How to adjust a Centreboard or Daggerboard in a dinghy (part 4 in a series)

[@merrinfroggett9597]

Ah, now I understand why you keep the centreboard fully down when using a spinnaker. Thanks Phil.

[@philswatersports]

No worries, glad you found it helpful 🙂

[@stevec-b6214]

So, I have a pivoting centreboard which changes centre of lateral resistance, would this be useful when sailing single handed without a jib? Could you do a video on single handing a dinghy with a jib? Thanks again for such a well made video.

[@philswatersports]

Hi Steve C-B, Thanks for the feedback and ideas. I have some ideas for future videos to help people with their sailing, including things like launch and recovery of a boat single-handedly, how the sail controls work, etc etc. I'll add your suggestion to the list. It's very time-consuming to make these and I'm already part-way through some others, so hopefully I can do something like this later in the year. In the meantime, assuming that you're asking for ideas about sailing a boat without a jib that would normally have a jib (rather than a single-sailed boat), then I'd suggest the following: 1. If the boat is designed to have a jib and you don't use it, the boat will try to turn into the wind a lot (explained in the part about sail balance & turning forces in my sail setting video). To counteract this turning force, pull the centreboard up about 30 to 45 degrees to balance the forces and make the rudder much lighter when the boat is flat (the centreboard/daggerboard video helps to show this in practice). 2. On many boats, the jib contains the forestay that holds the mast up, and is how the rig tension is applied. Be careful if you don't put the jib on at all - it's much better to put it on and tension the rig, and then furl the jib if possible so that the rig is properly supported. Some forestays are only designed to hold up the mast when not in use and aren't very strong, also known as 'lazy-stays' because they don't work hard! 3. If you're not using the jib in order to depower the rig, you could also consider reefing the mainsail. This will help to depower the boat, as well as helping to balance the sideways forces from the sail to make the boat more controllable. As the mainsail gets smaller, the power moves forwards again in the boat which will help to compensate to some extent for the lack of the jib. The boat will probably be better balanced with a reefed mainsail and jib instead of a full mainsail and no jib. Hope this helps Phil

[@stevec-b6214]

@@philswatersports Thanks Phil - that is a comprehensive answer!

[@philswatersports]

Hope it helps!

[@AlMerrymBintImranaway]

But but when something massive is block the center board, its best not to panic.

[@philswatersports]

That's true! Pull the board up briefly if you think you've got weed or rope round it and then check the rudder. Or stop head to wind and drift backwards off it, especially if you have a fixed keel that you can't lift up