Anonymous wrote:

i wonder how other viking sized sailors have solved the problem…

I think there are a number of solutions depending on ones situation. All of us who have posted have different situations and tend to think in terms of the situation we have ourselves. I would imagine Viking Sized sailors.... from that era, almost never slept straight out but rather curled up in as close to a ball as possible. Funny thing for me is that while I tend to curl up more at home where I have lots of room, I often find myself stretched out in our V-berth... go figure.

Anonymous wrote:

i have had two boats with a junk rig.

at the moment i'm sailing a classic catboat with bermuda sail (marconi rig).

but i would like to go back to the junk sail.

i am currently looking for a new boat to convert.

for instance, a marieholm 261 looks great.

i do, however, have a problem:

the space for sleeping is lost in the bow due to the mast, especially since i'm 6'2" tall; if the mast is in the middle of the bow berth, i can't sleep there, and the berths amidships usually are too narrow for me, and also often too short.

how have you solved this problem, if you have it too – how do you sleep in your boats?

maybe there are also pictures?

the vertue ("chu–fa") by ute hildendag, for example, has an elegant solution (you can sleep athwart or across), as you can see in the pictures; i know the boat, and even the toilet is right at the front in the bow, that's a great solution!

but when i'm looking for a "new" boat to convert, i have to look for storage space and room to sleep, too.

any ideas how to solve the berth problem?

You can move the mast to one side to create room or you can put the mast at the foot of the bunk and rake the mast forward to get the masthead in the right position for the sail.You could even combine both measures.

David Tyler raked the mast on Annie Hills old boat Fantail a Raven 26 and I did the same on  Frederic Elso's Hogfish.

I can recommend putting the mast off-centre.  I've had two boats with this solution and it was never an issue.  (What is truly astonishing is how few people even notice!!)

George: "...but doesn't the split/aero junk has to handle more lines?"

Len: "My understanding was that the SJR used less lines not more..."

Neither generalisation is strictly correct.

There is nothing magic about the split itself which makes the sail any easier or more difficult to set.

In addition to the mast parrels and the sheeting, contiguous (unsplit) sails seem to need extra parrels to hold the sail to its right shape - sometimes these parrels are the "running" type which means they may be "handled" (adjusted) from time to time eg after reefing. Generally speaking, a split sail would be no different.

The Amiina SJR may be a special case, not just any old junk sail with a split in it. With its low yard angle and high balance, and the proportions of the sail which have been carefully calculated, the horizontal forces needed to hold the sail in shape are minimal and none of the normal parrels (standing or running) are necessary. The sail can be made to drape perfectly under the sheeting forces and gravity alone - almost, but not quite.

Not quite, because the other special feature of this rig is that it uses spanned running parrel-downhauls instead of the usual standing mast parrels (either long or short) which used by conventional sails. These running mast parrels undoubtedly also play a small part in getting the sail to drape correctly. On the usual 5-panel version, two of these are needed, and they are adjusted each time the sail is reefed or unreefed. Just a tweak is needed, and it may be done at leisure. But they are "control lines" none the less, and are part of the deal.

I guess we could generalise by saying that both a split sail and a contiguous sail will need extra control lines of one type or another. A badly designed SJR might well require both types.

(PS it might be possible for the aerojunk or some kind of hybrid to do without any extra control lines, where there are "hard" batten parrels, in the form of wishbone battens, or the D-former or "ovals" seen recently eg Serenity (Boat of the Month Sept 2023).  I don't know about either of these types from direct experience. Generally however, there is "no such thing as a free lunch").

By the way, George: in addition to the suggestions made by Len regarding mast placement vis a vis sleeping arrangements: it is not unusual for a junk rig to have the mast offset from the centre line. The sail itself is slightly offset anyway. Off-setting the mast by 20 or 30 cm would not affect performance in any measurable way, and may be a solution if the mast appears to close to the "heads" or a berth or a  vital companionway.

Along with the range of mast positions fore-and-aft (by considering the range of mast-balance of the rig, from about 10% to 33% depending on the rig) you might also have a little offset athwartships as an extra variable to play with.

again, thank you very much!! 

very helpful — lots to ponder!!