Saraleeâs new spars are in place and the standing and running rigging installed. I now have the exact measurements for the new fore and top'sls. The top'sl will be about 25 sq ft or so (talk about toys ) . Dacron may be over kill for this; also, for the bigger Yankee. What material should I use for these sails, and/or why one over the other. I am thinking the top'sl is subject to chafe and damage from the gaff rigging and so nylon would be easier to fix. The graduated smaller Yankees will be Dacron. Your thoughts please.
A top'sl is a light air sail and if handled properly will chaff some, but that bad. To handle it right it should be brought down to the deck on each tack and re-hoisted on the new leeward side, so it doesn't grind itself to pieces on the rig. Many folks don't do this and carry the sail with it on the windward side, bulging through the rigging to leeward. This of course is hard on the material. Since it's a light air sail, rip stop will serve fine and will wear reasonably well too.
Head sails are a different story, generating a lot of drive, which quickly stretches out lesser materials so I'd recommend a light Dacron. When the wind strength picks up you'll likely want to change out to a smaller headsail.
Craig Here is my experiance, Burlap doesn't do good and is hard to find in a nice color. Bud.
I used thin (airmail) paper on my vacationer model..... :lol: :lol:
ROTFL, I had ruled out burlap early as it is now hard to find in any color and always smells like spuds. I ain't heard of airmail paper in 40 years! Do they still make it, and that big?
Thanks PAR. I was pondering a 150 from the fore sprit for those no wind days when the 22 run away from me. Is rip stop OK for this? I suspect Dacron would be too heavy, 50-60 sq ft or so. The Yankees will all be Dacron two or three sizes set flying.
I wouldn't use rip stop on a "shaped" headsail (having a hard luff, set flying or hanked) use 3.8 oz. Dacron, which is surprisingly light. Rip stop is fine for down wind sails, but upwind, driving into a 8 knot breeze at 5 knots will blow out rip stop pretty quickly (the sail is seeing 13+ knots over it's surface). Down wind the same sail will see 10 knots, less the boat speed, so the loading is greatly reduced.
Air Mail material is Tyvek and is a good material for down wind sails or el-cheapo make-um up yourself sails. It's a bit stretchy and will loose shape reasonably quickly, but is an inexpensive way to go. There are three types of Tyvek and one has holes in it, (House Wrap and the easiest to find of course) making it a poor choice for sails, the other two are much better. It can be had in very large "bolts" (widths) and I use it to play around with new sail arrangements and shapes.
Back to the subject at hand. A 150 can be carried some, up into the wind. Since this is the case, you'll want a real sail cloth to withstand the strains of windward work.
I'm not sure what you're attempting, but dividing up the headsails (cutter rig) into multiple, smaller sails will decrease efficiency a fair amount, particularly in small craft. The best you can do is have a well shaped single masthead jib with about a 20 to 30% overlap on a Vacationer. Much more overlap will require very early change out and limit windward ability. If you want better light air performance, the topsail will help some, so will a gen-aker or spinnaker when sheets are well eased. A 150 could double in this regard, particularly poled out, but will need to be put away when hard on the wind, because the sheeting angle needed to bring the clew close enough to the boat for windward work will place the main on the centerline, flapping away uselessly, if not completely back winded by the hard sheeted jib.
Several headsails, to suit conditions is a good idea, but I would get to carried away. A boomed jib with a single reef, a 120/130 and a big ass down wind sail (spinnaker or gen-aker) will be more then the average person will want to change in an afternoon's sail. Most of the time you'll have the 120/130 hanked on, maybe tossing up the spinnaker every so often for fun. The boomed jib, reefed down can save 'ya when you get caught with your paints down, or to just relieve some weather helm because of wind strength increases. A 150 is a very limited sail on a low aspect gaff rig.
I am really just playing with this right now. Working up the ICW here gets you behind the island and trees much of the way to P-COla so the top'sl is really needed there. You are right about the single head sail. That is the efficient way to go by all analysis. I am fooling around with the Yankees because they look so damn cool and the working jib is much too small (~80 % or less as designed). On the light air days the 22s run away from me. Based on this information I suspect I will not make the big fore sail and just stay with the dacron for the smaller ones and a first shrouder. Adding a mid size yankee can't get me into too much trouble if the wind pipes as set flying they are easy to dump. Bit of a pain though single handing. I generally sail between FWB, Destin, and the Mid Bay Bridge so too much sail handling on a 40 to 60 minute tack is a problem. Thanks much for the information Par. What do you think about a top gallant? :lol:
I drew up a square rigged gaffer some time ago. The square sail is about as good as it gets from a close reach to dead before. It does add some complication to the rig, but not as much as you'd think. The sail can be handled from deck (no going aloft to furl) and can be surprisingly efficient. It's a low aspect sail so heeling forces are minimal, though may not be much help in the shadow of the stuff crowding the ICW shores.
Personally, I'd try the topsail and buy a good 130 masthead of light fabric. The 130 can be poled out or sheeted in tight and the topsail can be flown when you have the time to fool with it. To me, small craft should be as simple as possible, few strings to yank on and easy to handle. This generally means the least amount of sails hoisted as you can use, to provide the performance you desire.
With the limited height of the stick on this boat, topsail yard and all, the advantage in difficult, fluky areas will be minimum. There's just not enough aspect (height to width ratio) in the sail plan to gain much of an advantage. The electric or iron jib may be an easier reprise in these locations, though not as romantic, nor as cool looking.
If you really want to improve light air ability, then you need a new mast and sail plan. Your boat could easily tolerate a 10% increase in area, possibility with a better headsail to main relationship. This would boost the SA/D (Sail Area to Displacement ratio) into the to mid 20's (current SA/D for a Vacationer 18'ish and good for easy air cruising) and truly improve the abilities of the boat in light wind. This would also have the draw back (there's always something) of requiring a reef sooner, but not a bad trade off, if most of your sailing is in light wind strengths.