New Owner in New Mexico

Hello Everyone,

Please join me in welcoming Tim Star aboard as the new owner of Rocket #12. Tim divides his time between New Mexico and Hawaii (very nice!) and will be taking delivery of his boat in New Mexico in late August or early September for some lake sailing. I've invited Tim to join our blog and hope that he'll jump in when he takes delivery or sooner.

The April issue of SAIL has generated a lot of interest for Rocket Boats and will be up on our website as soon as I can track down our elusive webmaster. If anyone would like a PDF copy now please let me know and I can email it to you.

Thanks and welcome to the club Tim!!


Anthony

Here are some pictures of our first race day. It was blowing, and Alan was on the boat. That is one fast Rocket! Good times.

Here is the beginning of the tuning and trim guide I have been developing for myself with the Rocket 22.

This IS NOT a definitive, sanctioned or official tuning guide. I haven’t had the chance to go head to head with other Rockets, and my boat may be slightly different due to small changes that have been made in set up, etc. Given the dynamic state of trim, tuning, and sailing techniques the following should be viewed as my impressions consistent with my sailing style, rather than guide for how to sail the boat. I’ll leave that up to the first Rocket 22 world champion.

It is a collection of my observations and experiences with the boat, and I hope you all will share the same.

I also hope everyone is planning on coming to the Best of the Okanagan this summer to rub elbows, share tips, and have a great time. If you haven’t seen the promotion for the event it is on the Rocket site.

The next phase in this guide will be determining base settings for rake, shroud tension, forestay length, mast jack turns, etc. I am playing with lots of different variables but I think there is light at the end of the tunnel.

This boat is so much fun, because it can be a real challenge in all conditions – but SO rewarding when you nail it. It’s not hard, but occasionally confounding. By this I mean taking a traditional keelboat (e.g. J22) or sport boat (Melges 24) approach only gets you halfway there. It wasn’t until I talked with the 5o5 and 49er guys that the whole thing came into focus…blurry focus. Since throwing my preconceptions out the window I am making leaps and bounds in understanding about how to sail the boat and set it up. I find it a very cool process.

Upwind, the boat is operating in three modes:

Mode 1: 2-8kts we are adequately powered up with the boat being quite weight sensitive.
Mode 2: 9-12 we are already overpowered, but with the right recipe she finds her groove, and the application of some special techniques (like heeling through waves) makes a huge difference in performance
Mode 3: 12-25 doing all that we can to de-power the boat.
Note: I’ve sailed in 25+three times. That’s not fun on any boat, and this is no different although remarkably dry comparatively.

The lack of backstay and mast jack make tuning the boat different than the keelboats I am used to. Normally as the wind comes on we crank on the rig…that doesn’t really work with the Rocket – in fact it is the opposite in some cases. Rig tune at the dock becomes pretty important and the associations of what each shroud is doing needs adjustment.

Sails

The jib

We are asking A LOT of this one little jib. But there are plenty of controls to change the shape. I found it is really important to get the tack low, otherwise the clew height is thrown out of wack.

Jib Halyard

The set up on the boat allows for a ton of range in the halyard tension. I put in enough tension to get the wrinkles just out of the luff. This winter the breeze has been up just about everywhere I have sailed so I have taken to cranking on the jib halyard to round the entry, pulling draft forward. This is helping de-power the sail too…a need that comes on quickly. It is hard to repeat settings without marks on a luff so much of these adjustments are feel/look driven. In the 8-12 range I find that playing the jib halyard is fast.

Jib Sheet

The boat really responds to active jib sheeting. Legs in hiking will make these sorts of changes easy, and should keep the jib trimmers VERY involved in the game. Interestingly, I like to use a leech telltale for the trimmer (leech telltale for the trimmer, luff telltales for the driver). I have placed tape on the top and bottom spreaders to get a better reference point data. Because the clew is so close to the lead block small adjustments make a huge difference. I have found that a very twisted jib (at least matching the mains leech) is quick, and doesn’t backwind the main. I am trimming the bottom of the sail pretty hard and twisting off the top. Again the leech telltale tells the story – but as the wind comes on I sheet hard and if we get stuffed I ease (an inch) and start over. As the breeze comes on I move the lead aft and then ease slightly (two-three inches. Then I move to barber hauling out and sheeting hard again – repeating the process. I have been sailing in big breeze with a luffing main and a hard sheeted jib, but think that easing the jib a bit and keeping the main working might be faster. I am used to using IN-Haulers instead of out-haulers. It might be interesting to see if out-hauling out of a tack and then shifting gears in, on, and forward would be fast. I am treating the barber haulers like the traveler for my jib.

