Hi Thomas,

I’ve not been visiting much this year and have just seen this.

I bought Ying Zhou (formerly Pelican) from Roy in 2023. 

I have renamed her Boo Baboo.

She still had Pete’s jointed batten sails on her which were a little tired, and I managed to tear them whilst sailing her from Scotland back to Essex.

I was curious to see if Split Junk Rig might work on her having been delighted with the SJR conversion I had made on my previous boat, a Sadler 25.

As far as I’m aware SJR has only previously been used on the foresail of multi masted boats, with contiguous sails behind. 

On chatting with a couple of members I understood the reason for this-concern that were SJR to be on both masts, that the Jiblets of the aft sail might be spoilt in setting by the dirty air from the foresail when 

close hauled.

Notwithstanding these concerns I realised the only way to find out was to try it, so earlier this year I ran up a pair of SJR sails in polytarp (should the experiment fail it would only have cost me £100 instead of multiples of that for posher cloth).

I’m delighted to report that the experiment was a complete success.

There is no backwinding of the jiblets in the aft sail by the foresail. 

As the Masts are widely spaced the gap between luff and leach of 

the two sails is nice and wide at 1.6 metres which must help.

The only slight drawback I have found so far is that with SJR balance being 35%, a dead run will have the foresail over two thirds shaded by the aft sail when sailing wing on wing. This is only an issue under full sail, as in any wind that requires reefing I just reef later. However I don’t often sail dead downwind, a training run is more comfortable and there is much less shading.

In converting her sailplan to SJR she is no longer a Ketch and is now a Schooner (the 35% balance required this switch).

Performance wise I’m delighted, she’ll reach 7.5-8 kts through the water closehauled in the right conditions. 

Earlier in the season she got into a tacking duel with a 40ft Beneteau that wasn’t pointing any higher, and which only very very gradually got away from her.

I have uploaded a few photos to my album in my profile.

I converted Pelican, a Freedom 33, to a J R ketch using a sail plan drawn by Alan Boswell for a Freedom 35, 'Gypsy Blue' (I think?), which lives in Falmouth.

The Freedom 35 is the same hull as a 33, but built in the UK with a different deck and layout down below. Apparently the '35' came about because the price sounded too expensive for a 33 foot boat.

Hi Thomas,

there is one more Freedom 33, Use, which also belongs to a Thomas and is german flagged. You can find some fotos here.

Unfortunately he is not (yet) part of the JRA, also. If you are interested, let me know and I'll get you in contact!

It seems like the masts on the Freedom 33 cat ketch are in a great position for a JR conversion. Anyone have any insight? I like the idea of a modern hasler/McLeod rig with cambered sails.