wingdiver
Well-Known Member
Lots of replies about the foresail issues - which is great as we need to replace Mermaids as we still have the old one from before the re-rig which is 10ft too short.
We have a cruising chute and you can bend that back like a huge genoa at certain points of the wind (well our experienced sailing buddy could!) so getting a smaller sized furling genny would seem to be OK for us.
No-one seems to have mentioned mains (which are mentioned by the OP). Our decision was based on ease of use and cruising not racing. We were after main and mizzen sails.
We ended up with sails from Kemps made from a ripstop 9.5 material. Both have stackpack/lazyjack systems (also by Kemp) and are loose footed. The mainsail is fully battened and runs on an external Harken track. The mizzen is 3/4 battened and runs in sliders in the mast slot.
For ease of use of even a big sail like our main (55ft up the mast 16ft along the boom) this system is excellent. You can pull the sail up by hand to within a couple of feet of the top before finising by winch and lowering in a hurry single handed is a piece of cake as it all just tumbles into the stackpack.
Kemps did a very good job. Not as cheap as HK sails but very reasonable for made in the UK (near Poole) and we can't fault their workmanship. Will certainly talk to them about the new genoa.
We have a cruising chute and you can bend that back like a huge genoa at certain points of the wind (well our experienced sailing buddy could!) so getting a smaller sized furling genny would seem to be OK for us.
No-one seems to have mentioned mains (which are mentioned by the OP). Our decision was based on ease of use and cruising not racing. We were after main and mizzen sails.
We ended up with sails from Kemps made from a ripstop 9.5 material. Both have stackpack/lazyjack systems (also by Kemp) and are loose footed. The mainsail is fully battened and runs on an external Harken track. The mizzen is 3/4 battened and runs in sliders in the mast slot.
For ease of use of even a big sail like our main (55ft up the mast 16ft along the boom) this system is excellent. You can pull the sail up by hand to within a couple of feet of the top before finising by winch and lowering in a hurry single handed is a piece of cake as it all just tumbles into the stackpack.
Kemps did a very good job. Not as cheap as HK sails but very reasonable for made in the UK (near Poole) and we can't fault their workmanship. Will certainly talk to them about the new genoa.
