[Public-List] Mainster

Mon Jun 27 13:09:00 PDT 2011

It is set loose footed as well as loose luffed, but attached at the head to the halyard, at the clew to the boom (supported by a topping lift), and at the tack typically to one of the easy reef points for tacks (I'm not sure quite what those are called, but I've seen ones that are spirals and allow attaching a tack safely without actually pinning it).  The sail is triangular, with a hollow cut leech (to avoid need for battens which don't tend to work so well in extremely light air), relatively flat because nylon stretches a fair bit.
The boom attachment keeps the sail shape much cleaner at 90 degrees or so to the wind.
The loose-footedness makes the sail very easy to set/stow - just hook it on at the tack, hook/tie it on at the clew and halyard, and haul her up.  Stowing  is easy to - drop the halyard, detach the 3 points and stuff the sail into a (smallish) bag.

Supposedly useful from about 55-75 degrees off the wind (closer in slightly stronger breezes) to 180, albeit not as good as a blooper far off the wind, but very easy to manage.  Will start you moving in just a few knots of wind and won't slat if there less than that.  Should make boat handling easier too as having a main up makes tacking much cleaner  -- the wind on the main balances the boat so that you don't fall terribly far off - particularly is large waves/little wind I've ended up just about gybing with the jib drawing and the main stalled.  Again, I will post reviews once I've tried it along with the sailcad design I used.  Lake Ontario can be very calm early in the day so having something to keep moving without the engine noise is helpful.  For ocean work, there isn't enough fuel to go very far and having a sail up, not banging keeps the rolling down and the patience from wearing too thin.  Still, it is an experiment for me which is why
 I'm trying to keep the costs down.

Bill.

________________________________
From: "crufone at comcast.net" <crufone at comcast.net>
To: "Alberg, Public List" <public-list at alberg30.org>
Sent: Monday, June 27, 2011 3:40:56 PM
Subject: [Public-List] Mainster

Bill, 

Thanks for the description.  I have never heard of such a sail. Is the sail loo se footed as well?   I suppose that you need an easily adjustable topping lift for the main boom to help shape the mainster. Perhaps it is not even attached to the boom? Is the sail triangular or does it have shoulders as a symetrical spinnaker would have? 

Michael 

From: "Bill Wallace" <wayfarer3134 at yahoo.com> 
To: crufone at comcast.net, "Alberg 30 Public List -- open to all" <public-list at lists.alberg30.org> 
Sent: Monday, June 27, 2011 11:25:51 AM 
Subject: Re: [Public-List] Looking for ideas to organize cockpit lockers 

A mainster is a nylon mainsail, ala an article in Good Old Boat magazine.  It is set flying (eg not attached to the mainsail track) in place of the mainsail during very light winds.  It doesn't slat even in the lightest winds, but is only good to 10-15 knots maximum wind speed.   Because it is nylon, you just stuff it into a bag and it doesn't take much space, so I don't mind carrying an extra sail. 

If we you want to sew your own, I find that I can easily buy ripstop nylon at fabric factory stores (Lens Mill Waterloo, Ontario and nearby) and if I'm not fussy about the colour, then buying the entire remaining roll gets me a cost of about $6/meter (yard).  Downloading one of the sail designing programs allows you to quickly design the sail and print out single-sheet outlines for each panel.  Those get transferred to the fabric and the edges cut with a hot knife (I use a propane soldering iron from Lowes - $20 - that way I don't worry about the cord moving the fabric - but do it outside in a light wind that moves away from you). 

Cost for me is about $200 for either the drifter or the mainsail. 
100 in fabric 
50 in high-tech rope for the luff/foot 
25 in thread/needles 
25 for a few rings and nylon webbing for attaching the corners 

sailrite sells a kit for about 450 I think the quote was, and for a first sail, I would recommend going that way.  This will be my third sail, so I'm keen to try designing it as well, and for the cost/effort, I don't mind ruining a sail if it doesn't work out the way I want.   

I plan on setting the drifter attached either just inboard of the forestay or just outboard for long runs  attaching it to the end of the anchor roller gives it another 30-40 cm further out and that should help the boat balance. 

If I like my sail, I will upload the sailcad files to the alberg30 site for both the drifter and the mainster (and eventually for the try/storm sails), but that won't be till next June at the earliest as I do my sewing and any woodworking over the winter and try to sail/install over the summer. 

Bill. 
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