Sail , Vesion 2 test movie

[Peterj]

Well today i wents out and tested the new sail.

The water out there is putrid and stinks also, so fishing didn't even cross my mind.

It worked rather well , however on the first run towards the pier at the airbase the mast stays slipped and made things a bit difficult with the sail dropping into the water. I had to truss it to the deck and make my way into shore and fix them up.

Once that was done out i went to head back to the parking point.


Well it went rather well, the wind was lightish at the time . That was probably a good thing as the mast stays were slipping and i could feel the power in the sail from the pull on the sheet line it was giving. I had no worries sailing from the pier to probably 50 mtrs to the west of the house there. Winds was around 10 knts at the most and the yak sailed at right angles to the wind with no problems.
By the feel of it id say i could have sailed further into it.
All in all it seems to work well, the home made rudder works well with it .
I think a solid mount might be the next thing, the removable one works ok but i need to make it rock solid so the mount on it doesn't slide from side to side.

[GoneFishn]

Nice work Peter. A shame about the line tensioners not working. I have just used the plastic tent tensioners and lock them in place with a knot from the excess.

Did you find at any stage the force on the sail would be an issue (tipping you out). On my first run it felt quite stable even directly cross wind, a small amount of lean but that's to be expected. I recon up to about 20knots you wouldn't need outriggers, but who goes out in that.

[ELM]

Looks great Peter and will be interesting to here some gps speeds compared with the wind speeds when you get the base sorted out.

I recon up to about 20knots you wouldn't need outriggers, but who goes out in that.

well used too anyway , AI is fantastic in 20 knots .

[Peterj]

Yeah well they ( tensioners ) were worth a try, but they cant hold the force or the mast pulling on them. They lose a bit of grip when the mast is down, and the tension is off them , i think its the way they are made.

Ill make some of the tent tensioners out of alloy plate i have here, that should fix it. I don't want to not use the removable mount, if it needs a dagger board it will come from that.

I did feel some good force a couple of times, its 200 longer up the mast and boom than the pattern. I think 20knts might be a right on the edge of easy handling.

The longer mast made it easier to handle as well, both in stowage and getting it up and down, i used the paddle keeper to hold it down.

[swit]

I had similar problems with my DIY mast stays slipping, so I'm now using a couple of SS turnbuckles...the type they use for stringing steel cable. Easy to adjust in small increments and they have a locknut. They seem pretty strong but I haven't actually tested them under load yet...i.e. on the water. The ones I'm using have 5 stamped on them, I think they're the smallest ones available. I picked mine up from Anchor Marine in Sandringham for $6.50 each. I also priced them at Bunnings, they had slightly different ones but they were nearly 3 times the price!!!

Cheers
swit

[Peterj]

I was thinking of the turnbuckles.
If i were to use them they'd be on the plate to the securing points rather than the mast to the points.

What sort of sail have you got for it?

[swit]

Much the same as yours and GoneFishins'...home grown effort a la FlatEarth plan. After seeing both of your vids, I'm Just itching to give it a whirl.

[Peterj]

Cool , we have a whole sot sailin group out there

[GoneFishn]

Cool , we have a whole sot sailin group out there

Very underrated its a lot of fun, and can make the long trips more injoyable

Hey swit with that black sail, we'll have to call your yak the "Black Pearl"

[Peterj]

I think in some way there is sort of some mystery surrounding sails and how to make them.
Maybe the work we are doing with the different mounts designs, rigging etc all be it from sources found from all over the net and some weve thought of to overcome certain problems may help take away some of the "i cant do that factor" for alot of people.

We may have to hold a diy yak sail meetup at some stage