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Rotating Mast: hi- tech for the masses?

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Martin
Deckhand

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USA
16 Posts

Initially Posted - 11/24/2004 : 23:01:23

It seems that MacGregor figured out how to put a stayed rotating mast on a mass produced sailboat (MacGregor 26M). I could not find the specs but it seems that the mast height must be not too different from the masts on Catalina 25.

Do you thing it would be possible to retrofit Catalina 25 with a rotating mast? It probably would not be legal for racing, but it may improve the performance considerably.

Do you have any experience with such masts on monohulls (especially smaller ones?)

Happy Thanksgiving,

Martin

Edited by - on

Dave Laux
Captain

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318 Posts

Response Posted - 11/25/2004 : 11:35:16

It would require an entirely different mast and staying system. Its fairly easy to do on a boat that is wide for its mast height and not too powerful ( Mac26) or very wide for its mast height and able to stand a heavy spar section (mnltihulls). Otherwise I doubt it would be worth the effort. Dave

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Bill Holcomb
Admiral

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USA
769 Posts

Response Posted - 11/25/2004 : 13:01:35

Hi Martin,

In addition to what Dave said....... Yes you could, but the standing rigging would probably have to be much like a multi-hull setup. 75% fractional forestay; no backstay; diamond shrouds to support the top of the mast. So a really big main, dinkey jib, and no spinnaker. To accomodate this, you'd probably have to move the mast base forward to just aft of the foreward hatch in order to balance CLP and CE.

Plus, the marginal increase in production with a boat with a theoretical hull speed of less than 6.5 knots doesn't seem to be worth the effort 'n expense.

Having said that, the rotating mast system on the 47 ft long X 32 ft wide racing cat that my Dad and I rented in Maui a few years ago could really make your day. 25 knots of breeze on the lee side of the island, flat water, 17 knots boatspeed up wind and 24 knots on a beam to broad reach. What a day!!

Bill Holcomb - C25 Snickerdoodle #4839

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ClamBeach
Master Marine Consultant

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3072 Posts

Response Posted - 11/25/2004 : 14:45:25

The high-tech stuff is cool, but I agree with Bill that adding a rotating mast to a C25 wouldn't be worth the cost. Overall, I'd rather pony up bucks for an inexpensive and practical in-boom or in-mast furling system...

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Martin
Deckhand

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USA
16 Posts

Response Posted - 11/25/2004 : 14:55:33

Thank you for your views.

...pony up bucks for an inexpensive and practical in-boom or in-mast furling system...

Is there such a thing?

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ClamBeach
Master Marine Consultant

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3072 Posts

Response Posted - 11/25/2004 : 17:57:25

"... inexpensive and practical in-boom or in-mast furling system... Is there such a thing?"

Well the inexpensive part... no. Mainsail furling systems are available for bigger boats. Haven't seen much of same on sub-30' boats much.

Point I was trying to make that if I were Roger or Frank I'd be looking develop products to make sailing as easy as possible... Increase the population of buyers.

Easy roller furling on the main would be one of those. Self-tacking jib systems would be another. If you read the 26M pages it sounds like Roger added the rotating mast to allow the boat to be effectively sailed under main alone. (making it easy).

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ronrryan
Admiral

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USA
561 Posts

Response Posted - 11/25/2004 : 20:32:51

I had a pal, gone now, rest his soul, who got old like some of us and fell a couple times on his Caliber 28. We put an old Shaefer roller furler drum at the goosneck, put the upper swivel aloft (ran the keeper up via the backstay) and got our local used sail loft to retrofit a jib with a UV-sailcover to suit. This was the old-style Shaefer behind the headstay wire luff rig, there are a lot around used, not desirable any more. The rig worked fine, although the luff was a little saggy behind the mast. It let him sail another three years until the big C got him. I had some cheek blocks in my junk box for turning the furling and outhaul lines, and a machine shop pal made us up a sort of "yoke" for the gooseneck area. Pretty simple rig, really. Fair winds, happy thanksgiving to all, ron srsk Orion SW FL

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Brooke Willson
Admiral

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USA
983 Posts

Response Posted - 11/25/2004 : 23:26:44

I had a friend with a 25' cat ketch with rotating masts. Yes, it was simple to furl and unfurl the sails. On the other hand, lifting the masts up out of the sockets to remove the sails required a crane.

