhgomm

To convert, 2.54mm = 1 inch ( exact conversion ), and 12 inches = 1 foot, so 2.54mm x 12 will give you how many mm in a foot, then just multiply by 2, which gives 60.96mm = 2 feet exactly.

The metric system can be tricky for us Americans. I thought 2.54cm = 1 inch or 25.4mm = 1 inch and 609.6mm = 2 feet exactly.

Hi Everyone,

Sorry about the mistake with the decimal points in the previous post, this would be correct only if the mm were cm, as there is 10mm to every 1cm !!! , "To convert, 2.54mm = 1 inch ( exact conversion ), and 12 inches = 1 foot, so 2.54mm x 12 will give you how many mm in a foot, then just multiply by 2, which gives 60.96mm = 2 feet exactly."

This should have read, To convert, 25.4mm = 1 inch ( exact conversion ), and 12 inches = 1 foot, so 25.4mm x 12 will give you how many mm in a foot, then just multiply by 2, which gives 609.6mm = 2 feet exactly.

Thank you BradLH for being on the ball enough to point this out, as it was very important, I made the mistake of relying on my memory, anyone who actually uses the following program would get the correct answer !!!, "There is a useful, free computer program called 'Convert' available at http://joshmadison.com/software/convert-for-windows/ which is a universal imperial to metric converter, it can convert to and from metric for every conceivable type of measurement so easily you will wonder how you ever did without it !!!. "

Thanks guys, I was just "yanking" your imperial chains... LOL. couldn't resist.

Cheers

Originally Posted by dhgomm

Hi Nick,

Most people over about 35 in Australia would have learnt the imperial system first, before things went metric, you can still get things such as nuts, bolts, and drill bits in fractions of an inch sizes in Australia, and many other countries.

To convert, 2.54mm = 1 inch ( exact conversion ), and 12 inches = 1 foot, so 2.54mm x 12 will give you how many mm in a foot, then just multiply by 2, which gives 60.96mm = 2 feet exactly.

There is a useful, free computer program called 'Convert' available at http://joshmadison.com/software/convert-for-windows/which is a universal imperial to metric converter, it can convert to and from metric for every conceivable type of measurement so easily you will wonder how you ever did without it !!!.

I used this program many, many, many times during my PDR build. Good stuff.

I generally don't recommend using a metric conversion for any of the measurements. Problem is that nothing is exact and when the measurements are stacked up you can end up with quite strange measurements at the other end of the boat.

I have had a couple of problems where builders have not been able to get bulkheads in straight and it threw out the mast rake. The reason - they converted measurements.

I really don't recommend it because there will always be a few people who are not careful enough.

So I recommend getting a metric measure and using it solely to build the boat. In the USA a metric measure can be bought from Duckworks. A couple of builders have even found them in their local big box stores.

Like normal ... this is not a complete prohibition ... just to be aware of the downfalls for less experienced people.

MIK