Dart 15 Forums

Mark Ballamy wrote:

I am an experienced capsizer from day one and have been over in Mirrors, 505s, Fireballs, (many, many times), Topazes and now my newly acquired 15. The causes are many and various but mostly come down to lack of concentration due to the sheer joy of zooming over the water with an unbent ear. However, I sail at the Hayling Ferry Sailing Club (was Solartron) and we move between the Solent and Langstone harbour, depending on the current in the Fairway and the wind strength and whoever set the course. I have twice been inverted with the mast dragging along the bottom due to a strong tide and the wind coming from the opposite direction. This places the boat in a situation where it is not possible to right by using the classic procedure. In fact the last time it happened, in a 5, our Safety boat took 20 minutes to get me up, using both crew. the race was then nearly over. The scene being set, I am appealing to anyone who knows where I can get a suitable masthead float so that I can deal with things by myself. I am retired and like to go for a zonk during the week and can't always be sure of a kindly soul to offer their services to get me out of the mire. Well?

Bob replied:

Hi Mark, I have seen somepeople fix a small fender to the top of the mast to do this. There are also proprietary Zeppelin shaped units available - mostly on top of Hobie masts so it might be worth trying Hobie UK.
Other ideas - there are several good chandlery websites for mail order such as:-
www.pinbax.com
www.sailboats.co.uk
www.mailspeedmarine.com
Best of luck
Bob

George Stephen replied:

Mark,

I know Bob has answered giving you some info on masthead floats, but I'm genuinely surprised that you can't get your Dart 15 up (I know I had problems at Gurnard, but I was not well and had a shoulder injury which prevented ne using my right arm). I think that you should be able to right your D15, almost regardless of whether you have wind with, against or across tide UNLESS

1 You are really too light weight to sail a D15 - I'm not expert here but if you are c 11 stone you should be ok or
2 Conditions are really bad - probably Force >6 or possibly really bad wave action. Remember that we've sailed a standard format D15 Nationals in Force 6+ with fair wave action, there were many capsizes and all managed to get up much quicker and with less assistance than you describe or
3 Perhaps the upper section of your 2 part mast is not airtight - there's some advice on this somewhere in the site, possibly in some of the many chat pages.

You mention "the classic procedure", but are you using the classic procedure for cats like D15s (rather than what you do for the dinghies you list or even what you might do for some Hobies - eg the 16).

So just in case you're not doing it right, here's my recollection of what you should do.

If the cat is over about 90 degrees with hulls horizontal (as opposed to near vertical with transoms aloft after a pitchpole or cartwheel or bows up after an abortive attempt to right from 180 degrees over), get aboard the lower hull and grab the righting rope from the main beam end at the top hull (this can be difficult to get to!) and lean out on it just aft of the main beam to get the mast almost out of the water. If you don't have a righting rope, consider getting and fitting one, but until you do you could use the mainsail halyard (a bit thin and liable to press into the hands, and probably best tied off round the mast ball in a clove hitch before you toss it over the top hull) or possibly the jib sheets after unclipping them from the jib and tossing them over the top hull - but beware here as you may pull out the fittings to which you attach the blocks if you have an older boat). You should only need to be a little off vertical to do this, rather than the nearly horizontal position you need to right the cat. Then check that the jib and main sheets are uncleated (you have to lean round the tramp to do this, which will tend to push the cat towards 180 degrees over, so do it quickly, pausing to get back and lean again on the righting rope if complete inversion threatens - which is why I advised this in the first instance).

You're now ready to try to bring the bows round head to wind, which you do by continuing to lean out a bit on the righting rope while you walk towards the bows, keeping the mast almost out of the water and depressing the lower bow into the water. In this position the cat will slowly turn head to wind. You do this so that the cat will right fairly easily and minimise the chance of going all the way over the other side when you do pull the cat up. When the bows are approx head to wind move back to a fraction aft of the main beam.

