Any thoughts on a "Standard " mini sail?
What size would it be?
For what size mast 4.2, 4.3, 4.4 mast?
What boom length?
What sort of cut horizontal, vertical, radial?
Number of battens?
What cost would it be to be viable for a sailmaker to have an internet order on line service?
etc, etc, etc.......
Over the last few years Ive made about +25 sails for the minis, current sails being used are
me 4.0m radial cut, narrow boom for ALSA ini class3 racing, 4.2monofilm vert cut for LLM racing.
Miranda 3.8m radial cut, with3m reef .Also suits craz trav
littley's 3m , any cut.
Test pilot1 4.5m with a reef to 3.8m
i try fo fit a reef point into all the sails I make now just for the convenience.
the Blokart 5.5m sails get a lot of use here on lefroy, the 2 and 3m sails rarely come out.
all my mini sails have fitted to a 4.6m WS mast except the newest 3.8 radial , where I chopped of 400mm from the bottom of a 460 mast to get a skinnier mast down low when reefing.
I try for a boom length of 1.2 - 1.4m, and lots of sail area up high to help the sail twist in a gust
Landyacht, why the choice for a radial cut? does this add more pieces to be made into the sail? could it be made simpler?
Im thinking of a low cost ($300 - $350 approx) simple sail for the mini's, made by a sailmaker ... or am I just dreamin?
Did Cisco take the fert. bag sail you made to a sailmaker for a quote?
when I made enquires for new dacron cloth, the coloured stuff only went up to 4 or 4.2oz. the small roll of 4oz that I have is a tad light for ,say, a 4m mini sail .it really needs to be 4.5-5 oz cloth. I havent done much with some of the composite materials or monofilm. the kevlar sail I did recently was the first that Ive played with ( it was a big old piece of sailcloth.)
Im using a radial cut/vertical cut as a sailmaker "unmystified" the sailshaping process for me when he explained how he achieved a sail shape with the different 'broadseams'.
most of the sails Ive since made mimic or derive from that original lesson on a beach.
you also need to consider the surfaces that people are sailing on to
If i was making a paddock bashing sail for say, Lachlan, it would be a bit longer in the boom(1.6?) same for some of these "new saltlakes" and softer beaches that some of the guys are now discovering. that would give it a bit more "low down " grunt, rather than top speed
the 4m sails that i make from bukibag material take 5-6 hrs of work fom start to finish , working from a set of templates. in dacron that would be 7m cloth @ $24.00 ($168.00)battens and tensioners $70.00?, freight $50.00, leaving $62.00 for labour ie $10.00 ph.
even ciscos price is probably a bit cheap , probably since hes using old stock cloth
Can't quite remeber but think my sailmaker was in the same range (around 650) when I asked him about a 4m Blokart sail made in the white reinforced material...not the monofilm. Almost 12 months ago, and he loves sailing been in the business almost longer than I have been around!!
Hi guys, I reckon $650 is about as cheap as anyone outside of asia could do them.
Paul, for a cheap sail, eyelets and cord do just fine for batten tension (saves a bit) and I don't think it's quite fair to include freight in raw costings. I know you live in the sticks, but I reckon it needs to go on the end, not the early costs, so it's going to be $X + freight.
With multi stack cutting from templates a fair whack of labour comes out, we used to 5 at a time and at least as quick and probably more accurate than one at a time with scissors, especially if the buyers can agree on a sail shape.
Gizmo, sorry on your wish for a real cheapy (both you and I are living in the "Good old days" on this one!)
I found that it was cheaper to get my sail from england that anything that I could purchase in AUS (at the time I could not find any sailmaker that made purpose cut sails for land yachts) The cost was $650 from R J sails freight is the problem unless you have some one traveling back. Mine was for a class5 but they do make a range of sails.
cheers
AUS230
