The HOTLINE has made a comeback:
It's in the mail now.
Doug is describing the full set-up from a 17 Sport point of view.
The Sport, being boomless, does not come with a mast rotation control.
The 17SE (racing version) has a boom and the mast roation arm, with the control line to a cleat on the boom.
The self-tacking setup is shown below:
The system is made up of an 8' length of 1/4" elastomer (like solid surgical tubing available at
http://www.apsltd.com), with eyes formed in each end using hog rings (the stuff will not hold a knot). Arrow 3 points to the elastomer.
Put a Harken micro block on the elasomer. (Arrow 2)
Each end of the elastomer is pinned to the bottom hole in each forestay adjuster, so that it stretches across the boat. (Arrow 1)
Take a piece of thin (2 mm or less), low stretch line, tie one end to the vertex of the mast rotator arm, lead it out to the micro block (centered on the elastomer) and back to the other side of the mast and tie it off to the vertex, pulling a lot of stretch in the elastomer in the process.
You can see how much the elastomer is deflected in the photo.
Because of the difference in lever arms of the small line pulling on the vertex, the mast will always stay fully rotated to one side or the other. Mast rotation when jibing is not a problem - upwind, you usually have to give the boom a shove to get it to rotate to the other side in medium to light air.