The main

It is a BIG main. I’d like to see a reefing point (or two) put in, but then again I like this boat for its potential in short distance races (under 200miles).

Luff tension

I am going for max hoist, and in fact would be a fan of a halyard lock, adjusting the tension in the luff with the Cunningham.

The Outhaul

The outhaul controls the main more so here than on most boats I have sailed. It really can be eased off and seems to have major impact of the power of the sail. I ease it to add helm/power. In light air the rounded leech seems to help with pointing, but you can go too far with this allowing air to stack up and stall in the sail. The bottom telltales tell the story.

The mainsheet

I drive the boat with a combination of sheet and traveler and because of that am constantly adjusting them. My sheet range is about 6 inches in most conditions. Again, unlike many keelboats that like to stall the top to promote pointing this boat seems to REALLY like flow. I try to keep flow going ALL the time. Unlike the jib, which seems to like over sheeting in most cases the main stalls early, and when that happens the skinny foils stall. I ease the main quite often. In the big breeze I am carrying a lot of luffing – but because I have dropped traveler I try to sheet as hard as possible. As the sheet is tensioned it acts somewhat as a backstay, you can go too far…and you’ll know when you have☺

The traveler

I play the traveler quite a bit. In the light stuff I bring it up to promote pointing and add a little helm. In puffy/moderate conditions I get a serious workout. In big breeze I vang sheet and drop the traveler.

I rarely change the traveler without adjusting the sheet. Under 10 the traveler brings the boom to centerline and the main is twisted – i.e. LOTS of sheet adjustments, as the breeze comes up play both mainsheet and traveler, but more traveler than sheet. Above 15 the traveler is all the way down, vang on hard, and I am back to using sheet.

Vang

In the light air I have it all the way off, because it impacts the leech and stalls it. Above 15 I pull it on hard so that when I blow the main the whole sail dumps and then comes back on quickly when I need it. At the windward mark it comes off again initially otherwise the boat will not come down in breeze. Off the wind it is the throttle! I have mine run differently so that it can be played better from the back of the boat when on plane.

Steering the boat

I think you could remove the tiller and lock the rudder in place on this boat. Upwind, I drive with the sails and weight as much as possible. The rudder doesn’t really steer the boat that well anyway, so when you try and steer with it you are just creating drag that is getting overpowered by the sail plan. I also have had to go away from my point/feather ways and drive with the bow down. I move forward as far as possible in order to stop the gurgle at the back of the boat (note: DON’T leave the motor on the back!). FYI - I think the tiller could be quite a bit longer and recurved.

Downwind in light air I like to stand and help drive the boat with my weight. Downwind in heavy air I am outboard and steer pretty aggressively with weight AND tiller. It is important to get ahead of the boat because the time from stall to wipe out is VERY short. But once you have a groove going weight will get you where you need to go. I also have two downwind modes. The hot and the deep. Deep starts with LOTS of weather heel. Until the helm goes to lee helm. It is a good skill to learn because it makes heavy air jibes a snap. And then hot. The transition is still being worked out. I sail pretty hot until the 9-11 kts zone. I think we loose in this zone because it is pre-plane and we are about 10 degrees off of symmetrical boats. (NOTE: I fly the A-kite almost exclusively). That said, a wavy 10kts and we can work the waves pretty well and sail just as deep as anyone. Over 20kts I switch to outside jibes, keep the jib out and ROCK AND ROLL. You can sail pretty deep (by the lee) and still plane – then the boat trips. We are experimenting with this as our jibing technique in big breeze. It is scary but we think it works and it is WICKED fast…so long as you don’t mess up.

