Light Air Sails: How to Handle Them

It’s easy to look at long-distance racing yachts of 60ft and above with multiple downwind sails set on roller furling gear and assume similar setups are ideal for cruising yachts. To some extent this is true, and much of the excellent gear now used on cruisers was first developed aboard such craft. However, there can also be problems with applying the same principles to smaller boats and different sails. It’s therefore important to understand the pros and cons of each system.

SNUFFERS

Little more than a decade ago a snuffer—basically, a long, cloth tube with a line, or lines for pulling it down over a deployed sail—was the only device a cruising sailboat was likely to carry for handling light-air downwind sails, and these still have their place, in particular with symmetrical spinnakers and asymmetrics designed for sailing deep downwind. Used correctly, they are also well proven and have helped many thousands