It seems to me that the bermuda rig is a pretty simple piece of technology. I never cease to be amazed at efforts to turn a good little sailboat like ours into a different boat. I wouldn't want to emulate anything about a MacGregor: they're pretty horrible boats, designed for people who can't decide whether they want a sailboat or a powerboat, so they get a bad one of each. I would think if you seriously want a boat with a rotating mast, you should look at a different hull.

Brooke

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Martin
Deckhand

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USA
16 Posts

Response Posted - 11/26/2004 : 14:25:09

Very interesting, thank you. Mainsail furler for our boats would surely generate good interest. But if there is a furler added behind the mast, what happens to the battens when the main is furled?

Undoubtedly there were people amazed at the efforts of those who thought of making perfectly good little boats of their days into something different by adding ...a sail...or a keel...or something else which eventally found broad acceptance. That is not to say, heavens forbid, that something macgregorish would ever find broad acceptance... but a furler for the main hopefully would not fall in that category.

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Brooke Willson
Admiral

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USA
983 Posts

Response Posted - 11/26/2004 : 18:05:45

Martin, there's a long history on this forum of people wanting to modify their C25s to make them into very different boats. I was not referring to incremental improvements, but to rather extreme modifications that would be better and less expensively served by buying a bigger boat. In my humble opinion, a mainsail furler really isn't needed on a C25.

Mainsail furlers are appropriate on larger boats where mainsails are larger and heavier and difficult to furl and stow by hand. On something thirty feet and above, yes, a mainsail furler makes sense. A furling foresail is appropriate because it's way up there on the bow, and it allows you to furl and unfurl from the cockpit in big winds and seas. Gravity is a wonderful furler on a good mainsail.

I think it was Doyle sails that offered a batten that would swing from horizontal to vertical so it could be used in an in-mast furler. I haven't seen that advertised lately. Vertical furlers use battenless sails. In-boom furlers allow horizontal battens. No one makes a boom furler for a boat as small as a C25.

Which is pretty much my point.

Brooke

Edited by - Brooke Willson on 11/26/2004 18:06:33

Dave Laux
Captain

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318 Posts

Response Posted - 11/26/2004 : 21:31:03

With a cut down sail the furler drum between the goosenck and mast head is OK, but if you tried to fly the full main that way you would be asking for trouble. You would have converted a disributed load with the distribution toward the boptom of the mast into two point loads ( one at the gooseneck and one at the masthead) and you would add the enormous compression load that it would take to make the luff tight to an alredy heavily loaded in compression system. This might cause problems . Dave

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roberoo
Navigator

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USA
182 Posts

Response Posted - 11/27/2004 : 02:17:55

This isn't an in mast furler. But for the price it might work for some. I am going to check it out at the Miami Boat Show in Feb.

http://macksails.com/mackpack.htm

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Frank Hopper
Past Commodore

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Pitcairn Island
6776 Posts

Response Posted - 11/27/2004 : 10:16:50

<blockquote id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by roberoo
 This isn't an in mast furler. But for the price it might work for some. I am going to check it out at the Miami Boat Show in Feb.

http://macksails.com/mackpack.htm

<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote">
That is a pip off of the Doyle Stack Pack. My friend has one on his ODay 272 and loves it. They are pushing it on the 272, even the Stack Pack is intended for larger boats. Much more that lazy jacks really does seem over kill on our size mains, (which are SMALL). O)nce someone has full battens it is hard to imagine needing much more help in mainsail management.

Back to the original question of rotating masts, look to the catamarans. They have an overload safety system designed into them to compensate for the light loose rigging that allows for aerodynamic mast rotation; it is called capsizing.

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