Gerr Downhaul -- CD25

[jbenagh]

I installed a Gerr Downhaul on my CD 25 over the winter. I'm pretty disappointed in its performance though. It is not able to bring the new jib into the "nice tight bundle" that is advertised.

I used a single ring on the forestay. The directions I gound recommended three rings on the forestay, but that would require welding them all intertwined.

With a single ring, the high friction point appears to be the genoa clew. It might be the ring on the forestay though...

I have thought that three 1/4 in blocks could fix the problem (two at the forestay ring, one at the genoa clew) but I am hoping that someone here can point out the flaw in my reasoning.

Jeff

[tartansailor]

Jeff,
I( do not know about rings, however a most effective down haul
is a line fastened at the head of the sail, then running inside the hanks to a block at the bow casting. From there it leads through several bulls eyes on stanchions to a cleat well aft.
The down haul line remains with the sail, and each sail has it's own down haul line.
That works.

Dick

[dsholler]

I have one rigged as described, but I shackle it to the head of the jib.. so I leave the downhaul rigged when I switch sails. That way, you only need one downhaul, and you just have to make sure you do not tangle it when you hank on the jib, but you woudl have to do that anyway..

[jbenagh]

The shackle to the jib is a good idea. I bet that also reduces the friction a lot versus my through-the-grommet approach. I will try that before I add the blocks.

Dick, last year I used the downhaul you described . It worked ok but the sail goes in the water and you still need to go forward to tie off the sail. The Gerr version should, in theory, bundle the sail up on the deck.

Jeff

[dsholler]

The sail goes in the water? I rarely have that problem. It is true that you are left with a big pile of sail on the deck, but tighten up a sheet and tie off the downhaul and it usually stays out of the way long enough for me to get into my slip, or wherever I am going.

There are lots of good instructions on how to rig the Gerr downhaul (This one seemed pretty clear http://bbs.trailersailor.com/forums/tsa ... ead/340793)

It may be that the problems you are having are related to your only using 1 ring.. instead of the conventional 3..

[jbenagh]

The simple downhaul put the sail in the water. The Gerr just didn't bring the sail all the way down, more like halfway. It's about 2/3 of the area but still a lot of sail flopping around.

I used the same instructions you provided. I used only one ring because I couldn't figure out how to get three interlocked ones -- what did you use?

Thanks for the tips!

Jeff

[dsholler]

I haven't done it yet! was planning to rig it up on my typhoon next week. I had planned to use a ring and two carabiners. Having only one ring sounds like it would bind up the downhaul against the forestay. You might even be able to just do it with the carabiners, have them interlock around the forestay. The question is whether the opposing tension on the downhaul will cause them to bind on the stay (one part of the downhaul is pulling up on the ring/carabiner, and the other pulling down.. )

Given that my jibs are both small and ancient, I will give this a try, but if I cannot get it to work, I probably will just go back to the straight downhaul through the hanks that is shackled to the head.

[Sea Owl]

Jeff;

Thanks for pointing this system out - I will be giving it a try myself.

As I look at it, with the drawings at the site referenced, it appears that you have two options corresponding to the two 'steps' of furling with the system.

Step1 (Option 1) - Keep Jib halyard tight, pull in downhaul line, bringing clew of jib to forestay. This would have the effect of pretty much 'defalting' the jib. I suspect there would be opportunity for sail 'flapping' at this point, but sail is definitely depowered/ineffective. Good for quicky/temp dousing while you deal with mainsail or other issues if you so desire (I think)

Step 2 - Release jib halyard, continue to pull in downhaul line, bringing whole sail to deck. This will be the 'hard' one I think, as I can easily visualize 'binding' of the downhaul as the sail comes down.

Am contemplating using blocks to replace the two rings not around the forestay to decrease friction as sail compacts in step one. Key here I think is that whether rings or blocks, you have to have one on each side of the sail for it to work smoothly. Not something to be put on in a 'quick fashion necessarily. At present I mainly use one hank sail (although I have more) so not a big issue for me.

Last year I used a simple downhaul, and had several problems. First, I couldn't figure out how to run the downhaul 'through' the hanks. I use a 1/8" downhaul, and there still wasn't a place I could find to run the line through on each hank. Exposing my ignorance, but do those who do this run it through the 'mouth' of the hank, i.e. the same place the forestay is running? I had a lot of 'binding' problems. Wound up just hooking to the head of the sail down to to a block at the foot, and back to cockpit. Work OK, much better than having to go forward to pull jib down, but not to my satisfaction.

I will say that I found that if you get the jib cinched down with your down haul, and tighten a sheet, that generally I had no problems with the sail going in the water or 'flapping' in the breeze. If it was relatively breezy, after getting both the main and jib down, I would go to the mast area and put an elastic sail tie around the jib to keep it controlled - not hooked to anything else, just cinching up the jib itself.

Again, thanks for the tip!

[jbenagh]

Last weekend, I noticed that the line for the Gerr downhaul (new about 20 sailing hours ago) was pretty chafed where it goes through the clew. I think adding a block there would help a lot with chafe. With the clip hook I added last week, it should work pretty well. It also means it's easy to remove or install when needed. I may add two blocks at the ring also -- I have a couple non-swivel ones around that I can try to lash on.

Sea Owl: The Gerr option 1 works just like you described. It's good enough to calm things down but you do still need to go forward to get the sail furled enough to motor.

Also, for the plain downhaul, I didn't bother with through the hanks. The downhaul didn't move around much. You might consider brass/bronze rings around the stay if you want the additional location.

Thanks for the ideas!

Jeff

[jbenagh]

The block suggestion was right on. I added two small blocks (Ronstan series 20) to the ring on the stay and one larger block (a Harken roughly similar to a Ronstan 30 because they were out of the Ronstan) on the clip at the jib clew.

I tried it this afternoon in about 10kt winds. The result was not quite the "tight ball" I hoped for but it did deflate the sail, keep it out of the water and keep it from riding back up the stay. This was with my new genoa -- I expect even better results from the older, softer jib.

Thanks again for the help working this out.

Jeff

PS I'm pretty sure I saw two other CD 25's today in Salem sound, maybe London and Solstice.