BYYB Forums

Hi All,

I tried doing a seach for these things, but was unable to find anything much...but I am still new at this, so please forgive me if I am repeating a question already asked...

I have built a triad, with the lateen rig as per the plans. Firstly I must say that I love the lateen sail, my only previous sailing has been with a balanced lug rig on an 8' pram dinghy I built at the end of last year to learn to sail in (prior to this all my experience has been with motor boats and canoes)... While I like the balanced lug, the lateen manages to have even less lines, which I like! I am all for simplicity where boats are concerned. My opinion is that the less moving parts it has, the less places something can go wrong...

My reason for posting here, is that I have noticed that the triad is very slow coming about, presumably because of the keel, and a few weeks ago I found the sail wanting to capsize me faster than the boat would come about (I let go of the mainsheet, and stayed upright, with only a sail pointing in the wrong direction, but that was after I dipped a gunnel in the water). Got me thinking about reef points for the lateen sail. Has anyone out there put reef points on a lateen sail before, and if so, how? Do you think it was worth it (ie, is it a difficult job to reef in comparison to other sail types)? Or do you think I should consider a different type of sail that is easier to reef? Or should I just wait for a calmer day to sail? 

The second part of my question is that, after being caught out in some reasonable chop on another occasion, I am wondering about modifying the bottom of my triad into a V. The particular day I experienced problems, was probably a day I shouldn't have been out sailing, but the wind picked up in the hour or so that I was out, until the lake was starting to form little white caps...I dropped the sail and rowed home. The chop was quite significant that afternoon, and the boat took quite the battering. It got me thinking that a v bottom would certainly help with pounding in a chop. Again, has anyone done this before? I was thinking about using the existing chine and keel, and simply planking over it. It looks like it should give enough deadrise, my only hesitation is that as the keel deepens forward, I would effectively lose some rocker. So I guess my question would be whether I should cut down the keel forward to maintain rocker, or forget the rocker, and go for the deeper V forward? Anyway, at the moment it's all hypothetical (at least for the next month or so), as I have uni exams coming up in a few weeks...and have just started on a new boat building project...I have been bitten hard by the boat building bug...perhaps a warning should come with all boat plans: Caution, boat building may consume your life! But having experienced the joy of building, and using my own boats, I wouldn't have it any other way!

Thanks for any help that can be offered,
Steve.

Paul if you read this how about one of your designs, similar in size, a rounded our hour glass hull that could be strip built, center board rather then dagger with salty looks not the new streamline of today?  Since Stephen and I are two of the few who built Triads he might like what you design as much as I.  You could answer his questions to so I don't end up hijacking the thread of his post to.