Storm Sail

CAI:  Yes I did a small “napkin” to start with (a small sail).  Yes it is a 10 square foot trysail for the mizzen.    That’s what you use in storms.   I am hoping that it can double up as anchor sail and reduce boat swing.  That keeps the boat from moving around when at anchor.   Storm sails can have bright colors so they can be seen more easily in bad weather.

The sail is made in the old style.  Sown rope, rope edges and so on.  “Lifted tables” is the method used for hemming the sail.  There are lifted tables, folded and taped.  Lifted is the strongest and the most labor-intensive.  There are straight corner patches on both sides, a roped luff and foot with rat-tails.  Gentle broad seaming is used for sail shape.  There is more sail-shaping on the edges. It’s topped off with nice sewn-in bronze rings with leather.

I have a small portable walking foot zigzag sewing machine, a Reliable Barracuda 2000E. It is a Thompson clone from Taiwan.  It’s  noisy , finicky and amazingly strong.  It does 8 layers of 9 oz Dacron sail cloth with V-138 thread. That’s 21 lbs in tensile strength. I hope that I will find place for the machine on the boat when we are sailing…

So now I am on to the next one.  The main trysail (about 98 square feet)  and then a storm jib.

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trysail