MAXIMUM SAIL POWER CHAPTER 10 SAIL INVENTORIES - Part 1

Chapter 10 deals with sail inventories. In Part 1 we look at some of the not-so-often used sails but sails that do serve a really good purpose.

The first nine chapters of Maximum Sail Power focused almost exclusively on sail design, construction, and theory: what sails are, how they are made, what they’re made of, why they look the way they do, and how advances in sailmaking technology will affect the sails of the future. Now it’s almost time to use these wonderful products, to abuse them, to fix them, and to figure out which sails are best for you and your boat. In other words, we’re coming to the fun part. Still, before we take to the water to learn how to trim and handle our new sails, let’s first decide just what sails we need. Like just about everything else in sailing, a little forethought can save you a world of hurt or heartache somewhere further down the road.

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For example, do you want to race, cruise, or a combination of both? Your answer to this question can have a profound effect on the sails that you ultimately choose. Furthermore, if racing, are you a part of a class that places specific restrictions on the number and types of sails that you can buy, or are your options dictated only by the size of your wallet? If you cruise, are you daysailing, week- end sailing, coastal cruising, going bluewater, or venturing around the world? Ultimately, the size, shape, and number of sails you choose to include in your inventory will depend on your sailing goals. Think long and hard about your objectives, and don’t just go with your first impulse. Rather, in addition to planning for your immediate sailing needs, try to anticipate what your plans might be in the future. For example, you might be sold on weekend racing for now, but know in the back of your mind that a race to Bermuda is in the cards. With that in mind when buying a new mainsail you might decide to have your sailmaker add some light Dacron taffetas to the laminate to give the sail that extra level of durability it will need for an offshore passage. Similarly, after years of cruising, you might be toying with the idea of trying some Wednesday night racing to see how your boat does around the cans. As a result, when it comes time to get a new genoa, you might want to go with a slightly more sophisticated design with more stretch-resistant materials, or maybe even a molded sail to give that extra edge in terms of performance. It’s this kind of planning that allows you to get the most from your sails. Before we look at specific categories of sailors, let’s first look at some of the other sails we might need in our inventory as well as some of the newer sail-handling systems. The Working Staysail On all boats with a foretriangle large enough to accommodate an inner forestay, the working staysail is a very important part of any inventory. On most boats the inner forestay is about one third of the way back from and parallel to the headstay. As soon as a boat bears away onto a reach, the gap between the mainsail and headsail widens, and the effect they have on each other is reduced. While creating lift is no longer important, keeping wind circulating between sails is, and setting

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a staysail effectively fills the gap. A working staysail is a full-size, fairly rugged working sail that sets on the inner forestay and can be used on its own as a heavyweather sail or with the headsail when reaching.

Working Staysail perfect for double-headsail reaching Many larger boats will have a removable inner forestay so that the stay can be pulled back to the mast when it is not needed. The stay is attached to the foredeck with an over-center lever that, when in place, allows a reasonable amount of tension to be placed on the stay. This is useful especially when short tacking with an over-lapping headsail. Other more serious passagemakers like to have a series of inner stays with rollerfurling units on each of them. The first stay is just aft of the headstay with an inner forestay in its usual place and a babystay close to the mast. The advantage of this is that you can have different size headsails on each stay and unroll the one most appropriate for the conditions. While this is a nice convenience, there are some www.greatcirclesails.com

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drawbacks. The weight of three furling units with rolled-up sails adds to the heeling and pitching moment of the boat, to say nothing of windage. The second problem is that it’s very difficult to get sufficient headstay tension on all of the stays. As soon as you have one right, the one closest to it is not right. Hydraulic rams at the base of each stay go some way toward getting decent tension on the stay you are using, but it’s a cumbersome process. For smaller boats there are two inner forestay options that work very well. One is the self-tacking jib, or club-foot jib, and the other is the Hoyt Jib Boom. In fact, both of these options can be found on many cutter designs. The self-tacking jib is a non-overlapping staysail set with a rigid boom along the foot. The sheeting systems vary a little from boat to boat, but the idea is to have a sliding track in front of the mast that allows the sail to move freely from one side to the other. When the boat tacks the sail slides across to the other side keeping the same sheet ten- sion as you had before you tacked. A more modern configuration on the same theme is the Hoyt Jib Boom designed by innovator Gary Hoyt. This boom is essentially a club-foot jib, however, the boom is rigid and keeps the leech of the sail from riding up when the sheet is eased. The Hoyt Jib Boom works especially well sailing downwind when it can be set wing-and-wing with the headsail.

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Mizzens Mizzens are still popular on more traditional cruising yachts, and for passagemaking they are an ideal sail. They don’t offer much when sailing upwind other than to balance the sailplan, but as soon as projected area comes into play when sailing off the wind, the mizzen finds its stride. Because traditionally most mizzens were small sails, especially those aboard yawls, they did not add much to the performance of the boat. But in recent years there has been a trend toward larger mizzens aboard big ketches like some of the offshore designs created by Steve Dashew. Small mizzens need only a single reef point, or none at all. Once the size of the sail increases you might consider a second set of reefs, but on the other hand most sailors just drop the sail at that point. It depends on the boat and the amount of weather-helm the sail back aft is creating. The fabric for the mizzen will match that of the mainsail, only it will be a lighter weight. Mizzen Staysail Some cruisers will say that the best thing about a mizzen mast is that it gives them a place to fly a mizzen staysail (and hang their radar!). A mizzen staysail is a very useful sail that is set from the masthead of the mizzen mast and tacked to a point on the deck. Usually the tack point is free floating. Once the wind is aft of 70 degrees apparent, you can set the mizzen staysail with the tack on centerline. Then, as the wind comes further aft, you can rotate the sail around by moving the tack to the windward side. This allows the plane of the sail to be more efficient. Mizzen staysails are usually a light nylon for small boats or a light laminate for larger boats. www.greatcirclesails.com

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Daisy Staysail There is one sail that I am particularly fond of, a sail that is often found on racing boats, but hardly ever carried by cruisers, a sail with three names and a number of purposes. To some it’s known as a Daisy Staysail. To others it’s a Tall Boy while others simply call it a Windseeker. Regardless of the name, it is a high-aspect, loose-luffed sail usually made from a light fabric. Cruising sailors prefer the sail to be made from nylon, while racers will opt for a light film-on-film scrim. The sail is set free-flying on a roller-furling unit. A wire or Spectra or Vectran line up the luff allows the sail to be snugged up tight so that the luff does not sag when the wind comes up. The wire also allows the sail to be rolled away when it’s not needed. In its staysail format, the sail sets under a spinnaker or light- air reacher and is used to break the slot between the headsail and mainsail just as the working staysail would. By creating two slots you add power and performance to the foretriangle, providing there is enough wind and the angle is right.

I hope that you enjoyed this blog. There are many more at my website www.greatcirclesails.com. If you need new sails for your boat just click this box and I will send you a no obligation quote.

BRIAN HANCOCK Owner Great Circle Sails