On Cool Change we mostly sail two-up. That is my wife Erika (skipper) and me (who thinks to be the skipper). Hoisting the gennaker always has been accompanied with a fair level of anxiety, especially in close quarters such as Pittwater with its many social and other racers believing they’re having rights far and beyond any cruising vessel. Mind you, I get pretty annoyed myself when racing and one of this huge plastic tubs(like ours)  appear right in our line of attack. But that’s sailing!
Anyway, I am digressing! Lately, what made using the gennaker on Cool Change such a great and pleasant experience with hugely reduced levels of anxiety is the absolute fantastic top down furler from Equiplite.
Not only is it extremely light and strong to carry our 152m2 gennaker on our 14 tonne vessel, it features simplicity in use and maintenance. Where other furlers are equipped with lots of stainless hardware, most if not all attachment points are of strong dyneema rope and very easy to use and replace if and when required.
Furthermore, the same furler can be used for a Code0 as well negating the need to buy a furler for each sail.

But what makes the top down furler so great is its relative ease of use and neat furl of a full bellied Gennaker!
Step 1
To hoist the sail means simply to attach the furler to the bow (in our case the bowsprit), the head and swivel to the spinnaker halyard, and to run the working sheet to back block. Then just simply hoist it up, apply some tension to the halyard, and “pronto”, we are ready to release the gennaker.
Step 2
We usually run at approximately 140 degrees when we release the furling line and start bringing in the working sheet which in turn will deploy the gennaker.
Step 3
When cruising, we simply gybe by furling the gennaker first and then releasing it again after the gybe. This, we found, is the most stress-less way for short-handed sailing.
Step 4
When it’s time to bring down the gennaker, we simply put the boat on autopilot. Erika operates the electric winch with the furling line attached to the electric winch (furling line runs all the way back to the cockpit), while I stand a bit forward to have a good look at the gennaker and control the furl via the working sheet.We do that at between 130 to 140 degrees. As the furling starts on the top of  the gennaker, we wait untill furled approximately 1/3 down the anti-torsion rope, than Erika brings the boat on to the wind by another 10 degrees and we continue to furl the gennaker. We let a bit of the working sheet wrap around it for a few extra turns and “voila”, we’ve done and can lower the gennaker which by than is a nicely furled sausage and doesn’t take as much space as the old gennaker “in a sock affair” did.

While the top down furler has quite some benefits for racers, I feel that the added convenience, safety when short-handed, and ease of use of the gennaker, makes the Equiplite Top Down Furler the ideal addition for any cruising couple. For us, we now fly the gennaker a lot more and it is adding a new level of enjoyment to our sailing experience.

On Cool Change I have recently added a bowsprit to be able to fly my Gennaker with the new and ingenious "Top Down Furler" from Equiplite.
The bowsprit enables me to:
1. Fly a bigger Gennaker (152m2)
2. The increased luff-to-mast angle lifts the bow improving the trim at high speed and keeping the rudders more firm in the water.
3. Using the bowsprit moves the center of effort of the sail plan forward reducing weather helm and giving greater control at increased speeds.
The bowsprit on Cool Change is the removable type from Selden.
However, due to the nature of my foredeck with the raised gunnels, I had to come up with a novel and innovative way to install the bowsprit. Please see the pictures that show the installation to the (out)side of the boat to minimise interference with the foredeck. The bowsprit can be retracted or completely removed.

On Cool Change we do have a fully battened mainsail with a Lazy Jack system. One of the issues we have encountered when surprised by strong winds (e.g. 30+ knots) especially at night is the difficulty to drop the sail completely in those conditions. Usually turning the boat into the wind and releasing the main halyard drops the sail nicely into the boom bag via the lazy jacks. However, when confronted with strong winds, we often find that the sail drops only partially and the top bit of it is still up to about  the first spreader flogging heavily. While we are blessed with easy access due to our deck saloon rooftop to manually pull down the last part of the sail, in heavy seas, with a flogging sail this can be quite a perilous exercise.
To overcome this we have attached a line (6mm -see picture below) at the top of the mainsail - going down in a straight line to the second reef point (when the sail is up). Now, when we drop the sail and it does not quite come down all the we have easy access to this line which by then should be abou t at the mast base and can be used to not only pull down the rest of the mainsail but also to secure it to the mast base to avoid the wind from blowing it up and out of the boom bag.
Alternatively, if one does not want to go forward at all, one can instead of fastening one end to the second reef point, lead the line all the way down to the mast base and via blocks back to the cockpit. This way you can pull it down from the security of the cockpit. However, be aware that you will get quite some line length with this configuration and there is more chance of it flying off and getting tangled with the sail or other lines if you do not have somebody bringing it in quickly as you lower the sail.