Finally joined the ranks of those who have capsized.

[persephone]

So while racing at QYC today I capsized. The wind had been pretty light (almost dead at times). Anyway I saw the puff and shift coming, but failed to recognize the intensity. Didn't have mainsheet in hand (nor did I have my pfd on... tsk tsk) and it seems like before I knew it the lee gunn'l was under water and I was standing on the side of the centerboard trunk. I did manage to climb over the high side in an attempt to get on the centerboard, but missed the mark and slid off just forward of it. At that point the mast went under. Luckily Quannapowitt is pretty shallow this year so it didn't turtle, but I still needed the rescue boat to come pull the masthead out of the mud.
All the extra flotation really helped, the boat was floating pretty high in the water when it was over, and when it righted it didn't wallow or counter roll and I still had 6 inches or so of freeboard.
The gear and the lines tangled, jib wrapped around the head stay, lost a towel, sponge and a scotchbrite pad (for cleaning the slime off the bottom).
Nothing broken and now I know what capsizing is like. I have to admit before today I wondered why so many have capsized in the daysailer. I have come close, but always seemed to recover with no more than 10-20 gallons of water coming over the lee gunn'l. Now I see just how fast she'll go in the right conditions.
One note on adding flotation. There has been some discussion on the merit of stuffing the area under the gunn'ls. I would say this was one of the keys to the boat not taking on as much water as others I have seen (water was below the level of the seat tops by a few inches). The boat stayed higher in the water, so as it rolled back there was less hull under to scoop up water.

[MrPlywood]

Glad everything worked out. Your situation sounds exactly like what I encountered last weekend. Good to know that the gunwale flotation helps. Did you need help getting it righted, other than the help to unstick the mast?

[persephone]

The procedure is to tie a line from the rescue boat (preferably the bow) over the high side and onto the submerged stay (or in my case the convenient handles on the cuddy sides right about where the o'day emblem is) and they pull the boat. This method pulls the boat sideways them up. I helped get it rolling by adding my weight to the board, but I didn't want to stick around there too long.
It's tough to say if I would have been able to right it alone. Even at 255 pounds I don't think I would have had enough energy (as in force times distance etc...) to roll it.

I still think I might try a controlled capsize (pull it over by the halyards close to shore and let it swamp) to see if I have enough mass to roll it over.

[MrPlywood]

Good to know. Thanks for the update.

One more question that I might post on it's own - do you have a rudder stop or any hardware that keeps your rudder from sliding out of the gudgeons? If I ever turtled, my rudder would likely head for the depths...

If I was on the right coast I'd come give you a hand with your controlled capsize. I have already enlisted help to do it here. If I can get the flotation added under the transom and then get everyone together we'll do it this season, if not it will be first thing next season.

[jdubes]

I can easily say that at 255lbs good luck at rolling it back over yourself. I couldn't, all i could do was prevent it from turtling. My centerboard would have snapped before i got it back over. It took me at 240 and roughly another 120 to right her.

[persephone]

I do have a stop for the rudder. My upper pintle is drilled below the gudgeon and I use a small 'trailer hitch pin' to keep it from falling out.
I don't trust the spring tab the rudders came equipped with. I never did, but this spring I bought a used rudder for our club daysailer that was recovered from the bottom of a lake... complete with that spring tab still attached!
On the centerboard, I am lucky enough to have bought my boat complete with a wood core centerboard, so it might be able to handle the extra weight.

[jeadstx]

I have a DS2 and when I capsized back in March, I had trouble righting it, although I tried putting my weight on the CB, I weigh 350 and that wasn't enough. I was able to keep it on it's side, holding on to the CB, while I swam it to shallower water. Once I was able to get the boat in water about 5 feet deep, I was able to right it easily since I had better leverage. My rudder was also pinned and stayed in place.


persephone,

On a side note I noticed in your signature that you have a National One Design. My dad started sailing those in the late 30's and I have the cotton sails from the boat he owned in the mid 50's

John

[persephone]

