A Sail and Sailmakers thread...

Well I have to say, for the first time I had a 100% visual experience of those controls making a massive difference. I've got this new soft sail a local sailmaker made for me, the first time I used it, it didn't do upwind worth a damn, flew offwind (which in windsurfing is always a sign of a dodgy sail)but being soft had luffing issues and half the problem that time my controls were not long enough to put on enough downhaul and the kicker wheels were off their track and it was too bloody cold to thing of anything anyway so I haven't used it until today, which dawned bright and a reasonable temperature with a pleasant force 3 out of the East.

I lengthened my downhaul so it would go through both cleats, made sure the kicker was working, had turned up with more than half an hour to spare so I could set it up, by bunging on massive downhaul it flattened the entry, this sail has a lot more luff curve and belly it also had that crap batten spaghetti strip y'all love so much and I replaced it with one of my old 80's racing sails aqua batten from the period they were made with kevlar reinforcement, that sorted out the top of the shape and you could see the foil nicely. By wanging on lots of gnav, it flattened the mid section nicely so this was how I set out from the gun and my upwind issues were over.
However downwind as usual there was no wind, it's always windy upwind and nothing downwind and a lad in a beaten up Laser, started to overtake, panic, Lasers don't overtake me downwind. Downwind is my only strength, I take everything downwind that sails on that lake until I lose the plot which usually happens about 45 minutes in. Anyway he goes, 'your sail looks quite flat, like a windsurfers sail,'I said 'yes that's how I like it, but it normally goes better off wind,' he said (by now he's almost on me, I use this trick engage them in conversation whilst getting an inside track on the next mark, now he's doing it to me cheeky git) as it dawned on me, 'better ease the kicker', my other sail needs the kicker on downwind, probably because it's so shagged, anyway, I dumped the lot, kicker, downhaul and wham, I shot away. Never seen anything quite so dramatic, probably because it's the first time I've used a new soft sail that responds so well to the controls, so I spent the rest of the race on off up down, tedious as it is, all that fiddling does work(when your not tripping over your own control lines and rolling around the bottom of the boat), but, the caveat it does different things with different sails, but this is my first experience of a soft sail.
Y'all probably know all this, but it's not that obvious on full batten sails, the effect isn't that dramatic, we haven't used them for years simply because of the lack of range and controls, but it was interesting nonetheless.
Totally useless if it really blows, I'm already maxed out on cunningham so I'll need some other way to depower, probably end up reefing.

Edited by iGRF - 07 Apr 13 at 5:01pm

Yes and I've rigged an adjustable system to do that, but right now the way it works I still need to do t with those fast pin in plates thing when what I really want is a system like the Clinker Bandits use.