Jib/Furler Question

[dgsl]

My wife and I just purchased a new Model M and then towed it for 17 hrs northward to get home. It is our second MacGregor, the first one being a Model X about five years ago.

The new boat has the optional factory furler and we would really appreciate an answer to the following questions:

1. Can the existing jib be used without the furler, i.e., the good old simple manual way?
2. Has the jib been modified for use with the furler?
3. Has the forestay been modified for use with the furler?

Thanks,
Darrell

[Frank C]

The new boat has the optional factory furler and we would really appreciate an answer to the following questions:

1. Can the existing jib be used without the furler, i.e., the good old simple manual way?
2. Has the jib been modified for use with the furler?
3. Has the forestay been modified for use with the furler?

Thanks,
Darrell

Actually, I think you'll need to answer your own questions. Just open some boxes and look at the stuff you received. However, just to clarify a few points:

• Macs don't use a headstay, which goes to the masthead. You correctly described the forestay, which goes to a point several feet below the masthead.
  
  The sail has no foil, but the furler does. It's the long, plastic extrusion with a hole for the forestay and a slot that holds the foresail. The "furling foresail" (for CDI's FF-2 furler) requires a #6 luff tape with an embedded plastic cable (6 mm) that slides into the furler's plastic foil.
  
  The factory provides a grommeted sail, which uses "hanks" to attach it to the bare forestay. When the dealer sells you a furler, he would usually (logically) convert the grommeted sail by installing a luff tape.
  
  If your dealer did not convert the foresail to a luff tape, then your jib will hank-on to the bare forestay, but cannot be used with the furler. It's a little hard to fathom a dealer selling you the furler without converting the sail to a luff tape.
  
  In my experience, the furler is usually delivered with a new forestay, so you shouldn't need to modify the factory forestay. If not, you might need to change the end-fittings.
  
  If you want to occasionally switch from a furling sail to a hank-on jib, you need two different sails, a furling sail (with luff tape) and a hank-on sail with grommets & hanks.

Congrats on the new boat!

[mtc]

When I installed the CDI, the foil needed to be shortened about 6" or so to fit onto the forestay. Additionally, I bored out the foil cap diameter a tad to allow the swedge to fit into the cap (the stay's double swedged) and allow full luff to be hoisted. Out of the box, it wouldn't give me enough luff tension because the foil wouldn't provide adequate length for the geni to be set.

I don't know why the foil needed to be cut. I followed the directions to the letter as well as the addage of 'measure twice, cut once' but needed to make minor modifications to the stock foil.

Anyone else run into this?

By the way, saddly, when I bored out the foil cap, probably only a 32nd, I cut into the halyard channel. Shouldn't cause a problem, but it annoyed me.

Michael