A good sail inventory is a basic necessity, and I don't mean
large numbers of blown-out racing sails. It's amazing to me
how many people are cruising with crap sails. But then,
diesel fuel is still relatively cheap....


Ryk wrote:
Depends on the local racing fleet... Non-competitive racing sails may
still have years of performance cruising capacity left in them. Still,
I agree that cruising with bad sails is not fun for me.


Depends on what you mean by "non-competitive." A lot of
racers are flogging their way around the course with crap
sails, too. By "crap" I mean a sail that is blown into a
baggy shape that will not respond to tuning, that has had
the seams stressed & cloth weakened such that it is at risk
of coming apart in a hard blow.

A sail with a full season on it is not competitive but
should be fine for good sailing (cruising or otherwise). A
sail with two full season on it will need to be recut to be
competitive and restitched to be any good for anything else.

I don't see cruising as all that different from racing, in
terms of demand on the sails & rig. In fact, when cruising,
one is likely to leave sails up longer and in slightly
stronger wind since one is likely to be shorthanded. Of
course, the racer's daily bending on, all that tacking, and
taking them off & folding them, is also hard on the sails.

One of the problems with hi-tech racing sails is that they
don't really lose much shape, they get unresponsive to
tuning adjustments (which you can live with) and weakened
(which is a problem). The sail will have a nice shape and
just look a bit tired, and suddenly disappears in a gust.



A cruising spinnaker, a 120 or 135 (depending on where & how
most sailing is to be done, I might even go to a 145 but
then I like to go fast) on a roller, and a staysail, would
be a good set-up.


I carry a good inventory, but sail changes tend not to happen a lot
when cruising, and then not until far after they should. Unrolling a
big genoa and getting it down on the deck can be nasty work if left
too late while the wind is rising. Most cruisers around here seem to
hoist sail at the start of the season and leave it on the furler until
the fall.


Same around here. A big light air genoa is nice to have but
taking it on & off is a PITA, so is stowing it... you don't
even want it on the boat the rest of the time. That's one
reason why I thought a 145 (for areas with lots of light
air, smaller for areas where the wind is more dependable)
with one of the reefing options would be good, with a
staysail for when it really blows. The staysail would be
easier to set, easier to stow.


It's great to fly my mylar 150 until the wind gets up over 7 knots,
but I would never keep it on the furler. If I wanted a general purpose
cruising sail I would go smaller than my standard 135 that I use club
racing.

Again, it's hard to generalize over different rigs and venues


And different tastes.

One thing I'd like in a cruising and "fun sailing" genoa is
one that allows somewhat better visibility. A high-cut foot
is deadly to a racer but desirable for any other type of
sailing.

Diesel fuel is still relatively cheap. Of the cruisers I
know, 99% of them motor 99% of the time when they are trying
to actually get somewhere. Crap sails is one reason for
that, but then you can buy a lot of fuel for the price of a
set of good sails.

DSK