You're then ready to pull up, for which you may need to lean out nearly horizontally with your feet on the keel line of the loswer hull. The initial effect will be slow, but as the cat slowly starts to right you will need to "pull yourself up the righting rope" to keep yourself off the water. Then the slow turning will quicken dramatically as the mast reaches around 35 degrees. When it is obvious that the cat is coming over you duck (you don't want the keel of the upper hull to hit your head) and move to grab the handles under the tramp as the cat comes down so that your weight will stop the cat going right over the other way. Make sure you grab the nearest handle first, which makes it easier to reach and grab the far one - which is the one you really want to reach - if you go just for the far one you may miss both....)

When the cat stops oscillating, let go of the handles and get to the back of the cat asap, climb over the back. This is because the back will depress down more with your weight making boarding easier. If you are strong then by all means get on over the main beam. But whatever you do, do it quickly, or your cat may escape off ....

But I guess you had problems from what was almost 180 degree capsize. Here you do what you would do for a full inversion. You get on the tramp and reach round to check the main and jib sheets are uncleated. You get the righting rope from the leeward hull (or the higher hull if you are not fully inverted) and stand on the other hull, aft of the skeg on the rounded part, and lean back on the righting rope. This will pull the cat up partly by the bows and partly by the other hull. Continue until it seems that the bows will pop up and then run forward along the hull, still leaning back on the righting rope, until you reach the main beam, when you should be able to finish pulling the cat up to the usual 90 degree over position. If you move too soon, you'll find that you still can't pull the cat up, so go back and get the bows up higher before you move forward. If you don't move soon enough, the bows will pop up, ditching you into the water. I've never discovered how to get upright directly from this position (or from bows down after a pitchpole) - I always deliberately capsize to full inversion and then pull up again as described to the usual 90 degree over with hulls horizontal - if anyone does know a trick here, please advise.

When you get to the usual 90 degree over position, you get the bows head to wind etc etc as describer earlier.

But whatever you do, make sure you are able to recover from a capsize. If you are light weight then a masthead float may be what you need, but I'm not sure. I think it is easier to get a D15 up from full inversion to the 90 degree over position than it is to get it upright from the 90 degree position, and I think this is technically right - the airpocket in the mast has positive righting moment in the water (and if my vague recollections of physics are right even the displacement of water by the rig is a benefit). While your masthead float will help prevent complete inversion, and assist regaining 90 degree capsize, it MAY make getting the cat fully upright more difficult because when its out of the water it will be deadweight at the end of the mast....

If you haven't already done so, do try the D15 Teach In, or if you want full cat certification then take a Cat RYA 2 course - there are very few cat instructors and I did mine at Cat Clinic.

I hope this is of some help.

George

Mark Ballamy replied:

George, many thanks for a very full account of what to do when over. i obviously didn't explain my predicament fully enough.My problem was that the mast was trailing along the bottom, sideways and the strong current was able to push the sail hard enough to keep the mast on the bottom. The force 4/5 was blowing from the opposite direction, onto the tramp underside, making the situation worse. Whatever leverage I could get on the "lower" hull was insufficient to lift the mast away from the bottom anyway so there was no possibility to turn the boat head to wind. That was why the guys in the safety boat took so long to get me up. I will gloss over the included incident of the large steel bouy that I was pushed onto by the current, which only delayed the operation still further! This was my first season on cats and I had read all the Association articles that I could find, as well as Brian Phipps book. However, I will take note of any advice given and apply it whenever possible, including the tip on the top mast section. Thanks again, George. Thank you also, Bob, for your ideas. Maybe I shall do just that. We have three Hobies in the club that use the floats and they swear by them but then they are a lot heftier than the little 15. Mark

George Stephen replied:

Mark,

My Club sailing is mostly in the Thames estuary, off Sheerness, with occasional trips into the Medway et al. While on occasion the flood tide can creat whirlpools at the entrance to the Medway at Garrison Point and the ebb tide is reckoned to be even stronger, the tidal flow where we usually sail is lower, partly because the depth of water is often a bit less than a D15 mast, so that an almost complete inversion leaves the cat tramp at an angle of about 10-15 degrees, while the masthead grinds the burgee on the sea bed.

