We’ve rigged a very simple 2:1 block/ cleat which just shackles to the vang bale on the mast. It works great, not the most accessible for a crew on the rail, but very easy to rig and derig. I found this on Amazon, Harken has a similar one too. 

Best wishes, 

Rick Doerr 

Platypus #1231

Hi Rick.

Interesting. I was sailing in a 15-20 knot breeze and reefing made it much more manageable.

We use 1149 for teaching ASA 101 in Saint Augustine 

We have two reef cheek blocks on the stb side of the boom and horn cleats stbd boom about three feet from the goose neck we simply clip the tack to the gooseneck with a soft shackle and shackle

We are able to get a flat footed reef quickly this way 

We are able to heave to on stbd tack and reef or just sail close hauled on the jib and reef too maintaining stbd tack

We are not racing and often have very little weight with small inexperienced sailors 

So the reefing really helps.

Also this method reduces the amount of flogging in gusts and improves sail life.

I don’t often use reef 2 because even though the boat is perfectly capable of sailing upright in 25knots our water gets short standing waves due to strong currents that make for a wet ride at any thing over 20 knots this is a huge distraction for the poorly dressed new students.

While our Ensign can be absolutely thrilling full sail 20 plus we find that most folks don’t want this kind of thrill the first or second day on a sail boat.

I assume that the cheek blocks are for the clew. With the horn cleats forward how do you control the loose reef lines along the boom?

Understood. 

It used to be common to reef the main, but the smaller jibs made it over kill and mostly raced so the reefing went away. If your delivering over some distance it might be nice to have,