@jeadstx

Very cool. I found mine on craigslist. It's actually most likely from the late 40's or early 50's. It is in fair condition, many of the original bronze parts are still there. I also have one set of old cotton sails. I'm hoping to have it race ready next year, including a new set of sails made of a more modern material that still looks like cotton, and built in the same fashion as the originals. I want to keep the boat looking period correct for the late 40's.
Do you have anything else from the boat? Drawings, plans etc...?
Here's a link to my photobucket album for it.

http://s664.photobucket.com/albums/vv4/theflyingcloudsbucket/National%20One%20Design/

[jeadstx]

persephone,

I don't think I have anything else from my dad's boat. Anything other than the sails he probably adapted to other boats. I can check his workshop tho the next time I go to visit my parents. The only thing I really remember of his Nat'l One Design was going to the lake to bail it out (he sailed it on Lake Winnebago in Wisconsin). I never sailed in that boat that I know of since he sold it before I was 5 years old. Oddly, I can still picture the boat tho.

John

[K.C. Walker]

Hey Geoff,

Well, now you're making me think it's only a matter of time. I've definitely been out in conditions, including last week, where I felt it was a bit dicey. I guess I should start thinking more seriously about the safety issue. I'm often sailing where I'm more than a mile from shore and there aren't that many other boats out. And, often I'm solo so I might be riding the bottom of the boat for a while if I went over.

Last Thursday I was out in a breeze that was picking up pretty seriously so I was headed back to the dock. It had become less fun and a little more scary. The chop had picked up to 2-2.5 feet with some pretty good whitecaps, you know, with that sort of ominously dark water. While I was on my way back I noticed a bunch of J-80s heading out for the Thursday night race. I thought, that will be interesting, so I came back with the power boat to watch the race. Those boats are pretty spectacular in those conditions. Though, on the final leg of the race a big gust hit while the whole fleet was flying those big a-sails. The leaders had just crossed the line and were okay but the rest the fleet looked like it was really struggling and a couple of the boats went down. Of course, being good keel boats they did pop back up.

My boat came with a nice retrofit of foam panels from the gunwales to the seat tops. So, I have plenty of flotation. Though, with a wide boat like the DaySailer and having the flotation at the edges it does seem like it would be somewhat akin to trying to right a catamaran, though a narrow one. I've often wondered about using a righting strap or even a righting bucket in addition to the strap. Of course, the big problem is keeping the mast from going under before you can even attempt righting the boat. Maybe one of those silly looking floats that they put at the top of catamaran masts would be a good idea. I wonder how much flotation it would take to keep the mast from going under. It doesn't seem like it should be much.

I'm glad it all worked out and if you do some controlled capsize and recovery I'd be interested to hear the results.

KC

[jeadstx]

After my capsize in March I added some foam flotation inside the mast near the masthead and also added a small plastic water bottle at the masthead for flotation in case of another capsize. Fortunately I haven't capsized again to try out my masthead flotation.

John

[GreenLake]

I'm still partial to the idea of fitting the bladder and mechanism of an automatic life jacket to the tip of the mast. That should give a good combination of low profile and high buoyancy. (I seem to dimly recall that someon mentioned an actual product based on those lines).

[jdubes]

The sailing association in my area sets up their boats with what looks like lobster buoies at the top of the mast to prevent a turtle.

Before
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7735240@N05/3119891312/in/set-72157611344773695/

After
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7735240@N05/3119892542/in/set-72157611344773695/

[K.C. Walker]

I found this article on the Albacore website http://usaa.albacore.org/node/5 . I think it's a pretty good article and I think I'm going to rig some recovery lines on my boat. I'd really like to try this out maybe we can get together sometime and see if this will work for a Daysailer.

KC

[jeadstx]

The attachment of "recovery lines" make sense to me. In my capsize I couldn't right the boat with the CB, but when I was in shallow enough water where I could reach up high enough to grab the rail, the boat righted easily. A line to grab onto might provide the extra leverage needed to right the boat.

One of the things I remember most from the capsize was how big the boat looked while floating in the water holding onto the CB.

John