I have capsized in conditions similar to those you describe, with the problem you describe occurring initially. The problem is as you say: the tide pushes the mainsail and hence the masthead down to the sea bed while the wind continues to push the trampoline in a direction which enhances the downward pressure on the mast.

The situation is not totally stable. If you can manage to get the cat partly round, it should then flip all the way round so that the sail and mast becomes "downtide" underwater and the tramp becomes "downwind" above the water with the wind blowing onto the top of the tramp.

On the occasions I recall most clearly (it was March 1994, 2 days running - a bad weekend for results), I made sure that the sheets were uncleated so that the sails were as free as possible to "flow down tide" rather than be pushed by the tide as an underwater sail/vane/foil, and then stood on the "lower" hull towards the bow while leaning back on the righting line so that it dug into the water (it was a bit alarming). It took a while before the cat swung round. Thinking about it, I should have achieved a quicker swing round by standing next to the transom rather than the bow. Note that you're not at this time really trying to get the masthead off the bottom to the 90 degree capsize position, you're trying to turn the cat, but you do need to lean back on the righting line to take the unusual strain off the mast.

But I can imagine that in less depth of water this might not work so easily, because you need to swing the cat round a long way before it will flip to the genuinely stable position of mast in the water down tide and tramp downwind. So if you are stuck in this situation and there is a rescue boat around, I think you want the rescue boat to use a line attached to the bow end to pull the cat round to the more stable capsized position.

You can then try to get the cat to the 90 degree capsize position, with the mast up wind. But note that if you get the mast too far out of the water you'll find that this position is as inherently unstable with the mast out of the water as it was stable with the mast in the water, so make sure you don't pull the cat up too far or the wind may get under the mainsail and flip right over..... Then turn the cat more head to wind by standing nearer the bow - when you do this continue to lean back hard on the righting line to keep the mainsail mostly out of the water, or the tide will push it back under, but don't get the mast too far out... You'll probably need to try to right the cat before the bows get head to wind, when you MUST get hold of the grab handles under the tramp when the cat comes upright to prevent the flip right over.

As regards the top section of the mast being air/water tight, there has been D15 articles in the past. I can't recall what the advice was. I know mine is not fully air/water tight, but not disastrously so.

Hope this further advice helps.

George

PS1 Some Hobies, especially 16s, need a different righting technique (on which I claim no expertise), so the advice you get from your Club Hobie sailors on righting cats may not be right for your D15. Hobie 16s have a reputation for being difficult to get up from a capsize, and I understand Hobie sailors' enthusiasm for masthead floats.

PS2 Because of the short mast on a D15, a 90 degree capsize tends to end up as full inversion in a bit of a blow as the wind force on the tramp and upper hull is greater than the buoyancy of the airpocket in the mast can provide. I don't capsize that often these days, but providing you don't pitchpole (eg you just capsize the rig to leeward) I reckon that you should get your feet out of the toestraps, grab the righting rope beside you and drop off to windward over the keels. Then by hauling on the righting rope while boarding the hull on the water you should be able to prevent the capsize going all the way to complete (or nearly complete) inversion. If you slide down the tramp it may take you so long to get round onto the lower hull, get hold off the righting rope etc that complete inversion is inevitable.

The last time I thought I was going over (the masthead was in the water) I was rather surprised to find that just before I was about to drop off the alarmingly high hull my weight hiked over a keel while hoilding onto a shroud adjuster cover started to pull the cat up. I was quick enough to get my weight back onto the tramp as the cat came down. I still can't work out the mechanics, but I venture the tale as a further good reason for choosing to go over the keels to windward rather than down the tramp.

There's another good reason for avoiding the slide down the tramp on a cat - there are toestraps and sheets (et al) to tangle with as you go, with a risk that you end up entangled under the tramp on complete inversion.

Mark Ballamy replied:

George, You hit all the right buttons there - thanks for all that info, it highlights my many problems well. I will try to do better in future now that I understand the reasons and the various ploys to attempt rather than just following the classic advice slavishly. Thankyou gents - I think we can close this subject till sometime next season!Mark