New screetcher sail tested
With almost all the crew on board, we got Revelations ready for a quick spin around the block, rather sail a couple of miles in False Bay to test the newly manufactured screetcher sail. This is a beast of a sail and weighs a ton! With a fresh breeze blowing, a perfect day for sailing, we eased out of our mooring and slowly motored to open waters. To overcome our problem of a twisting screetcher halyard, as a temporary measure, Brent rigged up a 1:1 purchase and the electric winches took serious strain lifting the heavy sail to the top of the mast. The screetcher was then unfurled and in it's fully opened state, filled one half of the sky. A quick change in direction and the screetcher was hard at work - pushing a 20 metric ton yacht at 8 knots (about 15 km per hour) through the water. That takes a lot of power and it is all free clean energy! At almost full revs, our twin engines can barely do that.
It was a real struggle putting the beast back in it's cage! Joe and Patrick combined really struggled and had to strain hard to furl the sail again. Wow! This was really hard work! Once tamed, we headed back to our mooring in False Bay Yacht Club. It was a bit tricky to get Revelations back into the tight space allocated to us.