Simple approach however when eased the mainsail chafes against it. I thought about keeping the reflector on the windward side and simply gybing when neccessary. Am I over reacting to the chafe?
Don, my reflector is on a flag halyard as Mark suggests. I was worried about chafe too - the edges of the Davis Echomaster are bare aluminum. My first attempt was to toss a light line over the spreader and hoist the reflector up. Sure enough, before long the reflector cut through the line.
Then we screwed two small eye straps to the underside of the spreader, spaced well apart. The reflector goes up on the outboard end and clears the return (down) end of the halyard. On my boat, the main doesn't quite reach the reflector so it doesn't chafe on that either. This is a function of vang tension and how far you ease the main down wind - mine's a sprit boat so the main never gets eased that far. (But it's close - if the reflector went up on the inboard end of the halyard it would chafe the main.)
So I would try it and see if with the right spacing you can avoid the chafe.
The other benefit of the flag halyard is that you can fly the SHTP battle flag! (R/C, we ARE getting battle flags again, right?)
Another way I deal with chafe prevention - I wrap all the edges of the Davis with a couple of layers of electrical tape. If you stretch the tape as you apply it, it conforms and shapes itself to the edge of the reflector. Uses up a bit of electrical tape, but it really stops the chafe. Also, you need to redo the tape every couple of years because it gets brittle and starts coming off.
- Mark