Spinnaker
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Spinnaker
A spinnaker is a sail designed specifically for sailing off the wind on courses between a reach (wind at 90° to the course) to downwind (course in the same direction as the wind). Spinnakers are constructed of lightweight fabric, usually nylon, and are often brightly colored. They may be designed to perform best as either a reaching or a running spinnaker, by the shaping of the panels and seams. They are attached at only three points and said to be ''flown''. Nomenclature Informal names for a spinnaker are ''kite'' or ''chute'' (owing to their resemblance to a parachute in both construction and appearance). Boats may have more than one spinnaker, differentiated by a letter to indicate symmetric (S) or asymmetric (A) and a number to indicate size (with higher numbers indicating smaller size), e.g. ''A1'' would be a large asymmetric sail and ''S3'' would be a smaller symmetric sail. Operation A spinnaker is used for sailing with the direction of the wind. Symmetrical ...
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Asymmetrical Spinnaker
An asymmetrical spinnaker is a sail used when sailing downwind. Also known as an "asym", "aspin", or "A-sail" it can be described as a cross between a genoa jib and a spinnaker. It is asymmetric like a genoa, but, the asymmetrical spinnaker is not attached to the forestay over the full length of its luff, being rigged like a spinnaker. The asymmetrical spinnaker has a larger camber than a genoa, making it optimal for generating lift at larger angles of attack, but the camber is significantly less than that of a spinnaker. The asymmetrical spinnaker is a specialty sail used on racing boats, bridging the performance gap between a genoa, which develops maximum driving force when the apparent wind angle is between 35 and 60 degrees, and a spinnaker, which has maximum power when the apparent wind is between 100 and 140 degrees. Due to its geometry, the sail is less prone to collapsing than a spinnaker and does not require the use of spinnaker pole. The sail can benefit greatly and be ...
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Spinnaker Pole
A spinnaker pole is a spar used in sailboats (both dinghys and yachts) to help support and control a variety of headsails, particularly the spinnaker. However, it is also used with other sails, such as genoas and jibs, when sailing downwind with no spinnaker hoisted. (Since the load on a spinnaker pole is very light on this point of sailing, sometimes a special light spinnaker pole called a whisker pole is used in these circumstances.) The spinnaker pole is rigged to run from the base of the mast, where there is a special fitting for attaching one end of the pole, out to windward over the side of the boat. There, one of the control lines of whichever sail it is to be used with is run through a fitting on the other end of the spinnaker pole. This allows for more precise control of the corner of the sail to which the line is attached. For a spinnaker, the line attached to the pole is the guy, or brace, and the corner is the tack. For other headsails, such as a jib, the line would ...
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Guy (sailing)
A guy (probably from Dutch ''gei'', "brail") is a line (rope) attached to and intended to control the end of a spar on a sailboat. On a modern sloop-rigged sailboat with a symmetric spinnaker, the spinnaker pole is the spar most commonly controlled by one or more guys. Types There are two primary types of guys used to control a spinnaker pole: *The afterguy, working guy, or simply guy and sometimes known as a brace is attached to the windward clew of the spinnaker, and runs through the jaws on the outboard end of the pole and back to the cockpit. The afterguy is used to rotate the outboard end of the pole around the mast in order to optimize the sail's effectiveness, depending on the direction of the wind. Because a spinnaker has two clews, there is always a second line identical to the afterguy attached to the leeward clew of the spinnaker. This is called the sheet and serves a slightly different function. When the boat jibes, the spinnaker pole will be moved from one si ...
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Sail
A sail is a tensile structure—which is made from fabric or other membrane materials—that uses wind power to propel sailing craft, including sailing ships, sailboats, windsurfers, ice boats, and even sail-powered land vehicles. Sails may be made from a combination of woven materials—including canvas or polyester cloth, laminated membranes or bonded filaments—usually in a three- or four-sided shape. A sail provides propulsive force via a combination of lift and drag, depending on its angle of attack—its angle with respect to the apparent wind. Apparent wind is the air velocity experienced on the moving craft and is the combined effect of the true wind velocity with the velocity of the sailing craft. Angle of attack is often constrained by the sailing craft's orientation to the wind or point of sail. On points of sail where it is possible to align the leading edge of the sail with the apparent wind, the sail may act as an airfoil, generating propulsive force as air p ...
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Parts Of A Sail
Sail components include the features that define a sail's shape and function, plus its constituent parts from which it is manufactured. A sail may be classified in a variety of ways, including by its orientation to the vessel (e.g. ''fore-and-aft'') and its shape, (e.g. ''(a)symmetrical'', ''triangular'', ''quadrilateral'', etc.). Sails are typically constructed out of flexible material that is shaped by various means, while in use, to offer an appropriate airfoil, according to the strength and apparent direction of the wind. A variety of features and fittings allow the sail to be attached to lines and spars. Whereas conventional sails form an airfoil with one layer of fabric, wingsails comprise a structure that has material on both sides to form an airfoil—much like a wing placed vertically on the vessel—and are beyond the scope of this article. Classifications Sails may be classified as either ''triangular'', which describes sails that either come to one point of suspen ...
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Sailing
Sailing employs the wind—acting on sails, wingsails or kites—to propel a craft on the surface of the ''water'' (sailing ship, sailboat, raft, windsurfer, or kitesurfer), on ''ice'' (iceboat) or on ''land'' (land yacht) over a chosen course, which is often part of a larger plan of navigation. From prehistory until the second half of the 19th century, sailing craft were the primary means of maritime trade and transportation; exploration across the seas and oceans was reliant on sail for anything other than the shortest distances. Naval power in this period used sail to varying degrees depending on the current technology, culminating in the gun-armed sailing warships of the Age of Sail. Sail was slowly replaced by steam as the method of propulsion for ships over the latter part of the 19th century – seeing a gradual improvement in the technology of steam through a number of stepwise developments. Steam allowed scheduled services that ran at higher average speeds than sail ...
