tophatyachts.com

Hello All,

I would appreciate the group's experience on the windward performance of the tophat.
I have owned my MK 2 for two years. In spite of doing everything I know of to improve windward performance ( eg maximising backstay tension, optimising sheeting angle etc) when hard on the wind in a good sailing breeze ( 10-15 knots) I can only tack through 120 degrees at best.
Is this normal ?
My headsail is the number one I think, the clew comes a couple of feet behind the shroud. It came with the boat and is a little long in the tooth.

Cheers,

Bart

Hi Bart

I too am curious what everone elses experiences are - if you have a look at the polar plot in the previous post you can see that tophats are capable of sailing under the 60 degree to the wind - or 120 tack in your question... let me know if I have misinterpreted this.

I have always found our boat pretty damn good close hauled and well under the 60 degree mark. I sail with a 130 genoa, maybe this is worth a try. Set up and with a bit of a breeze I find she sneaks up wind quite well.

Also interested in learning how your backstay is set up mine is not adjustable, and have thought about adding a tensioner but not sure if the rig is set up for it.

Look forward to hearing everyone elses thoughts

Hello Karl,

Thanks for the reply. My backstay arrangement has a pulley at the end of the backstay about 1.5 metres above the transom. A wire goes from one side of the transom through the pulley to a standard mainsheet block and tackle (using rope) which is attached to the other side of the transom. Hauling on this puts a fair bit of tension on the backstay and forestay and reduces forestay sag quite a bit. I have a backup bit of rope from the backstay to the transom in case anything in this arrangement breaks.
I suspected that my boat should sail closer to the wind - I gather the original design brief was for a boat which would go well to windward. I have a genoa so I will try it out.
I would be keen to hear about other boats windward performance.

Cheers,

Bart

Hi All,

I normally do not bother looking, but I did a few tacks this afternoon and kept tabs on the compass setting each time. In 20 knots of NE breeze in a choppy sea (about 5 miles offshore) my Tophat manages about 100-110 degrees between tacks. This was with a single reef in.

Cheers,
Mark

I thought you might be interested in this. I've been playing with the GPS plots for a Garmin GPS 60. I put the data in an Excel spread sheet and got these plots out. This is for an Endeavour 26, this is the track;



The polar diagram is shown below. The bearings are COS, course over the ground not apparent wind.


Greg.

Ahhhhhh Greg,

Please explain!

So how do you get that info into Excel and how do you read the plot????

I won't ask any more questions as I will give my age away !

Phillip
SEAKA

Hi Bart

When racing Isabella II against space sailors and other similar boats to ours I have not noticed a lack of pointing ability. The fresher the breeze the better for us. One of the most significant factors you mentioned is the age of the headsail - any stretch in the luff area kills the sails upwind performance (same with the main). Getting as much tension on the halyard helps reducing bagging in the sail, and as mentioned keeping the backstay tight will reduce curvature of the forestay. Trying different sheet block positions forward and aft may help, but ultimately a new sail may be the only way to make a significant difference.

Cheers,

If I am reading that polar correctly you managed to pinch 30 degrees at times, am I reading that right?

On flat water I have no trouble tacking at 90 degrees.

Can tack higher but the jib luffs and perfomance suffers.

I used to only manage 100 to `120 degrees but since those days I have done the following:-

Set up the standing rigging.

New sails (and learned to trim them!)

Clean hull.

When the chop gets up we just have to bear away to keep up speed and power. If we point higher we slow down and go sideways.

No magic pill I'm afraid but learning is a great journey!

Good luck,

Tom

G’Day All,
Karl, you are right the plot does look like the boat is sailing at up to 30 degrees but that section was taken at Pulbah Island where the wind was knocking and lifting and dropping out as you can see by the speed. Pulbah Is and Wangi Pt were affecting the wind greatly. I can adjust each point for the true wind but at that point we weren’t interested in it.
If we look at #4 and #5 that is in the unaffected wind. Well, as you know it still gusts and swings. You can see at #4 we were sailing at 60 to 75 degrees on a Starboard tack at about 6 knots. As we passed the channel we hardened up to 30 to 45 degrees and our speed of course dropped off to about 4 to 5 knots heading for the finish line. That is also course over the ground and speed over the ground COG and SOG respectively and takes into account leeway and apparent wind.
This data was taken over about 2 hours and contained about 750 points. The GPS was used in its normal mode. It doesn’t even have to be on deck, it could be in your bag as long as it gets a signal.