Boom - Clew Attachment

Hey guys,

I'm really excited now because I finally got "Das Boot" into the waters of Lake Michigan this weekend.
There was minimal wind, so I motored from the storage place about 40 miles to my harbor - the 5 HP Honda outboarder pushed me at a little over 5 miles/hour (that would be a little less than 4 knots I guess).
When a very slight breeze picked up I put up sails and tried to use the wind a little, but it wasn't much - never got more than 4 miles/hour.
The wind stayed very weak and kept changing directions, causing the main to flap around a lot and the boom to suddenly move across and try hitting me in the head when I wasn't looking - it managed just once, but that put me back in my place.

Another problem I had was getting riding turns on the halyard winches - attached is the arrangement my boat has. The angle of winch to the roller on the mast just seems to be promoting those running turns - how can I avoid them? Is the position of my winches wrong somehow?

Thanks for your help, guys!

Your photo #1 shows the Pearson original clew attachment. Some skippers install a block here to make it easier to tighten the foot of the sail, while others have installed an outhaul. An outhaul "search" of earlier posts will show a number of outhaul solutions.

Your photo #2 shows a winch located where . . ?? Primaries on most boats are along side the cockpit coamings. Cabin top winches are usually found closer to the aft bulkhead of the cabin trunk and are usually for vang, outhaul, cunningham or douwnhaul, reefing lines and halyards. Unless it's a very high clew foresail, sheets generally are lead back to blocks attached to deck level tracks. Check the track layouts in the gallery on Ariel #100, and the tech forum for track on 76, 77 etc.

Ah, Bill, you were too fast for me - I realized while I was posting that I should have another look at the boom - outhaul before I ask and removed that part of the post (but I didn't realize the subject lines stays..)
The winch I mean is the one on the cabin deck (there's another one on the other side). The photo doesn't actually show the halyard on it, since at that time I didn't have either main nor jib up - but I assumed that the halyards go from the rollers on the mast straight to the winches...

You have to lead a line to a winch from an angle below the winch if the winch is mounted on deck or you get wraps on the drum.

Using that winch on that halyard has 2 problems;
The feed is too high and the angle off the mast is wrong , the winch is trying to rip the block away from the mast .

Is there a winch or the mast ?

I have no winches on the mast, that's why I thought that these can only be meant for the halyards. I have the bigger winches for the jib on the coaming pedestal, of course, and they work well. The PO has spinnaker gear, but I didn't consider that the winches would be used for that.
Here is another photo of the winch more from above:

This is a Commander , right ?
If so, those winches are for the working jib , led to the block in the lower left of photo and back to winch .

For those winches to work with the halyards , they would need to be very near the centerline of the boat or have some other blocks in the path from mast to winch bringing it down to cabintop level then turning it toward the winch.
As it is you are "side-loading " the blocks , not good for blocks or lines .

Mike, you are wonderful. Your drawings in the pictures are great - thanks for making the effort. I didn't know that the working jib might use those blocks on the dog house. I'll check with the PO what he actually did with them. And I'll check if I have any blocks and attachments on the mast foot - I don't think there is anything there. And if I don't use the winches for the halyards that means that I don't cleat off the halyards on the cleats on the doghouse, but on the cleats on the mast above the rollers. I guess I might have to just pull the halyards by hand as much as I can...

Yep , those turning blocks or cheek blocks are for leading the line back up to the cleat on the mast . You can get them almost as tight as with a winch by using the technique called "sweating" the halyard , easy with 2 people.
Instead of pulling down on the halyard when the sail is up but not tight, pull away from the mast on the halyard with someone taking the slack up on the cleat. Ease the line back to the mast while the slack is taken in , don't just let go . I've done it this way on 122' schooner's with no winches.
Keep doing this until the line is tight , even a couple of 110 lb girls can get them tight that way .

I use those cabin-top blocks all the time with my working jib on my Commander. The boat points extremely well with the sheets that far inboard. The jib sheets come in between the forward lower shroud and the upper shroud. However, this discussion only heightens the mystery for me about what that winch was intended for.

My Commander has a cabin-top winch only on the port side of the hatch as shown in the photo: there is no companion winch to starboard. Trying to run the starboard sheet over the hatch to the winch on the port side doesn't work. It scrapes on the hatch cover and overrides on the winch. Daysailing alone in moderate breeze I just muscle in the sheet and cleat on the cabin top. But most of the time I run from the block on the cabin top aft to the block on the genoa track then forward to the main winch on the coaming. This requires a long set of sheets but it works well. It looks kind of cat's-cradle-ish but puts the sail controls in in the same place for every sail, and gives me a big winch if its really blowing. It makes less work of the working jib.

To make things look even more complicated, I'll take one turn around the leeward winch then cross the cockpit to the windward winch and cleat on the windward side. It feels safer when sailing alone and heeled over to have the sailed tied off on the high side of the boat where I'm sitting. I can keep up speed and stay heeled over while I get ready to tack. If there's a rail in the water I prefer to stay as upright as possible.

So here's the mystery. What was the thinking behind only one winch to port on the Commander cabin top? I've seen two others the same way. Could this have been intended for ground tackle? Anything to do with a spinnaker? I've never flown one and wouldn't know. All I can tell you is my boat was definitely built as the economy model with as few features as possible. That single winch had a purpose but I can't figure it out.

I spoke to the PO and he says he used the winches for the spinnaker (i have them on both sides). But that means that the big winches on the coamings are used for the jib sheets after all. I guess the biggger blocks on the rearmost tracks (halfway along the coamings) are only used for the large Genoa then...

Good to learn that I won't use them for the halyards after all.