tophatyachts.com

Gday,
Having recently blown up my st2000, im taking a different approach to them now, instead of turning it on & leaving it for hrs & hrs to do its stuff, im now treating them as an aid to relieve me from the helm when I get tired or need to do something.
I recently tried sheet to tiller steering & was pleasantly surprised how well this worked, if I had taken more time to balance the boat & set up the blocks, I reckon it would have steered the boat effectively for a long time.

This video is my first attempt of sheet to tiller steering:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9TL7Rx3 ... tube_gdata

cheers

That looks pretty impressive Shaun.

Any chance of a diagram on what you used and how you ran the blocks, sheets etc?

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Thanks Rob! I suppose I could have been less lazy and googled. I really appreciate you taking the trouble,

Seems simple enough, must give it a go!

Yes, exactly the same as Rob's attachment, thanks Rob.

Very easy to set up, I used single blocks, tied to a loop of rope & slipped it over the winches & some bungee cord with an anglers knot in one end over the jib sheet cleat around the tiller & back to the cleat....plenty of room for improvement.

cheers

Where did you attach it to the jib Shaun?

I used sheet to tiller on Joylee for the whole time I sailed her, never had an autohelm and rarely had a crew. I used mainly the setup on the second diagram which if you set the boat up right to start with gave me selfsteering to a slightly broad reach. I just took the jib sheet around the winch a 1/4 turn and up to the windward winch, once around the winch- twice if needed and then tied off on the tiller with a slip hitch- homemade ockie strap from the tiller to the leeward coaming. if you are sailing solo setting up the jib sheet in that way for normal sailing can sometimes make life a little easier in windy situations, worth a try- then if you need to self steer for a bit you are good to go within seconds-

That's interesting about the st2000. I've had concerns about my st1000 occassionaly getting what I though was overly warm with extended hours of hard use so I would give it a break to cool down. Using sheet-to-tiller steering sounds like it would prove very useful.

I had surgical rubber of differing resistance instead of bungy.
and a cam lever on my job sheet

Have you a photo of the cam lever in use Rob?