Radial sail for in mast furling?

[JohnB40]

Hi
I have a Beneteau 40 Oceanis with in mast furling. I need new sails.
I have three quotes but one surprised me with a tri radial main.
The current main is cross cut and the usual fairly flat shapeless sail as it has to roll into the mast. It does have 4 short vertical battens but not sure they help a lot.
Is a dacron radial sail OK for a furling main?
How will it fly once furled/reefed a foot or two into the mast?
She is very much a cruiser, not a performance cruiser.
I know little so any ideas would be great.
Thanks
JohnB40

[Dockhead]

My in-mast furling main is tri-radial cut, and works fine. I don't know why a radial cut sail would be worse than a bias cut one. Either type can be cut flat or full as the design requires.

My mainsail is laminate, not Dacron. Laminate seems to work better for in-mast furling as it is thinner and rolls up more easily. Not to mention being much nicer to trim.

[Kenomac]

Our DYS tri radial cut main works fine with in mast furling. The Sailcoat finish seems to make it slippery.

[UNCIVILIZED]

There's a difference between tri-radial & radial, so you may wish to clarify what your discussing with your sailmaker, & here.

[Markhunter1097]

Check out the north 3Di nordac, these sails furl very well and you should be able to get some shape into it considering it is moulded. And agree with,Kenomac, having the sail coated with mclube sailkoteplus will help a huge amount for an in mast furling sail

[model 10]

I have a radial cut Dacron sail and every sailmaker who has ever seen it goes off on how you can't have a radial cut polyester sail. The warp and the woof don't go the right directions for a radial sail in polyester fabric.

[sailcrazy]

After 3 cross-cut M/Ss in our in-mast furler, we were ready to try anything. The UK sailmaker in Marmaris, Turkey talked us into a synthetic tri-radial cut M/S back in 2013, and it's been perfect ever since. Minimal bagging, good shape, easy in and out, easy to reef-no issues at all. And we've had no mildew issues, either (a concern of ours with the synthetic...before we got it), despite cruising in the mid-to-southern Medd and Caribb exclusively since we installed it.

[UNCIVILIZED]

Originally Posted by sailcrazy

After 3 cross-cut M/Ss in our in-mast furler, we were ready to try anything. The UK sailmaker in Marmaris, Turkey talked us into a synthetic tri-radial cut M/S back in 2013, and it's been perfect ever since. Minimal bagging, good shape, easy in and out, easy to reef-no issues at all. And we've had no mildew issues, either (a concern of ours with the synthetic...before we got it), despite cruising in the mid-to-southern Medd and Caribb exclusively since we installed it.

I'm a bit confused on the construction of this one. Are you saying that the panels themselves are laminated, & that they're stitched together in a tri-radial pattern? And what materials are they made of exactly? Also, why go with said design over a fully laminated (monocoque) sail?

[Deltasailor]

Originally Posted by Guy

I have a radial cut Dacron sail and every sailmaker who has ever seen it goes off on how you can't have a radial cut polyester sail. The warp and the woof don't go the right directions for a radial sail in polyester fabric.

I would get a dog trainer if your "woof" don't go in the right direction! LOL

[sailcrazy]

Exactly. The fabric is a synthetic, laminated material. The panels are cut, layed out, and then stitched similar to a cross-cut sail, except in a tri-radial layout. Why not a fully laminated sail....cost!!!--it was off the charts! The fabric is somewhat proprietary, each big sailmaker has their own "brand" but they are readily available. Case-in-point...we swapped out our 135% old (2001) crosscut Genny for a 95% H/S last year, to eliminate always sailing with at least some reef in the H/S and not being able to see under the H/S as we're heeling over (there's to many unpredictable charter boats around where we have been sailing). I dug out the details of the fabric used on our UK Sailmakers-made M/S, and the local loft we used was able to find and buy the same fabric. So now both our m/s and h/s are tri-radial cut, synthetic fabric sails. Much lighter, much stronger, better shape...And they work very well so far.

[Kestrahl]

On some older masts you get chafe issues on the radial seams. But a Oceanis 40 should be fine as its a fairly new boat/mast.
Note that a triradial layout is only tri-radial when it is unreefed so when reefed the sail will suffer more than a more balanced cross cut cloth. The main advantage of tri-radial is it takes care of the diagonal loads out of the clew. But really there is not a lot in it.

[model 10]

Originally Posted by Deltasailor

I would get a dog trainer if your "woof" don't go in the right direction! LOL

You should get a dictionary. As to using polyester fabric on a bias as in a radial cut sail, it's not that hard to see how that is not the right way to go if you understand warp and woof.