Carrying a spare mainsail

[Dockhead]

FWIW, I carried a spare mainsail for 5 years and 10's of thousands of miles all around the NE Atlantic and Baltic. This year I took it off the boat and put it into storage.


A Dacron sail with UV damage and chafe is at risk of ripping or blowing out. A laminate sail showing signs of delamination, however slight, is at risk. A mainsail used on a rig which tends to chafe the sail is at risk. An ocean crossing largely downwind with the mainsail close to the spreaders is at risk. If you don't fall into one of these categories, perhaps you don't need a spare mainsail.



Just one person's experience; YMMV.

[wingssail]

We live onboard full time, cruise three months out of the year, and race about 25 times a year.

We have a full set of cruising sails and a full set of racing sails, 16 in total at this time.

This includes 3 mainsails.

When we were in our circumnavigation we carried all of them on board (we carried everything we owned on board). If folded well they can be quite compact. Spinnakers were folded and rolled and compressed into strong plastic bags. Other sails were simply folded tightly. The ones actively used for cruising were in ready bags (sausage bags). We do not have roller furling so that was 5 sails.

This boat has immense storage areas. In addition to the sails we carry a 12' dingy and outboard motor below plus big water and fuel tanks, provisions for 6 weeks, (more if needed), 100% of our clothing, spares, it's all there and it all fits.

Now we have a base with a storage locker, so we shift sails twice a year. This is racing season for us so we have the racing sails aboard (10 sails, no spare main).

Our forward cabin becomes a sail locker (photo) and holds about 9 sails (more when compressed). The others could be in lockers aft if they were aboard. No sails are on the cabin sole or on any of the settees, berths, or shower except in this photo where one genoa has been pulled out and is on the cabin sole.

So we have lost the use of the forward cabin for guests. No worries we can still sleep 6.

Do we need a spare mainsail? Only once did we need one. Returning to Mexico the mainsail was shredded, totally, in an accidental jibe. It could not be repaired (we have a sailmaker sewing machine and plenty of supplies) so we put on a racing mainsail and were careful with it.

[JPA Cate]

Hey, Fred, maybe you could explain for the newbies how to "be careful" with such a sail...please.

We have never carried a spare main sail. However, we've bought our share of new ones along the way, after having started out with a new one. No trysail, either. However, our 3rd reef is very deep, and off the wind, we can drop the sail and use the staysail.

Fwiw, the size of the sails and the displacement of the boat has a lot of bearing on what choices one makes about their sail plan.



Ann

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by JPA Cate

Hey, Fred, maybe you could explain for the newbies how to "be careful" with such a sail...please...Ann

We try to be careful with all our sails; no flogging, no over powering, etc.

Dacron sails, however are a little forgiving, but when we put up the Carbon/Aramid Membrane racing sail for the passage from Playa del Cocos, Costa Rica to Chiapas, Mexico, which is a big, light sail with only a single reef, and which cost PLENTY, we were sure to be especially careful.

That meant no flogging when raising or reefing. We moved the sail up or down quickly and sheeted in promptly.

No sailing over-powered upwind or down so that the sail was luffing badly.

Reef on-schedule and drop the sail if the 1st reef was still too much.

And be careful about reef points, no hoisting the sail with a reef point still tied in.

Fold it carefully and cover it immediately.

And most of all, no accidental jibes in 30kts of wind!

To read the detail of how we ruined the old sail, click here: https://wingssail.blogspot.com/2014/...-mainsail.html

[JPA Cate]

^^^^^Thank you. It is similar to how we do it, but we have no laminate sails, and less concern about slight luffing, I'm guessing. Sailmakers love luffing, and the more the sail shakes, the more the $$$ signs light up in their eyes!

....Or, at least that's how it sometimes seems.



Ann

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by wingssail

. . . This boat has immense storage areas. In addition to the sails we carry a 12' dingy and outboard motor below plus big water and fuel tanks, provisions for 6 weeks, (more if needed), 100% of our clothing, spares, it's all there and it all fits.. . .

Wow! Thread drift, but I just have to say it -- you are a lucky guy! First time I ever heard a cruising boat sailor say something like this.


Pet peeve of mine is lack of stowage and technical space on cruising boats. Even on a 54' boat made for serious passagemaking, the storage space is pathetic, no sail locker, highly limited deck storage, bah. I love my boat, but this is terrible -- Bill Dixon obviously devoted every cubic inch of space possible to the accomodation, at the expense of everything else


My previous boat was only 37', but the entire hull volume aft of the companionway was stowage and technical -- still not enough, but much better.


Getting back to the thread topic -- that's why I had to ditch the spare mainsail. The lazarette, the only deck storage, was overflowing. My spare headsail -- the 120% yankee -- lives on the floor in the forecabin, in the way of guests who sleep there. Bah.

[hpeer]

Bumping an old thread, I know.

