Cherubini 48

Sailplan

This sail plan is the original drawing of the schooner sail plan. Over the years, according to owners' preferences, there have been some options in the rig.

• The fore-triangle can be one jib or divided into a jib and a boomed fore staysail.

• The main sail can slide up or down the mast, with or without full length battens, or can have in-mast furling.

• The main mast has been built with a Bergstrom-Ridder swept-back rig. With this rig, a back stay is not needed. The trade off is that the back-swept spreaders limit how far out one can let the main boom. Alternatively, the mast can be built with regular spreaders and a boomkin and standing backstay, supplemented with running backstays.

• The height of the main stay (and its main staysail) has been higher or lower on different boats.

STAYSAIL SCHOONER NOMENCLATURE:

Starting from the bow, the first sail is the jib.

Next is a self-tending staysail. Since it is attached to the forestay of the foremast, the sail is called a fore staysail.

Coming aft is another staysail, attached to the stay of the main mast. Thus it is the main staysail.

Behind the main mast is, of course, the mainsail.

The sail on top is the fisherman's staysail. Its throat halyard pulls it up on the foremast. Its peak halyard goes up the main mast. The luff of the sail goes up on slides on the foremast.

A gollywobber is like a fisherman's staysail but is larger, coming down almost to the deck.

Adventurer	Muñequita
photos by Michael Berman

Two Cherubini 48 schooners, Adventurer and Muñequita, at the start of the 2007 Great Chesapeake Schooner Race. Adventurer's jib is cut lower; her main staysail goes higher up the main mast. Muñequita uses her fore staysail as well as her jib, but Adventurer doesn't. Both boats have the Bergstrom-Ridder swept-back rig and do not have permanent backstays or boomkins.