Dear readers,

Do you like to keep things as simple as possible when sailing?

The market, the customers, the sailors of today want more comfort, not only for living on board, but also when travelling. That's the general consensus and expert opinion. The self-tacking jib should make a contribution to this. Long forgotten and only used on a few unreservedly Northern European yachts, it has experienced a brilliant renaissance in recent decades. Hanseyachts got the ball rolling, French shipyards followed suit and soon self-tacking jibs were even being used on catamarans, even though you sometimes want to keep the headsail back for a successful tack on these vessels. But is the mimic, which is offered on almost every cruising boat today, really useful?

One thing is clear: tacking with a self-tacking jib requires no work on sheets, winches or cranks. This makes the boat suitable for single and small crews. But the disadvantages outweigh the advantages: Of necessity, the cloth is smaller than the maximum foresail triangle, so there is a lack of surface area and therefore sail horsepower. With the track and sheet deflections, whether on deck or through the mast, more fittings are required, which means more fuss, more weight and more costs. As soon as a schrick in the sheets is the course of choice, the self-tacking jib opens at the top and a good part of the already smaller sail area becomes ineffective. This can only be remedied by using a barber haul, which requires another fitting with an additional sheet and deflection. On deep courses, the sheet car bangs from one side to the other. And even in the harbour, the self-tacking jib seems to overwhelm some of the crew. While it may still be possible to remove the main halyard and thus prevent noise, the jib sheet, which is guided up the mast and then deflected downwards again, often remains a seemingly unfathomable and irremovable source of annoying, usually high-frequency and annoying flapping noises.

There are therefore many arguments against the self-tacking jib; the desired comfort comes at a high price. And self-tacking jibs are not unconditionally favoured by cruising sailors either. Charter sailors, of all people, reject the automatically tacking headsails and would specifically look for and book boats with a conventional arrangement, as large providers report. This is because this customer group does not want to sit idly by while only the person at the helm has anything to do and sails actively.

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So what is the best solution? A headsail that overlaps only slightly and completely fills the triangle of mast, foresail and forestay creates short sheet paths and can also be turned quickly and trimmed comfortably by a small crew or single-handed. With rails on the coachroof or positioned close to it for narrow sheeting angles and then equipped with an inholer, it can be trimmed effectively. With padeyes on the deck edge and an outer sheet, the sail remains effective even on rougher courses.

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The following applies in particular to the self-tacking jib and the small genoa: A Code Zero or a Gennaker ideally completes the wardrobe, which then covers all wind angles well, promotes sailing fun and also keeps the crew busy. Overall, this means more clutter, but it serves the sailing finesse. More comfort is just as nice as it is good, but preferably not at the expense of performance. And if sailing were easy, it would be called football.

Fridtjof Gunkel

Deputy Editor-in-Chief of YACHT

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