Just a few other things. I am generally sailing with three. I really like the way that works. I am driving and trimming main, my middle person is working the tweaks upwind and trims the kite while the forward person trims the jib and runs the pit. While I’d love the extra weight on the windward leg, I really like the mobility in the boat and think that in the light stuff we’ll crush.

This is pretty darn fun! When my rig numbers make more sense I’ll forward.

This just in from Alan

Hi guys,

This is the latest Quantum main in gusty, strong winds (up to 22-25). We clocked 13 under main and jib. This has 1in taken off the luff from the previous ones. I also have aprox 30in rake measured at the boom. The D1 Loos was 21, D2 25, and the D3 (lower) 14. Even when we were over powered it stayed flat but didn’t flog. There was 2 of us on board, the barber ½ way out, traveler off center by about 8”. I had 10 turns on the mast screw. I think the D2 and D3 are the ones that controls mast bend and the D1 is the one that creates bend. Increased rake neutralizes the helm and reduces foil stall. I heard recently that the reason for increased rake is to bring the CE back and the rudder and keel become canards sharing the lift making the helm light and neutral. I don’t know if its true but I’m a believer after todays sail. Oh ya it was flat water and shifty.

Alan

Alan Barnes

I am going to be using the local Doyle loft for building my sails. theyh are keen to take a crack at getting the class's business and I think that competition between lofts should be beneficial for us all over time. Now the question arises with respect to sail shape/type. My question for Alan and Anthony is, are you making progress on building a polar diagram? If not have you asked Don Martin for one?

Second question to Alan and the rest of the owners. What head sails are you using at what angle and wind speed ?

Sailing out west I expect that you have lots of info in the 8-10 knot wind range, but what are using at 15K? What do you think would be useful?

Comments from the Peanut Gallery - But good comments!

The OD Rules discussion has been stirring up comments from all kinds of places, Sailing Anarchy for example, plus I've also had a few emails from Rocket supporters, one of which I'll share here. Mike is not an owner, but a huge fan of our boat, a really nice guy and he also has some comments worth considering before we draft our OD Rules V2. Anyway, read on.

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Hey there Rocket Man:

Just stumbled across your rules note on SA and not having bought a boat I realize that I'm in the peanut gallery, but I'll share a few thoughts for what they're worth:

1. Both Chutes: The boat's a cool trainer, arguably better than purpose built boats like the U24, and more exciting than the Colgate. Part of what you could learn is when to use what chute. Or do Olympic style courses with two broad reaches and a dead down leg and use both chutes. Big part of the boat's appeal.

BUT, maybe let local fleets opt for one or the other to keep costs down in the early going if they want to. E. Coast might go syms in lower wind speed on PHRF beer can courses, west coast might go asym. Eventually, I think both is part of the fun.

Alternatively, start selling a 2 chute pack with the boat if you can get the right price point. But both is cool, and your hull is perhaps a bit unusual in that both have their place on the boat -- it will work really well with either, depending on the conditions.

2. Hiking: Seems to me sport boats love righting moment, and need to be flat, so I'd love wires. But I think I might go legs in. This boat is very broad and powerful as it is, and I keep hearing how M24 crews hate life because they sit out, get beat up, enjoy life beyond the windward mark for a 5 minute rinse cycle and repeat. Not a trait you want to copy. In fact, I'd talk to Mr. Clean about all the things the M24 sailors hate, and at least ponder changing all of them. The M's apparently are virtually two classes in one, with pros running programs, and everybody else getting really good cast off sails after every race.

3. Sails: Unlimited materials and no purchase restrictions would worry me. Your niche is to be a more pocketbook/amateur/tweaking friendly M24 in a sense. The M24 pros buy a new jib for every second regatta (or so one hears), and you need look no further than SA for a humourous rant about what you need to really run a competitive M24 campaign. Again, you don't want that.

Not arguing for white sails, mind you, or that you should keep sail sales all to yourself. But if you could find a happy medium -- a modern low stretch material with a little longevity to it -- and then have a sails per year limit with a breakdown/destruction exception, you'd help draw folks into a high-performance, lower cost of ownership plan.

