| Welcome to Elliott7. We hope you enjoy your visit. You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free. Join our community! If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features: |
| Good times!; Story time for best all time E7 rides! | |
|---|---|
| Tweet Topic Started: Feb 27 2008, 11:29 PM (331 Views) | |
| Number 48 | Feb 27 2008, 11:29 PM Post #1 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
I like stories, so I'll share our most recent adventure on Taking Back Sunday: It was my brother's birthday and he has been sick for several months, but was on the mend, so we decided that we'd enter a Lake Macquarie Yacht Club race in early February and have a bit of fun with a few mates, two of which haven't done a whole lot of sailing. I got up early and towed the boat from Sydney to LMYC where I met Dave at 10:00am so we could enter the race and get rigged. It was raining and the breeze had kicked from 10 knots to about 18 knots by the time we had filled out the obligatory paperwork and were ready to stand the rig. With the breeze hard on our side, we basically ran the mast forward, all the time concious that it could well get blown out of our hands! Anyway, we put the boat in the water at the boat ramp and motored it over to the jetty, tied it up and headed off to pick up a case of tinnies and grab some lunch. When we returned, there was 18-20 knots of breeze and the talk in the bar was of some kind of storm which was forecasted to blow at 35-40 knots. Given the forecast was for 25 knots max, we ignored the jokes about the little E7 being blown off the lake and began rigging for the race. The remainder of the crew arrived and we headed down to the start off Cardiff Point with a No.2 heady on to make it more comfortable for our inexperienced crew. On the way to the start, the breeze faded and heavy rain set in, which required us to put in the companionway cover and washboard. Soon it became apparent that a No.2 wouldn't cut it, so Dave headed up on the foredeck and changed to the No.1. We statrted the handicap start race in a 6-8 knot sou'wester and enjoyed a reasonable first beat to Coon Island. We crossed a Northshore 38 on the beat (when on port), whose skipper barked "Don't you do that again!". He probably missed knocking our outboard off by about a foot. The guys made some smart arse remarks and our whole crew roared with laughter. Meanwhile, the skies to the south were blackening and towards the south end of the lake we could see white water as the predicted storm front approached. We rounded the top can in front of a Magic 25 and a new Farr 40 (handicap start, remember). The Magic promply set his masthead assy in the building 15 knot breeze and planed away towards the wing can. The crew set our chute and we began to plane on the back of small waves on the relatively shy reach. Dave decided that given it was a shy reach, we wouldn't worry about dropping the heady. The breeze began to build rapidly and we were forced to bear away to keep Sunday on her toes. The Farr 40, by this time, was a couple of hundred metres to windward and probably on the same ladder rung. I looked over my shoulder and noticed that the lake was nearly white at the top can. Large keel boats were broaching, their spreaders near the water and their kites flogging wildly. Several yachts had torn their kites and were atempting to gather the mess. The Farr 40 picked up the breeze and beared away twenty degrees and broke out onto a weird sort of plane. Looked like he was doing 14's or 15's under a huge masthead symmetrical. He overtook us and it was at this point that we felt the hand of God. Sunday accelerated rapidly and began surfing like a Volvo 70 in the southern ocean! We lost probably 20-30 degrees of height and could barely hear ourselves shouting for trim over the roar of the bow wave. We blew the tweaker, dumped half an armful of vang and sat the boom just off the leeward stays. This crazy shit went on for what seemed like 10 minutes or so, and as the breeze built, the surfing became wilder to the point where I questioned whether this thing was going to hang in there. The helm was rock hard and I was concerned that I'd push the toe rails off the floor if I had the bear away any more. It was either that or I'd bend the tiller (or more likely stretch my arms!). Sunday began to adopt a bow-down attitude as our speed built and the crew cheered as we planed comfortably though the Farr 40's wind shadow and straight out from underneath him as if he was standing still. We hit one of the building waves, and punched through it like it was nothing. The crew was drenched in a thick sheet of salt water. The faster it went, the flatter it planed and eventually, I called for Dave to blow the spinnaker sheet while the sheethand helped me steer her away. We sheeted back on to our new course (another 5 degrees lower) with a loud "whomp" from the chute as it snapped open. I noticed the forestay was limp and the heady was like another chute, such was the bow in the forestay. Some of the crew complained over the roar of the breeze and bow wave that the mast was bending horrifically. We told them to forget it and shuffle back. Eventually it became apparent that we were a long way from the wing can. The tweaker was hauled in and the chute doused in a precise military-style operation. Scarily, dropping the kite seemed to have little effect on our speed which we estimated to be in the 18's prior to knocking off the chute. We struggled to make the wing can and eventually were forced to put in two tacks to get there. Dave attempted a heady change on a questionable square run to the bottom mark off Cardiff Point, however, upon hoisting the No.2, the press clips failed and the heady was blown to leeward, only being secured by the halyard and the captive pin shackle on the bow. After retrieving the heady, we decided to call it a day and surfed under main alone back to a hot shower at the Yachty and to drink some of those tins we didn't get to enjoy. Reliable sources in the bar afterwards stated that the windspeed reached 35 knots for a period of approximately 10 minutes, which then settled to a more reasonable 25 knots. Tough times indeed! Bit of a novel, I know, but now it's over to you... |
![]() |
|
| splat | Feb 29 2008, 12:18 AM Post #2 |
|
Newbie
![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Nice to see you guys with the same sort of problems we have had the last couple of races. Do you find that you run out of room to soak easily at this sort of speed. If you hot your angle up the helm just loads and you feel its just going to wipe out at any moment, other than flat off. When we dropped our kite the other day, and we began blast reaching we found that when we brought the angle up it didn't really effect our speed we were still crashing along at about 14-16 knots. We couldn't keep it together though with the kite in the waves. Waht sort of weight did you have onboard? |
![]() |
|
| Number 48 | Feb 29 2008, 05:53 AM Post #3 |
|
Advanced Member
![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]()
|
Talking to the more experienced guys, it seems that the rudders are the boat's biggest problem. They clearly have plenty of bite as observed by our most recent experience, but fact of the matter is, it's a door. I think they need a more high-profile, laminar flow style section with a narrower chord length. That day in the storm on Lake Macquarie, it was a real pig to steer. We probably had only just over 300kg on the boat in total. Two of the crew were basically useless, so my brother, my mate and I had our hands full. At Skandia Geelong Week week we got a cracking ride on a fairly shy reach in a fair bit less breeze, and we reckon we were doing 15-17 knots, although it was hard to tell without the log in, and four big blokes in front. Most of them reckon 17, so I'll run with that. The rudder was incredibly hard to hold that day, but we had our "normal" crew weight on board (380kg) and were sailing it pretty hard. I think it feels like its going to wipe out when you're pushing that hard, but I'm too scared to push the boundaries and see exactly how far it will go. I definitely know it can't be fast when you're fighting the rudder like that - such a big board at any angle other than straight must equal a shitload of drag. |
![]() |
|
| « Previous Topic · General · Next Topic » |





![]](http://z6.ifrm.com/static/1/pip_r.png)




2:46 PM Jul 11