From: jfh@cs.brown.edu (John F. Hughes)
Subject: Re: Tuff Luff and other headstay foils
Organization: Brown University Department of Computer Science
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 11:59:48 GMT

In article <1992Nov10.014200.22963@klaava.Helsinki.FI> tarkkone@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Lauri Tarkkonen) writes:
>In <1992Nov9.125516.8324@das.harvard.edu> bloxham@geophysics.harvard.edu (Jeremy Bloxham) writes:

[Laurie asserts more races are lost than won by headfoils[
[Jeremy disagrees]

>How much improvement do you think that the headfoil will give you?
>
>>Problems with modern headfoils are very rare: indeed, Tuff Luffs are
>>almost impossible to deform or dent by hitting them with the spinnaker
>>pole. 
>
>But when it happens, you loose very much indeed. 

If you read carefully, Jeremy said he doubted that more races were lost 
than were won. If you get in real trouble from your headfoil once in a 
hundred races, it's not hurting you much---you lose only *that* race.
On the other hand, it's giving you that little edge for *all* the other 
races.

>>The one problem which does occasionally arise is if the sail is
>>not fed smoothly into the groove a fold of sailcloth can get fed into
>>the groove along with the tape, but this is easily avoided. 
>
>Everything is easy untill you mess it upp. As I told I have seen this
>happening very often.
>
>>Twin grooved headstays are essential for efficient genoa peels and are 
>>probably one of the most significant developments in sail handling gear 
>>for racing boats in the last few decades.
>     ^^^^^^
>For the racing man, who is in the desperate need for the last half of
>percent of boatspeed. 

And Jeremy was talking about racing, right? I confess, on this one,
I think Jeremy is completely right. And I think that if the foils
lost more races than they won, racers would have pitched them
after a few years. It's true that racers get on binges where boat X
goes fast, so everyone imitates everything about boat X, including her
color (remember the sudden spate of black masts???), but it doesn't last
too long---soon there are lots of *losing* boats that look like boat X,
and people see that perphaps there was something *else* (like crew competence)
that made boat X win. But people *do*, in general, have a pretty good sense
of their place in the fleet, and are very sensitive to changes in it. If
the headfoil boats are all advancing in the fleet, while the hanked-on-jib
boats are by and large retreating, then folks move towards headfoils. 
Nowhere has this kind of trend and its overthrow been more evident than in
the case of the "winged keel," which is utterly loony on any boat that
doesn't have a depth limitation (see Dave Gerr's "The Nature of Boats" for an
interesting article on this). Lots of wings sprang up just after the
America's Cup boat introduced them, and they are now almost uniformly 
acknowledged to be slower, boat for boat, than the conventional-keel
models.

>
>>A great compromise for the cruiser/racer is the Harken roller furling
>>system with the split drum. When crusing one can use the roller
>>furling but the drum is easily removed (without detaching the headstay)
>>for racing leaving a twin groved headstay.  
>
>I must confess, I do not regard foresail furling to be a very usefull
>thing. If you use it for reefing, you get a bad shape of the sail anyway,
>and if you believe that the same sail suits all weathers you do not pay
>much attention to the set of your sail.
>
>In my boat I have a 95% self tacking jib (22.5 sq.m), with full lenght 
>battens, that I use in an ordinary summer about 80 percent of the time. 

How interesting. I have a 90% jib that I use about 70% of the time. It's
on a roller. Yours is on hanks.  

>If the wind will gets to the heavy side and I am on the wind I use a
>smaller selftacker (about 14 sq.m) that is made of really heavy cloth,
>and has full lenght battens.  This I carry upp to  35 knots apparent.

I use my 90% in those conditions, but if the wind lightens up a bit, I switch
to the 120%; for really light winds, I go to the 160%. And in very light
conditions, the reacher-drifter. 

>Beyond that I hope to be in some nice shelter, but if not I have a
>storm jib (around 7 sq.m), not selftacking, with ordinary battens, and
>the material still heavier. To the light side, I have a 120 per cent
>genoa, made of mylar with full lenght battens, this is good sail for
>the open wind, close reach if the apparent wind is less than say 15 knots.
>When the apparent wind drops to less than 6 to 8 nots it is time to
>take the light reacher, made of heavy spinnakker cloth, triradial, 
>and a wire luff, so that it can be set flying, it has some hanks,
>they make the life more easy while taking it down, this sail is without
>battens. It is about 175% and the clew is cut so high that it is sheeted
>whit the spinnaker sheets. This can be used for short runns whit the
>very long whisker pole, but if there is more time, the spinnaker will
>come upp. 

And you know what? I change my headsails when the weather changes. I drop the
old one on the foredeck, secure it to the lifelines, and hoist the new one. 
I do this singlehanded most of the time, same as you. It's a bit of a pain
keeping it on deck without the hanks, true. I keep sail ties secured to the
stanchion bases, ready to secure the sail as it comes down. I seems
to work fine for me. I would have preferred the hanked-on version, but 
my boat came with the roller, and I figured I'd give it a try before 
investing lots of money converting the sails *back* to being hanked on. 
You know something? It's worked pretty well. A *lot* of the time, being able
to roll out the jib is awfully nice. And when I get in harbor, and want just
the tiniest bit of power to manuever with, or to pull the bow off the wind,
rolling out just a little bit of jib works like a charm...

>
>If one makes a roller reefing headsail, it must be very heavy to withstand
>the stress of heavy winds, then it cannot be good in light winds. So far
>I have seen very few sails that have acceptable shape when rolled. My sails
>are most of the time acceptable (at least to me).

I agree. Roller reefing headsails are still a developing technology. But
roller furling seems to work pretty decently.

>The business of sail change is very different in a racing and cruising
>boat. When cruising, sometimes singlehanded, I feel taht it is a very
>good thing to have the sail on the forestay with the hanks. 

And I used to think this too, until I tried it the other way, and found it
to be not so very different.

>The things like the foil, that are said to be so great, are affecting
>the racing in two ways. Such things make the racing more expensive,

A new headfoil/furler for my boat costs about $1500. About the same cost
as a new main. About 1/5 of what I spend per year on my boat. Assuming
that a headfoil system lasts 10 years (mine was installed by the previous
owner sometimes in the mid-70s!), that makes it about 1/50 of my per-year
costs. And I'm not racing Sarah. I'd like to point out that in a typical
boat racing from our local yacht club, the cost of beer/soft drinks
for the crew exceeds this number.

But if, as you say, racing is too expensive, I think you should look at the
cost of sails rather than the cost of headfoils....


>>I used this system on my boat for two seasons before switching to a 
>>Tuff Luff (to save a few pounds aloft).
>
>You cannot serve two masters.

He *seems* to be doing just fine at it so far; or are you telling him that
he doesn't enjoy his racing? Or that he cannot switch back to his Harken
system (which he has stored in a loft) before his next trip off to Maine? 
>
>I am afraid that it is impossible to me to bring my point so that you
>would want to understand that the foil is gadget of marginal use but
>anyway more than marginal cost. And the people who have lost their
>races because of malfunction of the luff foils, have done it, believe
>you or not.

I claim that the useful gadgets appear and remain, and the useless ones appear
and fade. The continued use of headfoils is proof enough of their utility 
in a racing boat. For the cruising boat, the jury may still be out. I'm
pretty convinced that in the end, it's going to be the way of the world, just
like the "easily kinked" aluminum mast, and a million other things....

-John