Kent and All,

The reason I asked about what the JSD is made of is because if you have the standard rope one as I do,  the blocks you would need to use are humongous . I think my bridle legs are at least 1 inch in diameter or possibly larger.

Below is a quote from Ace sailmakers with respect to the attachment points. I was going to say do not attach the bridles to the winches and the reason is stated in the quote.

With an arch I would suggest you reinforce the stern cleats or change them out for steel ones. The bridle will be inside the backstays when you deploy the drogue. You should also make a hollowed out wood block that will cover the stern chock as the drogue wants to keep going into the chock when it is recovered. This will rip the cones. Mine also has  a through bolt to keep it on the chock.

I forgot to mention to CHECK the cones and see if the larger ends have a hem on them. If not  the cones will eventually fray . I had to change mine out after the hurricane. The newer ones have hems. See above my old drogue photos after the hurricane. My drogue looked pretty sad after 36 hours of 100 knot winds . It started keeping us at 2 ½ knots and when we hauled it in we were doing just short of 4 knots.

It is amazing to watch the drogue work. See photos.

I was also asked about chafe gear. I have a bunch of heavy suede turnbuckle covers from a few boats ago.

I find these very handy for chafe gear all over the boat. They have Velcro inside, however my Velcro is long since gone and I use a few cable ties to keep them in place.  They are made by Edson , they come in 3 sizes and have lasted me over 22 years.

https://edsonmarine.com/leather-turnbuckle-covers-medium/

I have been thinking about moving my SSB antenna so I can deploy the drogue outside the backstays.

One last note , If you see a gigantic breaking wave coming at you, the boat will be going under water. It was amazing to see just the masts sticking out of the water and then Kimberlite just popped back up. One time I had to hold my breath for a few seconds as the water was very deep. We did not have a drop of water down below-Thank you Captain Henry. The cockpit drains in about 30 40 seconds.

We kept a person on watch in case a ship was going to run us down and we had to cut the drogue away.

We also had the cockpit enclosure up the entire time. After a while a few zippers started to go , we just sewed the enclosure closed.

Now I have a few web loops sewn into each side of the enclosure at the zippers and we can easily tie it together.

Fair Winds

Eric

Kimberlite Amel Super Maramu #376

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Attachments on the Hull 
The hull attachments for the drogue should be as far outboard and as far aft as possible.
I have no information on the ultimate strength of a typical sheet winch installation, and it would be difficult to evaluate each structure. Unfortunately, a winch is not an ideal structure, since the load is applied above the deck line and tends to overturn the winch and pull it out. The optimum attachment for the drogue is clearly a strap similar to a chainplate, bolted to the hull at the corners of the transom and extending aft with a shackle.

For a load of 14,000 lbs, a strap ¼ x 2.25 x 18 inches attached with six 3/8 bolts would provide a conservative design.

A large steel cleat would be acceptable if the deck is thick solid fiberglass and a steel plate is provided underne