moyra wrote:
and...we had a hell of a time getting the top battons (the light ones) to pop last race in light air with zero tension. i thought we were going to be DSQed for pumping ourselved back across the startline, any suggestions or does that just suck for us to have brand new super stiff sails?
The following seems to work for us in the light stuff:
Crank on the downhaul (Cunningham) hard. This makes it easier to pop the battens over. Plus the boat goes faster in the super light stuff with a fair amount of down haul. This opens up the top of the sail and prevents it hooking to weather (which is dog slow). This then lets you put on a little more main sheet. This keeps the sails flat and lets the air flow reattach quickly when going through chop
As soon as the pressure builds back up to single trap conditions you can let the down haul off to power up - there will then be enough pressure on the top of the main to stop it hooking.
Chris.