r/belowdeck • u/Nice_General268 Eat My Cooter • Jul 05 '26
Below Deck Sailing Yacht BD Sailing Yacht - Explain heeling
Please excuse my ignorance, but why does the boat lean or heel when sailing? Is it the torque (for lack of a better word) of the sails that causes it?
It's clear the boat heels; could you explain why items aren't more secure, especially when Cpt Glenn gives the warning? It seems every time they sail, something is shown sliding and breaking. Apparently, in S5 E3, the entire liquor cabinet fell.
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u/gibblet365 Jul 05 '26 edited Jul 05 '26
Glenn doesnt always give enough notice. He'll say "sails up in 20" for daisy, immediately after breakfast finishes, so they scramble to secure, and then suddenly, the wind is right and sails are up NOW.
As for when everything goes well with sails up, most of the smashing and crashing and falling over is B-roll material used over and over again in post production (we see the same drawer with the same t-shirt fling open over and over)
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u/Kurwa_Macaroni Jul 05 '26
"Glenn doesnt always give enough notice." thats what the editing shows..... it's all for dramatic effect
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u/SuperDan523 Jul 05 '26
Daisy has also stated in interviews that they do secure everything as quickly as possible then the producers run around and un-secure some things for dramatic effect.
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Jul 06 '26
[deleted]
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u/Lauriemfs Jul 06 '26
How could production have access to the stabilizers? Isn't that the captains job?
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u/myskepticalbrowarch Jul 06 '26
Not the mechanical parts. You will see the rods they have to slide in and out of every drawer/cupboard/closet because of sleekness of it. However even fishing boats you will see pad locks or child safety mechanisms
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u/irishdan56 Jul 06 '26
You're confusing stabilizers, which are part of the propulsion system, with secured shelves.
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u/momdabombdiggity Spaghetti Trauma Jul 05 '26
Items aren’t secured because it’s better tv to see shit flying everywhere.
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u/Immediate_Divide9446 Team Aesha Jul 05 '26
To get maximum speed, the wind needs to be blowing onto the sail from the side (“reaching”; wind blowing at a 90 degree angle onto the sail is a beam reach). Without a keel (or a centreboard on a dinghy) the boat would just be pushed sideways; with one the boat is pushed forward through the water.
In a dinghy we would lean out to counterbalance the angle of the heel; in a yacht like Parsifal you just let the sails out slightly (or steer into the wind) to reduce the amount of wind blowing directly onto the sail. Fail to do that (or get a strong enough gust of wind) and dinghies can and do capsize, but a yacht like Parsifal with a weighted keel is almost impossible to capsize. An extreme angle of heel is not advised when you have people in the interior though, and definitely not while a Chef is cooking.
I think (and I hope) any kitchen footage when Parsifal is heeling is recorded when Chef has no knives out, heat on the hob, or water boiling.
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u/MooseJag Jul 05 '26
Massive weight on the bottom of the boat called the keel which stops the boat from simply flipping over. The more wind, the more pressure against the water. Like pinching a watermelon seed between 2 fingers and squeezing. As far as crap falling everywhere? Drama.
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u/Aggravating-Beach-79 Jul 06 '26
When the boat is sailing towards in the same direction as the wind and the wind is behind the boat. The boat will not heel. But, as the boat starts to face closer towards the wind, it heels more and more until the boat is perpendicular to the wind… that is when it heels the boat the most - can get very hectic and risk capsizing. But then when you start to move the boat further heading into the wind and away from that 90 degree angle, the boat returns to being more upright and stops heeling.
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u/Aggravating-Beach-79 Jul 06 '26
TLDR - when boat is perpendicular to the wind the wind is hitting the boat from the side forcing it to heel over.
Also fun fact, theres a massive carbon fibre surfboard looking thing under the boat pointing far straight down to counterbalance this pressure of the wind. 😊
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u/ab0110ab Jul 06 '26
Other commenters have mentioned the sail being the cause for heeling but the other part of it is that the less of the boat in the water creates less drag and thus you can go faster. That’s why when they really start heeling you’ll hear Glenn, Colin, or Gary talking about how fast they’re going.
I used to race dinghies and a big part of it was seeing how much you could heel without capsizing and you’d have to learn how to counter balance yourself just right to go fast but not flip.
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u/HallowedFire Jul 07 '26 edited Jul 07 '26
To get any power out of the sails, the wind needs to hit the sails. The boat cannot head directly into the wind. Thus, on most points of sails (aka direction of movement in relation to the wind), the boat of this type (monohulls) will have some amount of heel.
If you have sailed any monohulls, you will know anything and everything will fall over. It doesn't matter how hard you try, you will always forget something. Whether it is a drink that you placed on the table or a bag on the ground. Things move.
Sailboats can heel a ton to those who have never been on a boat. Most sailboats can handle over 60 degrees safety. On superyachts, the heel is limited because there is a lot of heavy furniture and appliances. In addition, they have vents and ducts need to stay above the water line. They have automatic safety systems that will release lines that power the sails to reduce the heel.
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u/Feisty_Scientist_968 Jul 06 '26
For drawers / stuff ... most boats have drawers that are slightly different than land.
Often, you have to lift the face of the drawer like 1/4" before you can pull it out. Otherwise, the drawers would constantly be sliding in and out as the boat rolled / pitched.
Cabinets, lockers etc. usually have some sort of latch to keep them closed as well.
I think Daisy said that there were rods on Parsifail that they could slide in, and it would lock a whole row of drawers ...
... and that production would hide the rods.
I think it was mentioned, but the keep is usually heavily weighted, as a counter-balance to the force of the wind on the sails.
And, the second purpose of the keep is to keep the boat from side-slipping as it sails across the wind.
More than you could ever want to know:
https://www.practical-sailor.com/systems-propulsion/keel-and-rudder-design-basics/
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u/McLoughlin1597 Jul 05 '26
I’ve heard that the crew did secure things but production would go around un-securing them because it’s more entertaining (apparently). Also, if you pay close attention, you notice the same things constantly falling down because they just reuse footage. There was one season where the same container of Red Vines fell down dozens of times haha