I sailed Arion for 10 years with just a small outboard motor on the transom for maneuvering in harbours.  It was useless in any sort of swell.  We got by with a few close scrapes and a lot of patience, which is why I fitted a small diesel engine eventually.  I believe a small engine is very useful.  I originally had a bermudian rig on Arion and the only difference with my junk rig is that I do not have any light weather sails.  One answer to this, which I was unable to do on Arion, being a short and heavy vessel, is to give your junk rig more sail area than the working bermudian rig.  Tom Colvin liked about 35% extra, which is about the same as a bermudian rig with light weather genoa or reacher flying.  Paul Thompson on La Chica added 50%, and I hear that LC is no slouch.  You just reef earlier, which is so easy with junk rig, and once the sail starts coming down, so does your weight aloft.  The taller masts, without standing rigging, do not affect the centre of gravity very much, if at all.  When Arion's sail is furled, the weight aloft is significantly less than it was with the old bermudian rig.  It makes Arion's motion a bit corkier in an open roadstead (I am rolling and bobbing as I type).  Sometimes I think about borrowing the practice of old Breton fishermen, who used to hoist an anchor up the mast when hove to at sea, to ease the motion!

Hi All,

I am interested in any feedback from members regarding going engineless with a junk rig. I was always interested in sailing without an auxiliary from my youth, and when my 54' ketch lost its engine in Mexico several years ago, I decided to keep her that way, with no regrets.

I have now started to the design to convert my Elizabethan 31 to a junk rig, and am seriously considering selling the engine in the process. Would losing it seriously compromise safety with a junk rig anymore than what it does with a Bermudian?

James