Schooner - Schooner Rationale

Schooner Rationale

Sailing vessels with a single mast will typically be sloops or cutters, either with a Bermuda or gaff mainsail. There is little justification for the cost and complexity of a second mast unless the vessel is reasonably large, (say) above 50 feet LOA.

If a vessel's size requires a second mast, the sail plan will usually be a schooner, ketch or yawl, all of which are fore-and-aft rigged (although a schooner may carry a square topsail). The schooner may be distinguished from both the yawl and the ketch by the disposition of the masts, and thus the placement of the mainsail. On the yawl and ketch, the mainsail is flown from the forward mast, or mainmast, and the aft mast is the mizzen-mast. A two-masted schooner has the mainsail on the aft mast, and its other mast is the foremast. Compared to a single-masted vessel, all the two-masted vessels can have a lower centre of pressure in the sail plan.

Although the ketch (and to a much lesser extent, the yawl) is more popular than the schooner in Europe, the schooner is arguably more efficient. The schooner can carry a larger sail area, because of its much larger mainsail and the effective sail(s) between the masts. Also, in a schooner, all the sails work together in a complementary fashion, optimising airflow and drive. By contrast, on a ketch or yawl, the mizzen sail is of marginal use, being very small and frequently blanketed by the mainsail.

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Famous quotes containing the word schooner:

    It was the schooner Hesperus,
    That sailed the wintry sea;
    And the skipper had taken his little daughter,
    To bear him company.
    Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1809–1882)