Steadying sail vs. get home sail. Unlike most of the scholastic arguments on the TWL, I have some practical data on this one. I have an older Willard Horizon motorsailer, PUFFIN, essentially the Willard 30 trawler hull with a mast and sail. The hull is still in production as the Willard Passagemaker 30, although like most of us, it has grown slightly heavier with age. The Willard has a full keel displacement hull with gently rounded chines, a high bow and a rounded stern. The LWL is 27.5' with a displacement of 16,000 lbs of which 4000 lbs is internal ballast in the keel. Beam is 10.5' and the draft is 3.5". The design is similar to that of small sail working boats of a century ago with all that that implies. It is easily driven below hull speeds and has good seakeeping qualities but tends to roll in beam seas. Power is supplied by a Perkins 4-107 driving an 18" x 14" prop. The boat carries 260 sq. ft. of sail on a low aspect rig, a large foresail and a smaller main. This is only about 2/3 of what a cruising sailboat of similar specifications would carry and PUFFIN can be considered to be sailing under perpetually reefed conditions. It can best be considered a 30/70 motorsailer. On a calm day and with a clean hull it requires 22.6 hp. to drive PUFFIN at its 7 kt. hull speed. This estimate is confirmed by careful fuel consumption measurements kept over several years. The best speed I have ever gotten under sail alone in a beam wind is 5 kts. It takes approximately 8.2 hp. to move the boat at this speed under power. Sailboat designers estimate that sails can produce about 1 hp. for each 27 sq. ft. of area under good conditions. The 260 sq. ft. of sail on PUFFIN should generate about 9.6 hp. of propulsive effect. The 1.4 hp. difference between the 9.6 hp. generated and the 8.2 hp. required to move the boat at a 5 kt. speed is undoubtedly due to the drag of the large non feathering prop. In essence, the prop drag costs 15% of the generated sail power. If we want to make only 3 kts. in a get home sailing mode, PUFFIN will require approximately 1.8 hp. Allowing for prop drag the sails will have to generate about 2 hp. Under good sailing conditions this would require 54 sq. ft. of sail, about that of a small sailing dinghy or Sunfish. A low aspect ratio 12' x 10' lateen ring would suffice. Obviously this is for ideal conditions. To be on the safe side, a minimal get home rig for PUFFIN would require at least 100 sq. ft. of sail. And, since get home conditions are likely to be in horrible weather, the mast and rigging should be strong and the sail made in storm sail weight. Scaling this data up for a 45' LWL, 45,000 lb. displacement boat, 3 kt. get home speed, allowing for prop drag, would require 2.75 directly applied hp. under ideal conditions. This could be generated by about 75 sq. ft. of sail area. Using a safety factor of 2, the get home rig should carry 150 sq. ft., about that of a small daysailer. This might require a 20' mast and a 15' boom. As in the previous case, the rig should be suitable for storm condit ions. Low aspect ratio rigs, perhaps a gaff or spritsail, would be best for carrying the maximum amount of sail on an unballasted boat. This type of sail is more efficient in beam and following winds anyway. Even a square sail would do but these require more rigging and knowledge than most of us want to burden ourselves with. I would like to point out that either of these minimal get home rigs will have very poor sailing performance by modern standards. They would parallel those of ancient Greek and Egyptian vessels. Pointing ability would be almost non existent. The boat could make progress only in beam or following winds. That's exactly the way the ancient ships sailed. They stayed at anchor or rowed until the wind was favorable. Still, with patience, a boat could cross oceans with this type of rig. Getting back to the main topic. Steadying sails are not for propulsion and are effective in stopping roll in beam winds. I have found a reefed mainsail minimizes roll when motoring across choppy bays. For PUFFIN that means about 50 ft. of sail area. The sail is sheeted in tight amidships and offers no propulsion power. The boat takes up a slight angle of heel and and the roll is attenuated. It is far more effective, of course, to actually sail using the full sail area. In that case the roll disappears entirely. We do most of our cruising along the Atlantic coast in a motorsailing mode, using both power and sail. Fuel consumption drops to very low levels and the sails stabilize the boat. Again scaling up to bigger boat size, a 75 to 100 sq. ft. sail would be effective as a steadying sail. But, if you are going to rig a sail anyway, why not go whole hog and make it a get home sail. Riding sails were not mentioned but are useful for high bowed or forward pilothouse trawlers that sheer back and forth at anchor. These are small sails mounted at the stern of the boat that serve as feathers on an arrow, keeping the bow pointed toward the wind. A small 20 or 30 sq. ft. sail will usually suffice. Finally, under the windy conditions in which get home and steadying sails are used, there is a lot of stress on the mast and stays. The rigging should be sized primarily for the stiffness of the boat not for the sail area. While a 150 sq. ft. sail area daysailer may get by with 1/8" wire rope for mast stays, a trawler using the same sail might need to upgrade the stays to 1/4". Most of the force on the sail is translated to downward pressure on the mast and upward pull on the windward stay. Typically trawlers are not constructed to resist these forces and the structure may have to be reinforced. Using sails as roll dampers is even harder on the rig than steady sailing and the chainplates, the places where the mast side stays are attached, must be firmly attached to the hull structure and not just the cabin sides. The ultimate disclaimer, of course, is to have your get home or steadying rig designed by a good naval architect. Larry Zeitlin (who can get home even when the power fails) PUFFIN Cortlandt Manor, NY