[Alberg30] heaving to on the main only

[Bob Johns]

On Thursday, July 31, 2003, at 02:58  PM, Dave Terrell wrote:

> Is it possible to heave to with only the main up and if so, how do you
> do it? A friend of mine and i have been trying to do this and have not
> succeeded so far. Both of us have boats with traditonal shaped hulls.

Dave,

Barbara and I successfully heaved to in Wind Call using only the 
working jib. Everything I had read said that you always heaved to with 
main and jib but we had been sailing all night under conditions that 
would not let us use the autopilot and we were exhausted and facing the 
possibility that we might have to continue all day. We sailed 
close-hauled with only the working jib and I tried tacking without 
releasing the sheet as I had done in the past when heaving to with main 
and jib. It took 4 or 5 tries before it heaved to. After I got it right 
the boat moved sideways and left a slick to windward for about a 
hundred feet and the breaking waves broke at the edge of the slick 
instead of at the boat. The motion was completely comfortable and the 
boat heeled but did not roll and required no attention. We had heaved 
to near a buoy and stayed heaved to for an hour. We were able to sail 
back and find the buoy and determined that we  had moved 2  kn in the 
hour.

We had previously heaved to with main and jib and I really did not 
think that the boat would heave to with only the jib. We were 
pleasantly surprised that it worked with the jib only. As it turned 
out,  the fog lifted to about 100 yards visibility and we were able to 
get into a harbor about 5 miles away.

Hope this helps.

	Bob Johns, Wind Call, #397

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