Tell Tale Placement

[bcoonan]

I am new to cat boats and am having trouble reading air flow.  My Sun Cat has two tell tales on the leech.  Will adding tell tales near the luff or to the leech make a difference?

[cavie]

I believe must of us have 3 on the leach.

[CaptRon28]

It's a fairly small sail, so the two on the leach could be enough. But 3 might be a drop better. The larger sail on my Horizon has 3. Don't bother with adding any to the luff. It won't really help.

[capt_nemo]

Rum Cat,

Short answer to your question is YES!

Like you, I want to see the air flow across my Sun Cat mainsail. Therefore, I added several sets of tell tales to the luff and two sets behind the gaff just to be aware of what is going on with air flow across the sail. Do I use them, YES. Do they help me sail the boat more efficiently, YES.

Check out page 19 here http://www.go-embedded.com/Sailingmanual.pdf for a diagram and description of the behavior of tell tales on a catboat main.

Here is a pic of my Sun Cat with luff tell tales visible and streaming.



Hope this helps.

capt_nemo

[Craig]

Agree with Don. I too have leech and luff telltales. My forward telltales are actually a bit aft of where Don has his  by a couple of inches. Chose that position to avoid possible mast turbulence. but not really that critical. Three is about right. On the leech of the HC I have one at each batten and a light nylon flag at the peak. Three forward telltales about 18" aft of leech.

[bcoonan]

Thanks Capt Ron, Cavie and Capt Nemo, this is a big help.