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Has any one experimented with a Lee board of the side of they're weekender?

I see you've been on the chat board with some adventures and started a previous thread about this leeboard question.

Your strong wind adventures where mostly from lack of sailing experience. You have to reef, once the boat begins to get over powered. There's no skippering skill to overcome this requirement, the boat is over pressed and you have only two choices; reef or fight a potential capsize. Most elect to reef, so this is the first thing you should practice (in modest wind strengths of course), so when you need to reef next time, you'll know how and have rigged up a reefing system you're comfortable with (there are several ways to reef).

My previous post on your other leeboard thread should cover what you're asking, though to directly answer your question, I don't know of anyone that's tried a leeboard on a Weekender. Even if you had one installed, your big wind adventure on Kalamalka Lake (my assumption), wouldn't have turned out any differently. Simply put, you made several mistakes, which caused you to have an ill handling boat. Sailboats are dependent on their balance, to remain "on their feet", so if you alter this balance with crew and/or sail hoist decisions, the boat will not act like you'd prefer. Flying just a jib in high wind strengths, places the CE way to forward in the hull, likely placing the helm "alee" which is the worst thing you'd want in these conditions. The jib alone can't act as a storm sail, it's just to far forward and must work in concert with a reefed mainsail or a trisail, in order to maintain balance. In fact, in heavy winds and if you only have one reef point on the main and none on the jib, the second boat reef is to douse the jib and carry on under reefed main alone. If you have a reef point on the jib, the second reef for the boat would be both the main and the jib.

Wow that is excellent advise. I am going to take some sailing lessons this spring and hopefully with a little more knowledge and practice I can regain my confidence. Thanks for advice 

Hi Paul this year has been a wild success. Been really light winds perfect for learning with. Today I took a few friends out.we had a pretty good wind but heavy chop.I reefed the main at the dock we sailed under a reefed main and jib. It was a lot more wind then I was used to and the jib sheet needed a lot of attention witch proved to be a work out. I decided to sail under reefed main alone. At a beams reach it was perfect. A nice flat boat clipping along at a respectable pace. i tried to approach the wind at a close reach and it just stalled out.the sail was full but we were barely moving and it felt like if I sheeted it in the boat would just heel over more. I then tried to tack. It just wouldn't happen. Tried about 5 times before I got it. The weather picked up even more and the boat once again found its groove  at a beams reach witch shot us straight home. I only had to reef the main once before (except for that nightmare story of last summer) .the last time I reefed it we ran home at broad reach and never tried to sail up wind. Does it lose that much performance by reefing or could there be other factors at play(current, chop, ???).

Thanks man,

Lyle franklin

One of the things I like to do is let go of the tiller when I am sailing into the wind to see if the boat will round up.  It seems to me that if I am too close, the boat will be reluctant to round up.  I have read somewhere that all sailboats have a tougher time going to windward the harder the wind blows until they can make no headway towards the wind at all.  When I tried sailing under main alone I found that my weekender would sail reasonable well toward the wind though not as close as with the jib. These days with both my sloops I find myself setting the jib to where it is pulling as well as I can get it and then setting the main to follow that.  The last time I took out the CP 16 I noticed that if I got too close to the wind my jib would shake a little and lose power.  My main would still be pulling, but I was going slower without the jib pulling its best.  Next you should try sailing under jib alone.  It is a real eye opener. 

If you are out in wind that is strong enough to make you want to reduce sail more than putting a reef in the main and end up dropping the jib, you are out in too strong a wind.  Been there.  It is good to push yourself and the boat, but do it under control.  Oh, and check your rigging after.  I have opened up even the 5/16 eyebolts from the pressure I put the boat under.  Weekender is fun to pound around in, (I have had breaking waves wash the deck clean) but laying one on its side or worse isn't.  It isn't the end of the world, because they will stand right up again, but the bailing is a real chore.

If you haven't yet I would recommend that you rig a downhaul for the jib.  I did it by simply adding a block to the tack attachment and running a line through that, then up the jib.  Run the line back to the cockpit and there you have it.

I am certainly not an expert or anything, but I have done some of these things without disaster, so if you make a plan and try things out you should learn a lot like I am doing.

Al

 

After the very first experiences, I generally avoid to start to sail with chop and hi wind (>15÷20 knots), because I'm used to sail for 2-3 hours max and most of the times weather conditions are predictable or obvious. Nevertheless I reef frequently (one very 3÷4 times)
for pleasure and if I wait to much to come back I have to do it in hi chops in worst conditions (from back).
My advice is to build/install a furling system on the jib in order to trim its its power and to reef the main as soon as you have the feeling that wind can grow.
Tacking can sometime be quite difficult if wave hit you in the wrong side when you reach the  dead point. In this case only your boat inertia can help you.
Here follow some points to consider when tacking:

1. Club foot: I have it and for my solo sailing is worthy, but I have cleare in my mind that it doesn't help tacks.
2. Sail profile: when I threw away the tarp sail done following the Weekender guide and made a new one according PolyTarp Sails instructions, tacking  turned immediately easy. I can imagine that with real sails things are even better.
3. Rails/chines: From my windsurf experience it was instinctive in my mind  that to turn up-wind I had to push on the chine windward. This is absolutely false on Weekender!  In low wind sit on the leeward board and you'll carve a perfect curve till the sail tacks. In hi wind you don't need to do it because the boat is naturally heeled, but keeping in your mind that this phenomena helps you tack.
4. Command inversion:  When you reach the dead point and stay there for a while, sometime you don't realize that you are moving backward. The rudder in this case turns the boat against the tacking rotation and the tack fails. Invert the rudder and magically you reach the new side!
5. Why insist on a hard tack instead on jibe?

Gianluigi

Thank you both for the advice. I do have real sails made by duckworks. Valid point with the club footed jib. I kinda need some one up there to over sheet it the wrong way. Also a sailing buddy of mine tells me that it's pretty typical of a sloop to lose reaching performance when the jib isn't up and it just gets worse when the main is reefed.I would like a furling system, but not on this boat. I'm gunna try slightly milder winds with all reefs out and just be prepared to capsize. Living in Vernon the wind is either like nothing or its blowing pretty hard. I'm just gunna have to learn how to get used to em

A Weekender under main alone has it's CE too far aft to be very effective up wind. She'll just keep trying to bare away, preventing you from doing very well. Simply put, you need the jib and it doesn't matter what type it is, assuming is not a big overlap. The two sails work as an assembly, not independently. With more experience you'll figure out heavy air, but it's best to work on modest airs, as you learn what you boat likes and doesn't like. As winds increase in strength, a gaffer loses some windward ability, because of it's inherent windage. Reefing will help, but only to keep the boat manageable (more upright), your windward ability will still not be as good as it is in moderate wind strengths.