Heaving To

          Heaving To is one of those sailing skills that many have heard about, but few have practiced.  It is a skill that has many benefits.  Here are just a few of the great reasons to know how to heave to:

1.     If you’re sailing single-handed, you can take a break from steering without dousing the sails.

2.    You can also fix and eat lunch, take a nap, go to the head, change clothes, etc – all with the sails still up, but the boat Hove To.

3.    Heaving To makes fixing and repairing things go quickly and easier.

4.    Reefing the mainsail single handed or short handed goes easier if you’re Hove To.

5.    You can plot your position on the chart without having the boat move significantly while you’re doing this basic navigational chore.

          So, what is Heaving To?  Simply it is adjusting the jib sail so that the jib is back-winded while the mainsail is sheeted out to about a beam reach setting.  One way to do this would be to release the loaded jib sheet while sailing and pull the jib’s clew to windward with the windward jib sheet.  This is quite a bit of work if there’s too much breeze blowing.

          An easier way to Heave To is to simply tack the boat without releasing the old loaded jib sheet.  As the boat comes through the eye of the wind, stop the boat’s turn by moving the tiller to leeward and ease the mainsheet.  As the boat comes to a stop, you’ll notice that your boat will perform sort of a “falling leaf” motion on the wind and waves with first the jib backing and pushing the bow away from the wind and then the main filling and the boat rounding up.  Adjusting the tiller or wheel to help the boat round up will complete Heaving To, and you will jog along on the waves and wind at about one knot or so with very kindly boat motion.

          Practice Heaving To on nice days with 5 to 10 knots of breeze.  It’ll only take a couple tries to figure everything out.  Then keep this maneuver in mind for those situations where you want to stop steering and there’s no one else who really wants to steer.

barnaclebillholcomb@gmail.com
 

Flattening Reef for your Mainsail

Mainsail Flattening Reef:

If you find your boat heeling farther than you want, one of the easiest ways to depower the sails is to tuck a flattening reef in the mainsail.  The flattening reef is a reef cringle that is sewn into the mainsail’s leach about the same distance above the boom as the Cunningham cringle is above the gooseneck.

Of course, you will want to have this reef point (as well as any other reef points) rigged before you leave the dock.  The setup is pretty simple…  Secure a stainless steel pad-eye to one side of the boom directly beneath the flattening reef cringle.  Then secure a block to the aft end of the boom; AND a cheek block on the opposite side of the boom from the pad-eye.  The reefing line is secured to the pad-eye; then led up through the flattening reef cringle; down and around the cheek block; then through the cringle again; to the block at the boom’s end; and forward to a cleat.

When the flattening reef line is tightened, the cringle is pulled down to the boom and tensioned aft simultaneously.  Doing this really flattens the bottom third to bottom half of the mainsail; which depowers the mainsail considerably.  With the tall rig on Snickerdoodle, I find the flattening reef particularly nice at about 13 or 14 knots of wind.

Since taking these photos, I have re-rigged the reefing lines so that they run aft on the cabin top instead of to cleats on the boom.  No more leaning out over the water to secure the flattening reef.

If your mainsail does not have a flattening reef point, you might want to contact your sailmaker and have one put in the sail.  I think you’ll like this reef point a lot on those gusty days.

barnaclebillholcomb@gmail.com