It is a good article and as they say there is a bit more tension at the luff when reefed than if i were using the reef hooks with slab reefing .. however it is not a lot. The tack reef cringle gets pulled tight to the end of the boom about 1.5 to 2 inchs aft of where the reef hook would hold it. I have a bolt rope main not slides so it is significantly stronger than the slides. So far I am still playing with the reefing system. Some times it works like a charm and once in a while it causes a royal mess at the end of the boom with one of the reef lines getting all twisted up. Over all I do like it much better and am not seeing what I would consider excess strain at the luff like they are talking about. It might just be how I have the bocks layed out.
Pineapple sails has an excellent post about reefing setups and why single line reefing is to be avoided. You can read the article at http://www.sailmaker.com/articles/reefing.htm
It is a good article and as they say there is a bit more tension at the luff when reefed than if i were using the reef hooks with slab reefing .. however it is not a lot. The tack reef cringle gets pulled tight to the end of the boom about 1.5 to 2 inchs aft of where the reef hook would hold it. I have a bolt rope main not slides so it is significantly stronger than the slides. So far I am still playing with the reefing system. Some times it works like a charm and once in a while it causes a royal mess at the end of the boom with one of the reef lines getting all twisted up. Over all I do like it much better and am not seeing what I would consider excess strain at the luff like they are talking about. It might just be how I have the bocks layed out.