TOPIC:

We have owned AL709 for forty years and use her for family fun only in Ballinskelligs, Co. Kerry, Ireland.



Lately her original sails have acquired rust stains and we have had North make a new set for her.

The boat has wooden mast and boom, not adjustable. The main fits fine, but the new jib is a foot longer than the old jib along the luff (162" as against 150") and too close to the distance from the bow deck fitting to the top pulley for the jib halliard (163.5") for me to get any luff tension, which the new sail needs, as it has no forestay clips like the old sail has.



I am thinking of introducing a little rake to the mast mount, thus increasing the forestay length by a few inches to accommodate the new jib.



Am I right, or should I ask North to shorten the new Jib ? ( their Irish Rep. is currently sailing in Sardinia and is not available)



Tom Kirby



P,S. I have tried several times to upload a picture of her to this forum in various sizes without success.tomkirby2008-05-28 11:22:14

I would have to measure my jibs, but it sounds as though they have made you a "high aspect ratio" jib, rather than a low aspect ratio one. You could shorten the halyard, and give the mast slightly more rake by shortening the shrouds. You probably have some vernier plates on the shrouds that can be moved a bit. This should make the boat slightly easier to handle upwind as it gets a bit windier . The other option is to get them to reduce the luff length as you suggest.

When I ordered new sails for Stingo, I deliberately went to a well known sailmaker that does NOT usually make sails for Albs to avoid this sort of aggro. North are known for their Alb sails so it looks like you got the standard pattern modern sails which do not suit an un-modernised classic Alb very well. If you gave them the measurements of the old sails, they ****ed up, but if not, I'm afraid its down to you



Modern racing Albs sheet the jib to somewhere on the side tank. Old Albs sheeted to the gunnel. If your jib fairleads are still out at the gunnel, [ideal for a cruising boat but not quite so close-winded on flat water - bl**dy pond sailers ;-( ], you may find the new jib less than satisfactory.



Try increasing the mast rake but the new jib may well need *much* more luff tension than the old one and give you other problems. I wouldn't have the new jib cut down, Either you goofed and you may need to order one that fits properly or North did and I would then expect them to supply one the right shape. It should be easy enough to resell the high aspect North jib.



P.S. My new sails were with 1 1/4" wooden battens, hanks on the jib and cut to match those I was replacing. They've been very satisfactory and I've done a lot of sea sailing in sometimes very nasty conditions with them.

Jean,

Many thanks for your prompt reply. I'll go with the mast rake adjustment first. The attachment points for the shrouds can be altered on what must be vernier plates, but I'll have to extend the forestay by a few inches. We'll see how it fits then.



Tom K.

Dear Ian,

Very many thanks for your early-bird reply, which is very instructive. Yes, our old Alb. has jib fairleads on the gunnel, and that's where they'll stay.

Uniquely (I think) 'Scimitar' AL 709 has sails which sport an oblique orange and white alternating slabs colour scheme on the sails, which would limit the resale-ability of the jib, perhaps. I naively didn't submit measurements to North, thinking that alb sails were alb sails period.(I sent tham a photo), so, yes I have a high-aspect clipless foresail, but I love the look of them and I'd like to try to accommodate them as they are if possible by raking the old wooden mast a bit. The problem of getting adequate forestay tension might rear its head then, but we'll see. The new main has tiny thin new battens, quite unlike the 2X4 planks req'd for the old sails !

My wife suggests I sell the whole new set(difficult with the number on the main) and have the old ones mended. Maybe she's right !

Tom K.

Dera Tom,

Reading your posts makes me wonder what luff curve they made the sails for. When you ordered the suit from Norths, did you tell them it was a wooden mast or did they just assume that you had the standard Cumulus mast? Sailmakers would generally want to know the all up crew weight so that they could get the corrrect fullness in the sails to for you combination.



If you were to be selling them I may be interested depending on what the specification was.

Dermod

Dom,

Yes, I told them I had a wooden mast and boom and sent them a photo of the boat under sail. I wasn't asked anything about luff curves. We sail the thing for personal and family fun only, and weight combo's don't matter to us anyway. I'll attempt to send a photo with this to illustrate the colour pattern which the new sails have, also including the AL 709 number. Attempt failed.

Tom Ktomkirby2008-05-29 16:40:37

Ian,

Nigel Young, North's rep. in Ireland has just returned from abroad, advised me to adjust the foot mount of the mast to give a little rake and he's sending me a set of luff hanks for the jib. I think that'll solve the problem.



Thanks. Tom K.

I hope and expect you should have a useable setup following Nigel's advice. If the photo was a decent one, with any luck, North will have spotted the gunnel fairleads and cut the jib to be much flatter near the luff than is now usual. If you find however that the main draws 10 degrees closer to the wind than the jib will no matter what you do to the mast rake and jib luff tension, then you are going to need to have North look at the jib again. I have a full bulkhead for the bow tank streight across a couple of inches in front of the mast step and still use the deck fitting and collar for a rotating mast so varying my mast rake by very much would require serious structural modifications. If you have enough space to move the step, you're lucky. I actually took my boat to the sailmaker and rigged it in their car park so they knew *exactly* what I needed.

Depending on your exact type of mast step, it may be worth thinking about how to make it easy to adjust (although IIRC the class rules correctly, it can't be adjustable on the water)