Re: Using a tether on a P-19

From: SolarFry@aol.com
Date: Fri Jan 28 2000 - 13:10:57 PST


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
        West Wight Potter Mailing List maintainer
                dfarrell@ridgecrest.ca.us
           List hosted by www.tscnet.com
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
As an experienced draggee (person dragged through water hanging from a line
attached to a vessel) I can state that forces exerted on holddown eyebolt by
a person being dragged are quite substantial. Enough to flip a small vessel.
The amount of water swallowed is enough to empty half the ocean making it
possible to walk back to boat. Although, feeling much, much heavier and
waterlogged..

I would like to humbly suggest that any "tether" applied to a P15 be placed
on the stern. Attaching to mast may have the unfortunate result of knocking
mast against water due to sudden drag from person falling and dragging
through water. Flipping boat would make it easier for sailor to get back
aboard after falling over due to a lower freeboard. But, he would then have
to contend with all that water inside himself and his boat..

The objective of a tether is not to keep a person aboard as some individuals
state, but to make it difficult for boat to sail away without sailor. Such a
thing will allow sailor to access different areas of vessel with knowledge he
can recover from a swim. It is intended to allow easy (???) return of sailor
to boat after falling overboard.

A "Short harness" is intended to keep sailor aboard while sailing but will
not allow motion fwd or aft of boat. In offshore racers I have been on, the
harness is clipped to a sunken eyebolt either in cockpit or sailor's station
with no more than 3 feet of line.
In a knockdown most of the bruises received are from harness keeping you
aboard while you fly against the wheel, winch, bimini, cockpit seats, etc.

With a short harness, a strong cable from a point on top of cockpit hatch to
bow is used to clip harness to while working foredeck. This line allows your
harness to keep you aboard while walking foredeck. Many sailors hate the
harness and elect to carry a teether line with long line to walk around deck
unhindered by a harness.

My 2 cents worth.

I managed to get 2 hours sailing time this morning.. Love my Potter..

Best
SF

In a message dated 1/27/00 3:36:07 PM Pacific Standard Time,
kent@songbird.com writes:

<< It really is just a matter of priorities.
 
 We have the following design goals
 
 0) keep you attached to the boat
 1) keep you on the boat
 2) avoid hanging over the side
 3) allow you to reach all the places you need to reach
 4) convenient to use
 
 Of course, if you have 1, you have 0 as well.
 If you are designing a tether for a child, then you can optimize for 1
 and 2, easily.
 
 For an adult single hander, 3 is a much higher priority, and 2 and 3
 may be impossible to implement simultaneously, as a practical matter.
 
 A long tether attached to the mast or similar location meets 0,2,3, and
 4. It also has the benefit of extreme simplicity.
>>



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Jan 31 2000 - 03:27:10 PST