Gaff and gunter rigged sailboats look similar, but which rig works best on a cruising dinghy? In this video, I show you how I rig my cruising dinghy moonlight, and talk about some of the pros and cons of different traditional sailing rigs. I go into a fair bit of detail about the origins of the gunter rig, how I go about lashing the sails onto the spars, raising the rig, and making reefing quick and easy. I hope you are enjoying these videos. Part of my mission is to inspire more people to enjoy and sail classic wooden boats.

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The main difference between a gaff and a gunter rig is that the sail has 3 sides. The Gaff rig was originally developed in Holland. The upper yard, or gaff, lays away from the mast, making the forth side to the sail. This gives the sail a low aspect ratio, meaning the center of effort is low compared to a mast-head rig.

The Sliding Gunter rig was used on many whaleboats. The top yard slides down the mast when the sail is reefed, again, reducing the aspect ratio, and also reducing the weight suspended from the top of the mast. Stepping and unstepping a shorter mast is easier. You have the same size and shape of the sail found on a Bermuda rig with its "bendy " mast, using the gunter setup. Wind-tunnel tests by Jeremy Howard-Williams found the Gunter was just as fast as a Bermuda rig on the wind, and faster off the wind.

In my experience, when faced with a stiff breeze, say 20 - 30 knots, the top yard of the Gunter lays off the wind. Spilling excess load, and this is even more exaggerated when the Gunter yard is dropped without changing the point at which it is hitched to the halyard. In fact, this is the way I always reefed the sail, and only now as I have made this video have I set it up properly to lower the point of attachment to allow the hitch to come right up into the sheave block at the top of the mast. I am looking forward to trying that out the next time I am out in a bit of a blow.

The gunter rig is a tremendously flexible design, giving the owner the ability to vary the setup according to sailing conditions and preferences. It is estimated that there are as many as 60,000 mirror dinghies sailed all over the world using the Gunter rig.

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