cross-cut or radial mainsail

[martti]

Hi
Could use some advices for selecting right type of sails. We are not-racing, family cruising
but appreciate good performance and some trimming.

Basically I wonder for 29.2 Jeanneau SO, should main sail be cross-cut and radial
or full cross-cut ? When material would be dacron (7.5 / 7.62 oz).

Thanks for comments

[davideso37]

Martti,

Cross cut sails use woven dacron has different size warp and wheft threads which are aligned with the stresses. Radial cut use uniform threads and can be dacron or a laminate often dacron on two sides of a mylar film. Assuming you do not have in mast furling, for cruising I would go for a cross cut dacron main with full length battens and take the leach out to the backstay for maximum sail area. The dacron is less susceptible to mildew than the laminated cloths. I have Ronstan ball slides on the ends of my full length battens to make it easier to raise and lower the main. Slugs tend to stick in the track.
There is a lot of useful information on the major sailmakers web sites and some really good independent technical information on the cloth manufacturers web site.

David

[martti]

Hi
Thanks David for good advices.
I found some good articles about differences between cross and radial cut. e.g.
www.fxsails.com/sailchoicearticle.php
www.onedesign.com/articles/article21.html
So maybe for size like SO 29.2 (20m^2 main sail), cross cut is good enough.

However you made great interest of your slider option on end of battens to help raise and lower the main sail. Can you share some ideas and since at first look full Ronstan system as whole seems quite expensive, is there any way to take partial advantage ? Just replace normal slider on full length battens place with ball slides, or ?

Thanks,
- Martti

[MartyB]

I just had a new UK Tape drive made for my Arcadia, and it only uses the ball bearing bat sliders for the top two full battens, the rest are the typical slugs that came with the mast I had. So far in the 4 times up, it went up just fine, and down for that matter.

If you want a laminate sail, Ullman is making what they call CAL or Custum Axle Laminate, a laminated scrim sail for the price of there dacron sail. It is pannel made like dacron. I do not recall seeing the US Ullman site having too much info, but the ullman loft in San Diego does have info on there website. Being as not too many of your sized boats were imported to North America, you may want to see if there is a european equal, as that is where I will assume you are located.

Otherwise, the North soft NorLam is a good sail, I have a 110 made of that. I was initially thinking of all norlam, but have decided to go full bore with the new main, and will get a carbon tape drive 155 here shortly, as I do do some racing. Then get a 140 for general cruising in dac or equal.

Marty