Hello all, does anyone here have any links to any clips/videos that explain the basics of sailing. I have a bunch of questions. I'll just list them below and if anyone has any links that covers any of the content in these questions could you post it please. It would be epic thanks.
Question 1: if you're sailing a cat in the open ocean with a lot of wind and a big swell and have a decent speed up, say 45 knots, can you yank a hard right on the steering wheel and flip the whole boat?
Question 2: in the same conditions what about riding down waves. Can you go down a wave, nose dive and sink the boat?
3:How fast do normal sailboat go? Anything generic and smaller than 14m?
4: Do these things flip?
5: lots of Sam holes sailing videos and a few others solo sailing, they go to sleep while the boat keeps sailing. Can the boat just flip then sink whilst this is happening?
thanks in advance. Just finding the whole sailing in the ocean thing absolutely fascinating.
Q3. There is a hull speed rule (i.e. it's physics) but basically for a 30 foot yacht maybe 7 kts, would be typical.
Q4. All boats can tip over, even European ferries full of people, trucks, etc. However normal monohull yachts have keels which provide a 'righting force' which basically means that the weight will pull the boat back upright. However, good management can reduce the chances of inversion, using heaving-to, drogues, sea anchors, reefing the sails, etc.
Q5. "Can it just flip and sink" - see Q4. Not in normal weather and management/handling. I've gone to sleep while the yacht was sailing or motoring, even sleeping through my every-20-minute alarm. The yacht was quite happy to continue sailing ahead, past a rocky island (maybe 2 miles abeam). After a night sailing, I am quite delirious though, imagining that the Earth was moving under my feet, just like the past day and night.
Practice will answer all your questions. Just sail often. Day trips, short overnight trips, then longer multi-day coastal trips, and you will see how safe it is, and how to manage it all.
Question 1: if you're sailing a cat in the open ocean with a lot of wind and a big swell and have a decent speed up, say 45 knots,can you yank a hard right on the steering wheel and flip the whole boat?
Do you mean 45 knots of wind or 45 knots of boat speed?
Firstly 45 knots of wind is a lot of wind. To sail safely in that kind of wind you would need to be reefed right down (triple reef if possible or a main trisail). With a stormsail up forward. Maybe a drogue. (or car tire) out the stern.
If you mean 45 knots of boat speed, no way will you or I ever see that speed.
Question 2: in the same conditions what about riding down waves. Can you go down a wave, nose dive and sink the boat?
You can nose dive this is called a pitchpole. However you are more likely to turn sideways. A boat is NOT a surfboard and behaves differently.
If you were to do such a stupid thing sliding down a wave you could easily "flip the whole boat".
This is called a broach and can easily lead to a knockdown.
3:How fast do normal sailboat go? Anything generic and smaller than 14m?
As Phil has explained all boats have a theoretical hull speed. The longer the water line length the faster the boat.
Small boat slow. Big boat fast.
Cats and Tris are different and sail faster. Now, some boats are fitted with foils and are crazy fast.
Google sailboat speed to find out more.
4: Do these things flip?
By these things I guess you are talking about, "Anything generic and smaller than 14m? "
The short answer is yes. However they shouldn't.
Handled safely, in good condition and kept out of dangerous situations this shouldn't happen, but it does.
Google; Sydney to Hobart disaster for a scary introduction to BAD weather.
5: lots of Sam holes sailing videos and a few others solo sailing, they go to sleep while the boat keeps sailing. Can the boat just flip then sink whilst this is happening?
Sam is the luckiest sailor that I have seen on Youtube. Fun, but he gets away with stuff that makes me cringe.
Boats have been knocked down or capsized while the skipper or crew were asleep. Pretty rare though.
I have seen Sam sleep on coastal passages. The biggest danger is to hit something, like another boat or an obstruction.
lastly, you should be very dubious of what you see on Youtube.
Gibbo, read or listen to the book "a voyage for madmen" about the first golden globe race. Not the recent YouTube about Don McIntyre. It deals with the differences between multihulls and monohulls as well as a heap of other stuff and is a great yarn.
Go and crew for someone on a dinghy or cat at a local yacht club, preferably someone who wants to get the boat fully lit and will take you out when it's howling.
