Mainsheet Traveler Dimensions

[Scott Rosen]

I'm looking to fit a mainsheet traveler on Patience. I intend to make it in the Herreshoff style, a bronze rod anchored on the ends with base plates. It will be placed on top of the transom. The original traveler was primative, but it worked, sort of. It was simply two large eye fittings screwed into either side of the top of the transom about 1/3 of the way from the gunnels, with stainless wire between them, and the main sheet attached to the wire with a snap shackle. My principle question is how far outboard should it run for optimum sail shape, etc.?

[John B]

Your boat is about 30 ft long,bermudan, a cruiser rather than racer . I think making it too wide is the most likely mistake , whereas making it narrow is unlikely to detrimentally effect performance at all. I bet you have a boom vang anyway.
I'd go for a max of about 18 inches.
If you are getting fittings made I'd consider some sort of integral eyebolt included so that you could attach a strop to shorten the travel up to a centre point. I've had to do that myself. If I wasn't using an original type traveller on the boat I'd make it really short with some buffers for the gybe. Effectively no traveller at all.

[Thad]

With what John said, the point of the traveler is to allow the tiller free play within it's arc.

[Zane Lewis]

Well I'm going to be difficult.
I aways go for the longest traveler posible and and a control line each side to bring it up for light air sailing. I think this is even more important if you don't have a very effective boom vang (or none at all).
I believe that any boat should be set up to sail as compentently as is practical.
Zane

[Ian McColgin]

I'm with Zane. In a breeze being able to strap her down and take the twist out of the sail from the sheet end beats stressing out a vang any day. On light days you can always twitch it to the center (to give the sail a bit more twisting shape if you find it helpful - I never have) without danger of busting the traveler.

Even modern high aspect rigs where racers commonly draw the sheet above centerline, are often improved, depending on the wind, by letting the traveler off a little and letting the boat foot like a real sail boat was meant to. After all, if you want to go straight into the wind, get a motor boat. . .

Or, for real fun, forget the traveler. Make a double ended sheet with one side 2:1` or 3:1 and the other side, for finetuning, twice that. Plans easily found through Brion Toss. Very cost-effective and nice.

G'luck

[Scott Rosen]

Thanks all. I don't have a vang. John is right--30 foot Bermudan cruiser.

Ian,

I also don't have Toss's book. I'm having trouble picturing what you mean by a double ended sheet. Like you, I've never found it useful to keep the sail in the center. Patience doesn't like that.

I like the idea of being able to shorten it for a jybe. An integral eyebolt on each base would allow that.

Do you know how a designer would calculate the amount of travel a boat should have?

[Bob Cleek]

Ian's right. Those travelers that let you haul everything to windward are fine on dinghys and racing machines, but few traditional wooden boats are going to like the kind of stresses they generate and probably won't sail that much better for it anyhow.

A double ended sheet is the way to go, with a handy billy (less stress than a vang, in my book, since it's at the ass end of the boom.) Just put a block at each eyebolt and run the bitter end of a long sheet out of both of 'em. That alone will pull things amidships pretty well and flatten the sail... a traveler works against that, since the main block runs across the traveler to the leeward anyhow. It you want to yank it over more, slap the billy on her. You'll have the billy for use all over the boat for other stuff as well. The biggest challenge installing a traveler isn't how wide it ought to be, but how you are going to fasten it to the boat. Think BIG backing blocks. You don't want it hitting you in the back of the head the next time you have an uncontrolled jibe. (Never had one of those?... mmmm. Lucky you! LOL)

[Ian McColgin]

Scott, email my a fax number & I'll draw some thoughts - probably send after the weekend.

I've seen very few boats where the beam out in the stern where the traveler would go is too wide, so I've never thought scientificly about it, but I guess you'd not want to go much further out that 10 degrees. Figure angle and curve will put it out another couple degrees and the main needs to be a tad flatter than the jib's optimal angle. Why worry - it can't possibly exceed the jib sheeting angle unless you have a seriously odd boat.

More boats are oversheated than run too freely. You see these guys pinched up into the wind, boom up to weather and jib hard on the spreaders pointing 35 degrees but going like a sow at slow wallow and leaving a pretty nice leeway because the keel can't get any lift.

If you do go rod traveler, it's worth having some big ss washers with rubber bumpers at each end. On Goblin I had a line from an eye on center to move the thing in from the very ends, but in the end never found a reason to use it and finally unrove the line.

