Today the snowy weather we have had in the N.E. United states broke long enough for me to get out and try my new sail i have made.
I have been wanting to build a sail for some time now for several reasons, first because i want a larger sail for light wind days and because my current sail is starting to show signs of wear and age and last because i cant take the 1980s -early 1990s HOT Pink color anymore. So i set up a large table indoors out of the cold and snow, bought a Chinese Walking Foot sewing machine, bought material and had a go at it. First just to hone my sewing skills i made a copy of my current sail. If it was ok i plan on another larger sail. Well it came out Great but not perfect. The luff or mast curve needs alittle adjustment ( which I expected ). The luff panel has some wrinkles that i need to work on, but once i get them sorted i will making other sails. The sewing machine has been great and useful for many other projects including CHEAP sail bags to store and transport sails. I will post another time on that project. The sail was inexpensive to build about $200 US dollars in material. i figure thats not bad for a brand new sail. it took about 2 weekends to build but the next one should go faster,but it was fun and will give me alot of pride to say i built it.

here is a comparison of the sail that i used as a pattern. if you look closely the mast sleeve has a slight twist fully sheeted too. so i need to work this problem out before i start the second sail.

Im using windsurfing mast which ive been told many times have too much flex. And i believe this is true. i may try a all ally mast to go with a much stiffer mast. i tryed an Epoxy/Carbon mast and the wrinkles got worst,





then i tryed an all aluminum windsurf mast (much stiffer) and it eliminated alot of the wrinkles and looked much better. But I feel it is still to soft .Here it a comparison 1st pic is sail with Epoxy mast and 2nd pic is withn Aluminum mast. You can see mast pocket is much flatter and luff panel is not wanting to push forward toward mast.

Just a thought. Maybe you could try a mast crane at the top to set the head back a little
Impressed with your workmanship Great job!

Thats a great idea that may help. i was going to make one day this may give reason to have a go at one now and see if that helps sail shape. Thanks Hiko

Put more tension on the batten pockets might help.Might pull out the wrinkles

I also think your sheeting point in the floor of your yacht should be further back. This would allow the sheet position on the boom to be moved further back and downward pressure further back on the boom and pull the sail away from the mast more. At the moment you seem to be pulling the sail down the mast at the second batten from top and the back half of the sail is being pulled toward to the mast. Instead of the sail bending the mast it seems to be collapsing it

Did you put more tension on the batten pockets?Sounds logical to me and works well with windsurf sails