Maybe the class could revisit materials at established intervals (5 years?) so that you can take advantage of developments without breaking the bank for current owners. I'm not good yet with the materials, but you're looking for the sweet spot in price/performance/longevity and then to prevent the winning with checkbook thing.

I'll ponder some more, and take a better read when I get a chance, but these are the gut reaction.

Cheers,

Mike R.

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Anthony:

After I sent along my gut reactions, I ran across your owner’s blog and saw discussion of the "owner/driver" concept. I think I'd go with whoever that was who said no "owner/driver" but not pros on the boat during sanctioned races.

This one's harder, because if the pros adopted you the way they have the

M24 (unlikely anyway), they give you a huge profile. But they probably also seriously mess up the level playing field, lead to big intimidation, tend to make the racing too "serious," and so on.

But as a guy who crews all the time, I gotta tell you that the night I was invited to drive the Taylor 38 I was crewing on in what turned out to be 15-18 knots (surfing anyone???) was a really good time -- don't know any better way to encourage new ownership than that. You also want families to let kids drive, etc., etc.

Cheers,

Mike R.

Michael D. Rowe

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My one more thought for today is about the weight limit. I think it important, and I think it may need some thought and experimentation even if it slows down adoption of the rules. Here's the "why," but I'm not in a position to tell you "how."

This all goes back to something Major Hall taught me about what makes a "good" one design back when I was getting into racing sailboards (and he was coaching the Olympic development program). The rule of thumb, as he put it to me then, is that in a good one design fleet, the fastest boat would be no more than 10% faster than the slowest boat sailed in some minimally competent way.

This made great sense to me then, and it still does. It keeps the racing close, if prevents new folks from getting discouraged and thinking they're idiots who will never perform. It keeps the fleet together and keeps the racing interesting and challenging. And it's dang hard to do in modern boats, ESPECIALLY in modern boats that plane.

In the Rocket, you have a lesser version of the problem I was describing for sailboards off the wind, AND a distinct problem relative to holding the boat down in heavy air/displacement mode, it seems to me. The trouble is, you don't know how MUCH of a problem you have in either category until you get out on the water and test (maybe you could do it with velocity prediction programs, but I doubt it).

What you want is clear enough -- you want the least restrictive weight rules possible (to make it inclusive and keep everybody happy) consistent with something close to what I've always thought of as "Major Hall's dictum." This may well mean a min weight to prevent lightweights planing away early, and a max for heavy air. The really cool part is that my instinct is that this will be one of the least weight sensitive boats around because of its basic hull form and high-powered sail plan. Of course, my instincts about these things are often flat wrong, but you're WAY better off than the sailboarders, and probably better off in this sense that something like the M24.

But you want to get this right, because if the good guys are planing away and regularly leaving the newbies wallowing, it's not good for the class. And you may need something provisional, because unless you can actually go out and do boat-to-boat testing in a variety of conditions.

OK, that's all from the non-owners gallery for now. Hope this doesn't convince you that I'm totally out of my tree.

But let me do one more thing . . . Having read a couple of Kristen's comments on the blog (all good), and realizing he's local to my neighborhood (hope he's having fun with "Count Down"), I'm collecting my earlier thoughts below and passing them along to see what he thinks (not to mention collecting everything in one place for you -- at the very least, we in the peanut gallery should make things convenient).

Best Regards,

Mike

Loos gauge numbers

Here are a few loos numbers I have put together so far. "0" on the mast jack is where the mast screw just engages with the mast post (2 or so turns from the very bottom).

Mast cap interm lower
0 just tight
3 11.5 sloppy sloppy
5 17.0 " "
6 18.5 " "
7 21.0 loose ""
8 22.5 tight tight
9 23.5 12.0 5
10 23.5 14.0 5
11 24.5 17.0 10

I found that in 10 - 12 knots of wind, 8 turns was perfect. Anything over 15 knots, and I would go with 11-12 turns. Bear in mind, that my Quantum main is cut very full. Depending on the wind this weekend, I may try to tighten the intermediates and lowers slightly.