Lateen Sails

     Hi
everyone, and first off, my first love is for 15^th century caravels,
with lateen sails thank you. Unfortunately, I am not a ship builder and will
likely never have one. I did however, come up with an idea that would
facilitate moving the yard from one side of the mast to the other when crossing
the eye of the wind, thus hopefully reducing manpower requirements somewhat.
The idea may well have been tried and rejected, and of course even if workable,
could not be used on a ship that was intended to be a period replica.

Having
observed many images of caravels that appeared to have all the lines in place,
I observed that a few of them did not appear to have any lines emanating from
the mast at a point above where the yard attached. That point is critical, as
the yard will herein be attached very close to the top of the mast.

In
practice, the sails would be pulled up to the yard by appropriately placed
lines. The “rotator” shown in the following link would then be flipped over as
shown and the sails could then be let down on the other side of the mast. 

https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=90F2DFCE00CBACE8%21210

A
problem will arise if the sails do not follow the yard all the way over and
they become entangled atop the mast or yard, so they would have to be drawn up
tight or some control lines would be required. Of course  a host of other problems might also be
possible. So is this idea workable?

My
only experience to this point is reading and looking, and my wife looks at
sailboats and thinks they are silly. So who knows what the future will hold. 

My
thanks to all for your time, and thoughts and comments would be appreciated. 

Author	Message Share Topic Printable Version Delicious Digg Facebook Furl Google MySpace Newsvine reddit StumbleUpon Translate Twitter Windows Live Yahoo Bookmarks Topic Search Topic Options Post Reply Create New Topic
Shoepuppy Send Private Message Find Member's Posts Newbie Joined: 22 Sep 14 Location: Eugene, Oregon Online Status: Offline Posts: 2	Post Options Post Reply Quote Shoepuppy Report Post Quote Reply Topic: Lateen Sails Posted: 27 Sep 14 at 4:08am
	Hi everyone, and first off, my first love is for 15^th century caravels, with lateen sails thank you. Unfortunately, I am not a ship builder and will likely never have one. I did however, come up with an idea that would facilitate moving the yard from one side of the mast to the other when crossing the eye of the wind, thus hopefully reducing manpower requirements somewhat. The idea may well have been tried and rejected, and of course even if workable, could not be used on a ship that was intended to be a period replica. Having observed many images of caravels that appeared to have all the lines in place, I observed that a few of them did not appear to have any lines emanating from the mast at a point above where the yard attached. That point is critical, as the yard will herein be attached very close to the top of the mast. In practice, the sails would be pulled up to the yard by appropriately placed lines. The “rotator” shown in the following link would then be flipped over as shown and the sails could then be let down on the other side of the mast. https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=90F2DFCE00CBACE8%21210 A problem will arise if the sails do not follow the yard all the way over and they become entangled atop the mast or yard, so they would have to be drawn up tight or some control lines would be required. Of course a host of other problems might also be possible. So is this idea workable? My only experience to this point is reading and looking, and my wife looks at sailboats and thinks they are silly. So who knows what the future will hold. My thanks to all for your time, and thoughts and comments would be appreciated.