We are adjusting our sail suite. Getting rid of a high cut Yankee (listed “for sale” here) and purchasing a new main. The old main is in reasonable shape but is very heavy. I took it to a sailmaker to ease the bolt rope and he said he couldn’t and the cloth was too stretched. So I started the sail purchasing process only to find I COULD ease the sail and it lost a whole lot of its belly.

The new sail will match the old sail except in a bit lighter cloth. The battens should be interchangeable. The old sail still has some life left. I can store it in the space vacated by the old Yankee. Both sails will have third reefs.

This one off boat has an interesting “feature”. Our stb. Settee extends under a shelf and cabinets. Empty it can sleep 2 adults. We cram spare sails under the cabinets and they make the back rests for the settee.

Keeping the old main gives some more confidence in purchasing a lighter new main. There is some increased risk to blowing the new main, but it will be easier on my body. If the new main does blow then we have the old main as a back up until we can get the newer one fixed or replaced.

And, worse comes to worse we could scavenge repair material.

44’ steel cutter, 40,000 pounds, typically Caribbean but have done Labrador/Newfoundland.

[AiniA]

OK, we did 40,000 nm mostly in the Trades but to South Africa where it can windy. Sail inventory with number to times used:
Main and #2 - all the time
Working jib - never, changing sails was a major pain
Staysail for removable inner stay - about twice a year
Storm jib - never
Trysail own track - never
Asymmetric - fairly often

We did repairs on main and Genoa occasionally

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Wow! Thread drift, but I just have to say it -- you are a lucky guy! First time I ever heard a cruising boat sailor say something like this...

Pet peeve of mine is lack of stowage and technical space on cruising boats. Even on a 54' boat made for serious passagemaking, the storage space is pathetic, no sail locker, highly limited deck storage, bah.

I don't think this is thread drift. The question is: should one carry a spare mainsail. I think the consensus that it might be nice, not essential, but most boats don't have room for it. My point is that you can carry spare sails if your boat is laid out to allow it, and spare sails are very useful.

I am not lucky to have this storage space, we chose this boat intentionally for its many unique characteristics including:

• Massive interior volume, mostly empty, which permitted space allocation which suited us.
• No second (or third) cabin or head. We can sleep small guests forward and an adult couple of guests on the settees in the main cabin, that's all, it's a two person boat, mainly (oh there is a pair of pilot berths which remain open if you want to cram in a crowd, but its intimate.
• Flush deck which adds considerable space outboard of where a normal cabin is, used for many things.
• Huge space aft for lazerette and big storage bins (9).
• A powerful sail plan which allows us to continue to hit our polars even with big loads (and consider that leaving off 8 of our 10 racing crew members makes up for a lot of added cruising stuff).

Then we modified the boat to add tankage, sail storage, misc storage bins, workshop, permanently mounted Sailrite sailmaker machine, shower, hanging locker, inside, centrally located, chain locker with room for two 300' rodes, and spare storm anchor, and a bigger and more complete galley along with a myriad of essential cruising equipment such as watermaker, hot water system, a vanity and dressing area, cabin heat, nav station with computer table, and more.

This is what allows to carry 14 sails, a 12' dingy, 15hp motor and every thing I mentioned in the previous post without any thing on the cabin sole, on any bunk, or on deck, on a 43' sloop. Most of it is on board when we race, and we win races.

We are not lucky we have this, and more cruisers could have room for a spare mainsail or other useful gear if they took care when selecting their boat.

[wingssail]

Originally Posted by AiniA

OK, we did 40,000 nm mostly in the Trades but to South Africa where it can windy. Sail inventory with number to times used:
Main and #2 - all the time
Working jib - never, changing sails was a major pain
Staysail for removable inner stay - about twice a year
Storm jib - never
Trysail own track - never
Asymmetric - fairly often

We did repairs on main and Genoa occasionally

We did 55,000 nm or more, covering all points of sail including upwind, but lots of trade wind sailing, crossed all the world's oceans, and many places where it is windy, including South Africa (photos).

Our sail inventory and frequency of usage: (cruising sails, we also carry a racing inventory, not included here).

Main and #4 Working jib - 90% of the time. Main has 3 reefs and we used them all. Working jib (#4) is 85%. This combination is good from 10 knots of true wind to about 35 knots of true wind (with reefing).
#2 genoa - Often. Changing sails is a bit of work but not a major pain, we do not try to avoid this and do it when appropriate.
Staysail for removable inner stay - Not equipped.
Storm jib - never
Trysail own track - Not Equipped
Symmetrical spinnaker - Frequently
Asymmetric - Frequently

We did repairs on most of the sails we have. With 12-14 sails aboard we have spares for everything.

The ability to adjust your sail plan allows safer and speedier passages and makes heavy weather far easier to endure. We think more cruisers should adopt seamanship and sail handling tactics, such as changing sail, common on racing boats.

Photos: Not afraid of going forward to change a sail, and sailing upwind off Africa's East Coast.