sailmaking questions
 

I don't recall any pictures being mentioned. There is a tradition, y'know, of sharing these things.....

;-)

Steve


Wish I had a digital camera! We HAVE been taking pictures and will
post when I get them developed. But we've had a family emergency and
working on "Gusto" is currently on hold. Will definately share
pictures later. When I first found this newsgroup I was a little wary
of posting my questions thinking that our crazy plans might have been
ridiculed. But when I read about making a boat out of soda bottles, I
figured I was in the right place!!! Thanks for all your help!

Sandy

sailmaking questions
 

if you are still looking for a way to design the sail, look up a
downloadable program called sailcut. it will give you all the details
for cutting each panel given the overall dimensions that you want the
finished product to be.

Carl McCarty wrote:

Sandy,
I am curious- did you find this material at Wal-Mart also?
Thanks, Carl McCarty

sandy wrote:

I just bought the material to make the sail for our still unfinished
10' nesting sailboat. I took another look at the material (thin
nylon) at Walmart and did find that you could readily blow air through
it and quickly decided against it. Then I found material that looks
suspiciously like real dacron sailcloth. The clerks had no idea what
it was. It's strong (I can't tear a thin sample of the cloth), it
melts with a match...and it's much thicker than the nylon material AND
you can't blow through it at all. At $1/yd, I couldn't resist it. At
that price, I figured it's worth playing with (even if it is bright,
BRIGHT yellow).

Now I'm trying to figure out how to design the sail. Hubby finally
decided that he didn't want the sprit sail and opted for a cat rig
instead. This material is 56" wide and I'm wondering if I should just
sew the panels together (using the full width of the material) or
what??? It looks like most sails use narrower panels but it seems
silly to cut the material only to resew it. Also not sure how to go
about shaping the sails. I'm thinking of keeping it simple and just
sewing the panels flat and shaping the sail somewhat by curving the
edges of the sail.

Appreciate any suggestions. Not looking for a professional
sail...just trying to do the best I can without knowing what I'm
doing.

Thanks!

Sandy




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