I was aware that the standard way to install these was attaching to
the intermediates. After discussing this with my rigger who's sailed
on one of our national teams, he suggested that I not touch the
intermediates and simply add two more chainplates inboard.
I did and this works fine, with no worry that the intermediates will
ever be overloaded. I moved the aft lowers to the new in line
chainplate and installed 6:1 blocks to adjust the new technora aft
lowers when I rock my rig forward. Using rope instead of wire
eliminates chafe on my main and boom.
With a double ended adjustable wire backstay 28:1 below decks and 4:1
gross above decks, headstay sag can be adjusted quickly and easily
upwind and downwind.
I also have gone to a masthead kite and am considering shortening my
pole from 9'-7" to J or 9'-0" so that I can have a LLS of 34' while
G=16'-2". My current spin is 31'-11 and G=17'-2". Either option gives
me a -9 penalty, and in our racing area it is definitely worth it. My
sailmaker is checking to see if the aspect ratio is workable in this
latest configuration.
Obviously I race only PHRF here, but my boat can easily be converted
to standard one design if I ever wanted to. Here, the standard set-up
is very slow against my PHRF competitors.
Laser 28s rate even here and Ultimate 20 are 30 PHRF slower. As you
can see, I'm up against some very tough ratings to race against and
our PHRF committee doesn't want to change because my boat has
performed much better than expected with old sails and novice crew.
Sailed well, your boat should do well against anyone.
If you need any other info, let me know.