Sailing with jib or main alone?

Rye

New Member
I sail an Omega 14.

Here is the back ground. Out on my river stomping grounds sailing solo. Winds were around 12 knots having a great time. I was on a starboard tack beating windward when a large gust capsized me. First time I had to right the boat. Glad I read that chapter!

Well long story short the winds were still blowing strong at this time, and I had my cell phone with me. I was luckily able to save it with the first tip but didn't want to chance going over again so I decided to try sailing with the Main alone. However I could not head up more than 90% to windward. So I decided to lower the main and try the jib, but same thing couldn't go windward. My sailing experience is limited and was wondering if this is typical of most boats to loose that ability with out both sails or just a characteristic of this craft?
 
I sail an Omega 14.

Here is the back ground. Out on my river stomping grounds sailing solo. Winds were around 12 knots having a great time. I was on a starboard tack beating windward when a large gust capsized me. First time I had to right the boat. Glad I read that chapter!

Well long story short the winds were still blowing strong at this time, and I had my cell phone with me. I was luckily able to save it with the first tip but didn't want to chance going over again so I decided to try sailing with the Main alone. However I could not head up more than 90% to windward. So I decided to lower the main and try the jib, but same thing couldn't go windward. My sailing experience is limited and was wondering if this is typical of most boats to loose that ability with out both sails or just a characteristic of this craft?
That's typical with all boats. Before my 14.2 Capri Mod.1 I had a Solcat 18 and I was sailing on the Napa river with a pretty strong wind in Vallejo, Ca. I was sailing back to the boat ramp and had to navigate between a narrow breakwater and down wind to the ramp with no place to turn around. I tried dropping the main but couldn't make any headway to the breakwater, so I had to keep the main up and bonzi in toward the ramp and jump off to stop the boat.
 
That's typical with all boats. Before my 14.2 Capri Mod.1 I had a Solcat 18 and I was sailing on the Napa river with a pretty strong wind in Vallejo, Ca. I was sailing back to the boat ramp and had to navigate between a narrow breakwater and down wind to the ramp with no place to turn around. I tried dropping the main but couldn't make any headway to the breakwater, so I had to keep the main up and bonzi in toward the ramp and jump off to stop the boat.
I sail an Omega also and have experienced some of the same issues myself, and i have been sailing for years. The jib sail gives you more "HORSEPOWER" to let you sail closer to the wind. The closer to the wind you sail the less power you have and the slower you go. There are several things that you can do to improve the performance of these boats. No. one; lock the traveler in the center of the traveler line by tying knots on each side of it, or by restricting the down wind movement of your traveler/block assy. Also, adjust the length of the traveler line so that the boom will center up with only about 3 inches between the blocks. the sheating angle will alow you to sail MUCH closer to the wind. No. two; Do not try to sail a straight line but instead sail in a loup pattern to fall off to build speed and then head up to the course you want to sail. These boats will stall out due to the light weight and start drifting backwards or go in a circle. Keeping up your speed is critical on these boats. Good luck; Charley
 
Thanks for the input guys appreciate it. I do have knots in the traveler currently but they are about a foot apart currently. I will try adjusting that. I bought this boat way too late this summer. I am sad to see the weather turning cold. Though I do have a list of winter maintenance to get ready for spring time.
 
You'll lose point as your sail trim falls off centerline (hence the need to bring up the traveler knots idea). A simpler solution would be to tie a loop dead center in the traveler and fix the mainsheet to that... so that you can sheet-in to centerline.
The jib and main work together to "force air through the slot, and accelerate it across the working area of the main." This slot should be "trimmed" to the sailing conditions (obviously)... but more importantly "point" is a culmination of tweaking Center of Effort and Center of Lateral Resistance in conjunction with proper optimized air flow. Best point is from a slight weather helm (tendency for the boat to head toward the wind) with your trim set so that teltales attached to the sails flow aft (top and bottom), and the top batten is parallel (port to starboard) with the boom.

Ok simple recommendation is, if you want to point tighter to the wind... reef and fly them both, it'll work better than either one alone. Dump the mainsheet out, and vang on hard... this is vang sheeting. This will allow you to sail harder and play the puffs.
 
If in doubt I go out with the jib down mainsail up. I almost have always put it up when I get comfortable with the wind that day. I find the main works pretty well alone, and one day while racing I had a technical problem and raced with main alone. My friends were amazed that I could keep up with half of the fleet!
 

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