Thank you, let me take some measurements. You were kind enough so send me a copy of Ed Burnette’s plans back when I was studying all this. Vixen carries a really long bowsprit so I’ve learned to reverse into tight places. The foretriangle is huge as the mast is almost as tall as the Marconi rig. Vixen came with two monster Yankees, one working the other other a tad lighter and larger. Can’t wait to use them, they look really powerful. I’ll keep one of them hanked to the forestay and either up or in the net.
My thought with the bowsprit traveller is to use a Drifter off the bowsprit in lighter airs. Then when going downwind, bring the tack of the drifter back to the staysail and have the two sails together, drifter to windward, staysail to leeward. I can also raise the foot of the mainsail to let air pass through to fill the staysail. I plan to sail the Columbia which is a lot of upwind - downwind stuff. Gotta love a gaff rig, hundreds of years of development.
Matt,
Kikorangi #26 had some rot as well. We had an replacement made by Cape George to the exact original specifications from 1979 which went perfectly (I had the yard do it…above my pay grade). Very happy with it. Hard to know when these critical parts might fail. I had our tiller (beautifully varnished,no sign of problems) splinter in my hand with a following seas in about 25 kts approaching a narrow stone river entrance. It as thoroughly rotted, although there ws no obvious sign of it until it went. After narrowly avoiding disaster with a spare tiller ready on the quarter berth, I figured replacing the bowsprit (with its epoxy filled rotted section) was a good idea.Regards, Geoff
I have had the bowsprit off of Bella, my 1991 BCC28, hull #95. Thankfully I found no rot under the Cranze Iron or on any of the spar. I did strip the entire spar, had it painted and re-installed the cranze iron using liberal bedding. Pictures attached below.