Interest in Code 0 experience on my BR20 GRP

[Peter Cockerton]

Graham

Good to hear from you again, yes I did go ahead with the code 0 purchase but not from Vega Voiles in the end.
The sail was made by the following outfit:

The Sail Register
The Loft
Unit 1 Gallamore Lane Ind. Est
Market Rasen
LN8 3HA

01673 849893

I could not justify the several hundred pounds for the continuous furler from Rolstan and the likes so in the end I tried £45 RWO furler and spliced my own furler line.

Must admit I love the sail, the cheap furler works well if you keep some tension on the controlling sheet when furling and blanket it with the main some. Admittedly the bottom part of the furl is tighter than the top but most of the time it stays sufficiently tidy to avoid coming loose and thrashing about, a bit more furl normally sorts it.

With my one piece wood mast I have a second hounds fitting some several inches above the jib hounds to which I route the spinnaker halyard through. I use a swivel shackle to attach the head to aid furling. The foot attaches to the RWO continuous furler. The furler line routes back to the cockpit and terminates on a single block, the block is kept taught to the rear cleat via a short length of shock cord.

My sail dimensions would not be applicable to standard gaffe rigged SB as the luff length would need to be shorter for the shorter mast height. Dan at the sail register will sort the dimensions if provided with the required luff length, remember to allow some distance between the head swivel and the hounds block for tensioning the luff and pre bending the spin pole.

Tacking with the code zero is fairly straightforward if crew on board, no need to furl, if solo than I furl, and tack and then unfurl again.

I initially rigged a bobstay and a tensioning line back in to the cockpit  but I found it to be more trouble than it was worth keeping the lines tidy and out of the way.

The RWO furler attaches to the spin pole via two short lengths of stainless bar to extend the furler away from the pole and to provide a better angle of approach for the furler line to the furler.

I also have the standard SB asymmetric spinnaker which I use for extended downwind sailing, this does not furl well with above setup, I tend to rig a flying tack line and drop the sail into the cockpit.

I light winds furl the jib and set the code zero anywhere between close reach and broad reach and the boat speed is quite noticeably improved without the concerns of the boat getting overpowered, the furling option makes it easy to quickly put it away when feeling pressed, the full asymmetric is better for running I find.

[Graham W]

Thanks Peter, I'll be contacting the Sail Register.  Do you have any photos of the sail in action?

I've got a Karver top-down furler and anti torsion line already, so I'll be using those for my code zero.

[Peter Cockerton]

Graham

Emphasise the reinforcement design you want at the head and tack to alleviate the "bat wing" problem you identified some time ago. I thought i had specified to Dan the design i wanted and the reasoning behind it but when collected i was slightly disappointed but it's not an issue for me with the separation between my jib halyard and the spinnaker  halyard i.e catching at the mast fixing. It will be for you unless you can create separation with one of those discs you attach to one of the forestays.

Attached photo's on the skew but can't sort even if i rotate before attaching for some reason.

Will try and take "an in action" photo next time I'm out and conditions allow me to hoist it.

Peter