Setup & Tuning

Below are some guidelines for setting up your Blaze. 
We have also made some extracts from the 'Blaze Forum' which are mostly of Mike Lyons responding to questions put by members of the forum;
these extracts are available via the additional navigation links on the left.

Download Blaze Setup 2006 by Mike Lyons

Battens

The Blaze (version 2 & 3) is equipped with a 10.0 metre semi-soft sail.  This has 2 full length battens in the top of the sail and 2 shorter ones lower down.  It is important that the battens are tapered as it is not possible to set the sail up as intended without them.  The most critical one is the lower of the full length ones.

Rake

Attach a tape measure to your halyard and pull to the top of the mast. Now measure the distance to the bottom of the hull at one side or other of the rudder-post.  A good starting point is to adjust the forestay to 7100mm (7 metres and 10 cm).  If you have an adjustable forestay this can be your 'central setting'.  Make sure that at the extremes of adjustment you cannot rake your mast beyond 7050mm - it may simply fall down when you least expect it.   Put knots etc in any rope system used to prevent you exceeding the limits of 7050mm and about 7170mm.

You will not need to play with this control much for most of your sailing.  If it's becoming survival for you then slackening the forestay will help and if you are near the heavy weight end of the spectrum you may want to make your mast more upright off-wind.  If new to the class simply set in the middle and LEAVE ALONE!

Rig Tension - Shrouds

The current fashion is for a 'sloppy' rig.  The sail seems to go best when the shrouds are relatively loose.  You should be able to move them side to side very easily without the sail on the boat.  Under sail with the crew on the side of the boat or further out the leeward one should just sag and flop about with no apparent load on it whatsoever.

Rig Tension - Lowers

These too should also be slack. Set up so that you can move them side to side about 50-60mm with rig set up but without the sail on the spars.  If they are too short to do this replace them with 'samson' or 'vectran' which you can fashion into lowers yourself (now permitted by new rules).

Use of kicker / mainsheet

Sail with little kicker unless overpowered when you should progressively apply it.  However the boat 'powers up' under mainsheet tension and using the kicker will take power away (as it pushes mast forward until restrained by the lowers flattening the lower past of the sail and opening the leach up near the top).

Mainsheet Blocks

It is vital that your mainsheet boom blocks are immediately above the rest of the system attached to the boat.  If they are too far back they will shunt the mast forward when you put mainsheet tension on and again this will again de-power the rig.   So if they are in the wrong position sort it out with the boom on the boat.   If they are the small ones supplied with many boats - sorry but get some good 40mm ones and hacksaw the originals off the webbing and shackle some large good quality ones on.

Rachet

If you are new to the class consider removing the cleat and its support arm until you have several months in the boat otherwise you will capsize twice as often as you learn.  Many prefer this set-up anyway and it is not an issue if you have a good set of mainsheet blocks to play with.  If you like a cleat then take the assembly apart and adjust the angle of the cleat arm to its lower position - AND remove the plastic wedge immediately underneath the cleat itself.  This will all reduce the chances of an unintended 'cleating' in tack or gybe but will require you to very positively cleat the sheet thereafter.

Kicker

They all work but make sure yours has enough range to really de-power the mast when fully applied.

Outhaul

This can almost be set and forgotten about in most conditions.  But do not over apply unless in serious depower conditions.  Feel short of power?  Ease it a bit but not until you have eased the kicker a bit first.

Cunningham

Different views on this one but as with outhaul do not over apply unless seeking a power reduction.  I use it to 'tidy-up' after applying kicker but rarely put it under great loading.

Control Line

Fly-aways - You can set up anything you like within very broad rules - but make sure they always work.  It's worth the effort and modest cost to sort this out.  Look at the diagrams on this site for ideas or other people's boats.

Rudder / Tiller length

My bias this one - the longer v1 tillers are superior as they impart a better 'feel' to the helm.  Consider replacing yours with one 100-140mm longer than as supplied with standard v2 & v3 rudder stocks.

Mike Lyons