I like the double ended approach as it puts the main sheet accessable from either side back aft and because it's usually easy to rig for a nice smooth slide when you gybe. There can be a tendency for the ends to 'walk' away from being centered, biut that's easily countered.

Mo' with drawings.

[Scott Rosen]

Thanks Ian. It looks like this post (before I edited it) crossed yours. Here's what I posted before reading your last post. I think you answered some of the questions, and I'll look forward to the drawings. Thanks.

***********

Right now I have no traveler. The Mainsheet is attached to a bronze bail at the end of the boom. The sheet itself runs through a block and tackle setup that looks like it was designed to be used as a boom vang on a large racing dinghy. The top block is attached to the bail by a shackle. The bottom block has a cam cleat. The bottom block/cam cleat assembly is attached with a snap-shackle to a large padeye screwed into the top of the transom. So, the sheet runs from a bail at the end of the boom to an eye smack dab in the top of the transom. It is centered amidships. There is no travel.

I want to be able to ease the foot of the sheet to leeward to get better sail shape. That's the whole idea of a traveler as I understand it. No need to be concerned with clearing the tiller, or anything like that, because the tiller comes through, not over, the transom. The foot of the sheet is above the tiller, so there's not interference.

My cockpit runs aft to the transom, with no decking between the cockpit and the transom. Think cat boat or Herreshoff 12 1/2 or any similar open cockpit design with a transom-hung rudder and tiller steering.

The traveler will have to be fastened to the thick piece of teak that runs across the top.

For the traveler, I'm thinking simply of using bronze rod, bent to the curve and camber of the transom, fastened to the top of the transom with a base plate on both ends. The block and cam cleat assembly at the foot of the sheet would attach to the rod with a snap shackle. The only difference between that and what I have now is that the foot of the sheet will be able to travel to leeward to keep the sail shape flatter.

So, the original question is how far out from the centerline on each side should the traveler run? I have the sail plan, but it doesn't show the traveler dimensions.

[ 05-24-2002, 02:54 PM: Message edited by: Scott Rosen ]

[Wooden Boat Fittings]

Scott, check your email for a photo of Aileen Louisa's mainsheet (double-ended, but without a handy billy,) if you need an idea of how one works.

What you have in mind to rig sounds very attractive to me (although I'm not sure I like the idea of a snap-shackle much.) I'd definitely make the horse the full width of the transom., though -- don't muck around with a fiddly short thing. Just put a movable buffer at each end of it, then if it proves to be longer than you need, move each of them in a bit and restrict the travel.

Take some straps down the transom from the end-plates so you can bolt through the transom rather than screwing onto it.

[Zane Lewis]

Just picking up on what Ian said. I have a situation were I am unable to use a traveler due to Camber and obstructions etc I don't have enough boom height for a vang, and I find using a handy bill to a chain plate a hasel as you have to go forward each tack. I plan to use someting like the following.

A 2:1 from each side as you would use normally for a traveler control line. Where they join together a 3:1 up to the boom. Mid boom sheeting.
This does allow for a lot of boom position and sail shape control right out to a reach but it take more time/practice to get it right. I have some resivations about it for short tacking in a blow etc because of this.

Zane

[ 05-25-2002, 07:30 AM: Message edited by: Zane Lewis ]

[John B]

Scott, A horse style traveller isn't really an adjustable traveller. You are looking for an average position for average conditions. Personally I'd just leave it as it is or make a short one with some buffers as I said before . If you read my tongue in cheek "Weather helm" in misc you'll see that I'll play with a traveller just as much as anyone when racing but you are really looking for set and forget I think.( like me)
Anyway, My horse type traveller makes a 7 Degree angle from the gooseneck and worked fine for the no vang bermudan we carried for um...15 years?+.Before that we had the setup that Ian's talking about. That worked fine too but the horse was the original type for my boat.

If your mast position was say 40% back from the bow that looks like it means a 2 ft traveller for your boat to be about that same 7 degree mark.

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid18/p8cccf7f2c1a39d7aab82d691b181093d/fdd27506.jpg
see what I'm messing with. Just what Ian was talking about. An extra line to shorten the travel and get a wee bit of twist on the wind. Ain't going to adjust it from tack to tack though.In fact , ain't going to adjust it anytime. set and forget.!

[ 05-25-2002, 11:32 PM: Message edited by: John B ]