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18ft Skiff
The 18 ft Skiff is considered the fastest class of sailing skiffs. The class has a long history beginning with races on Sydney Harbour, Australia in 1892 and later in New Zealand. The boat has changed significantly since the early days, bringing in new technology as it became available. Because of the need of strength, agility and skill, the class is considered to be the top level of small boat sailing. Worldwide this boat is called the "18 Foot Skiff". It is the fastest conventional non-foiling monohull on the yardstick rating, with a score of 675, coming only third after the Tornado and Inter 20 (Both multihulls). History The 18 ft Skiff has come a long way in more than 100 years of continuous development.See section 16.10 of From heavy boats carrying a crew of ten or more, to today's high-tech, light-weight, high performance design. Parts of the history of the early days of skiff sailing, between 1892 and 1945, is found on thpages of the Australian 18 Footers Leagu ...
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Jibe (sailing)
A jibe (US) or gybe (Britain) is a sailing maneuver whereby a sailing vessel reaching downwind turns its stern through the wind, which then exerts its force from the opposite side of the vessel. Because the mainsail boom can swing across the cockpit quickly, jibes are potentially dangerous to person and rigging compared to tacking. Therefore accidental jibes are to be avoided while the proper technique must be applied so as to control the maneuver. For square-rigged ships, this maneuver is called wearing ship. In this maneuver, the mainsail will cross the center of the boat while the jib is pulled to the other side of the boat. If a spinnaker is up, its pole will have to be manually moved to the other side, to remain opposite the mainsail. In a dinghy, raising the centerboard can increase the risk of capsizing during what can be a somewhat violent maneuver, although the opposite is true of a dinghy with a flat, planing hull profile: raising the centerboard reduces hee ...
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Sheet (sailing)
In sailing, a sheet is a line (rope, cable or chain) used to control the movable corner(s) (clews) of a sail. Terminology In nautical usage the term "sheet" is applied to a line or chain attached to the lower corners of a sail for the purpose of extension or change of direction. The connection in derivation with the root "shoot" is more clearly seen in "sheet-anchor", one that is kept in reserve, to be "shot" in case of emergency. Fore-and-aft rigs Fore-and-aft rigs comprise the vast majority of sailing vessels in use today, including effectively all dinghies and yachts. The sheet on a fore-and-aft sail controls the angle of the sail to the wind, and should be adjusted to keep the sail just filled. Most smaller boats use the Bermuda rig, which has two or three sets of sheets: * The mainsheet is attached to the boom, and is used to control the mainsail. In a rig with no boom on the mainsail, the mainsheet would attach directly to the mainsail clew. A mainsheet is a line c ...
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Julian Bethwaite
Julian Bethwaite (born 14 July 1957) is an Australian, Sydney-based skiff sailor and sailboat designer. He wrote one chapter of his father Frank's book, ''Higher Performance Sailing''. Skiff sailing Bethwaite started sailing 18ft skiffs in 1974 crewing on KB, before moving on to the boats 9Sports, Singapore Airline, and Mutual Acceptance. Bethwaite won his first 18 ft Skiff World Championship as crew in 1987 and again as skipper in 1990 and 1992. He held several positions relating to the 18 ft class, including secretary of NSW 18 ft Skiff Sailing League, manager of the Super Skiff Series, and Skiff Grand Prix. At this time, Grand Prix Sailing was covered on TV. Internationally, his partnership with Alex Gad developed media driven sailing events throughout Europe, the U.S., and Mexico that resulted in three Sport-Tel awards. Sailboat designs In 1980 based on a stretched Tasar Dinghy hull, he designed the first of the trilogy of Prime Computer 18 ft skif ...
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Sheet (sailing)
In sailing, a sheet is a line (rope, cable or chain) used to control the movable corner(s) (clews) of a sail. Terminology In nautical usage the term "sheet" is applied to a line or chain attached to the lower corners of a sail for the purpose of extension or change of direction. The connection in derivation with the root "shoot" is more clearly seen in "sheet-anchor", one that is kept in reserve, to be "shot" in case of emergency. Fore-and-aft rigs Fore-and-aft rigs comprise the vast majority of sailing vessels in use today, including effectively all dinghies and yachts. The sheet on a fore-and-aft sail controls the angle of the sail to the wind, and should be adjusted to keep the sail just filled. Most smaller boats use the Bermuda rig, which has two or three sets of sheets: * The mainsheet is attached to the boom, and is used to control the mainsail. In a rig with no boom on the mainsail, the mainsheet would attach directly to the mainsail clew. A mainsheet is a line c ...
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Genoa (sail)
A genoa sail is a type of large jib or staysail that extends past the mast and so overlaps the main sail when viewed from the side, sometimes eliminating it. It was originally called an "overlapping jib" and later a genoa jib. It is used on single-masted sloops and twin-masted boats such as yawls and ketches. Its larger surface area increases the speed of the craft in light to moderate winds; in high wind, a smaller jib is usually substituted, and downwind a spinnaker may be used. Definition The term ''jib'' is the generic term for any of an assortment of ''headsails''. The term ''genoa'' (or genny) refers to a type of jib that is larger than the 100% foretriangle, which is the triangular area formed by the point at which the stay intersects the mast, and deck or bowsprit, and the line where the mast intersects deck at the rail. Colloquially the term is sometimes used interchangeably with ''jib''. A working jib is no larger than the 100% foretriangle. A genoa is larger, with ...
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