I'm pretty sure I'm going to need both luff parrels for reefing stagger and at least some Hong Kong Parrels for sail set. My mizzen mast is raked aft a few degrees, and I set the mast line so that the leech/luff are (nominally) vertical. Between that offset going up the battens and the mast taper, I'm pretty sure I'll have diagonal creases otherwise.

I'm also rigging long batten parrels on at least my higher battens. The balance at the boom and bottom batten or two is so short that the standing luff parrel will stop them from falling more than a couple inches away from the mast.

I've still got my HK parrels rigged and they are taut when the sail is set, but not under excessive load - they do not distort my battens - perhaps because the Paul Fay parrels are taking some of the thrust (as short batten parrels would too).  Before I fitted the Paul Fay parrels, I experimented with two luff hauling parrels and removed the HK parrels, but found that the sail surged too much when hoisting or furling in a swell.  Now, I have just one throat/luff hauling parrel, combined with HK parrels on all sheeted battens and Paul Fay parrels on the 3 lower parallel battens.  When I haul on the T/LHP  it pulls the throat and the upper sheeted batten aft and the HK parrels make all the other battens move back as well and this removes creases from the whole sail.  I think the HK parrels are an important part of my sail's function.

Hi Barry,

It took time to get Arion's cambered sail sorted but I am happy with it now.  I replaced the broken yard with one that was 100 x 3.3mm by 4m and it never flexes.  I riveted a saddle to the middle of the yard and use it to locate a Spectra lashing that holds the halyard block and it also locates the YHP and a fixed yard parrel.  I've sailed the boat very hard over 3 years and 5000 miles without problems since.  I'd be cautious taking advice from people who have no experience with junk rigs.

I fixed the negative batten stagger by using the Paul Fay style of fixed luff parrels, making each one a bit shorter as I went up, to force each batten a little further aft as it comes down and they work well.  They do add a bit more friction but no more than short batten parrels would, and they have the added advantage that you can adjust them until your batten stagger is perfect. I now only have them on the lower three parallel battens.  The next one up moves aft when I take slack out of the LHP, which I always do when furling (and the YHP too, to keep the yard under control, especially in a swell), though I might put the Paul Fay parrel back on this batten for ocean passages, when I might be reefing at 0300hrs.  The batten above that is the extended one so it is not a problem.  I have used seatbelt type webbing for these parrels which reduces friction a lot.

I attach the lower end of my Hong Kong parrels with a rolling hitch with a long tail which is then seized to the batten and they have not slipped since doing this, though it was initially a problem.  Hose-clamps would be good too and I am sure Arne has ensured that they do not chafe the sail (by taping them perhaps?).

Arion's 35.7 sq m sail is sheeted with a 3 span, 6 part purchase (3 sister-blocks at each span), which is fine but I do use a winch on it occasionally.  I flake the tail into a box in the cockpit.  I wouldn't want the sheet to be any longer but it is manageable.  I do controlled gybes, hauling the slack out of the sheet as much as possible before putting the helm up, then getting a bit more as it comes across, before letting it run out through my gloved hands as the sail goes out again.  Sometimes, in really strong winds, if I am lazy or tired, I do a "chicken gybe", tacking the boat through the wind then falling off again.  Painless and slow, but then I don't race!  The only time the sheet bothers me is when the sail swings across the cockpit in calms or when trying to sail of a mooring etc.  It sometimes tangles with the tiller or knocks my hat off!

Flat sails are definitely a lot more sedate but the cambered sail is well-worth the effort to get it right for inshore sailing because the increase in performance is considerable, especially in light airs and smooth waters, when I'd say the performance of my sail is dynamic.  Hats off to Arne Kverneland

Back in 2012-2013 I had Flutterby’s newly sewed junk sails rigged, and did the first test sails to great excitement. I found that the sails DID work, even though I did a lot less sailing than I hoped to. Two years ago, I hauled Flutterby out for summer (hurricane season) storage in Georgia, took the sails down, and started a few things.

One of those things was a hard dodger, arch, and hard bimini of three solar panels connecting them. That project took a lot longer than expected, and life generally got in the way. I decided I wasn’t going to spend a summer in Georgia, so motored a bit further North, making it to Edenton, North Carolina, where I’ve started addressing some of the original issues with my sails, two years later!

• Both my yards bent in ways that alarmed me a bit, and when I compared them to the database of yards, found that they had scantlings that roughly matched yards that had failed like Fantail or Arion’s original yards.
• I lashed a ring to the top of each yard for attaching the halyard block and yard hauling parrel block. The lashing stayed put, but the advice I got from Brion Toss’s rigging forum was that it wasn’t nearly as good as it could/should be, so I’m doing those differently with my new yards.
• When I sewed batten pockets and webbing boltrope loops for my sails, I hadn’t figured out batten fendering yet. When I did, one row of webbing loops were too small to go around the vinyl hose I fitted onto the battens, messing up the leading edge of that sail and sail shape.
• With cambered panels, the PJR batten stagger formula needs revision, and I didn’t figure that out, consequently I my reefed battens tend to foul sheetlets above them
• I attempted to lash the batten ends to the sail so they wouldn’t protrude past the leech. That didn’t work. I also tied sheetlets to holes in the battens, and they tended to flip off the end of the battens. None of this helped sheetlet fouling.
• I rigged Slieve’s combined batten downhaul/parrels. They didn’t do anything to help the stagger/fouling issues, and really didn’t seem to be worth the effort on my simple mizzen sail. I may find them useful on my main still, especially since it does need some help being pulled down in some conditions.
• I rigged hong kong parrels, and tied them around the batten with a constrictor knot. Those mostly slid under load, failing to keep things well positioned Same with any other standing line I tied around the battens that way.
• I didn’t have sail covers, and discovered that the furled sail had lots of folds and pockets that collected rain water, and with lots of birds making additions to the water, it made quite a mess and stained my new sails.
• My mizzen sheet is a 5:1 sheet, and that is just too much string for such a small sail; with 8 panels, I needed to do this to get around Dmin issues, but I’m not happy.
  

I’m currently re-rigging my mizzen sail; I’ve already added webbing loops to attach my sheetlets to and modified the top of the sail to fit my replacement yard (well, one pass; I’m not happy with how it fits, I’m going to re-sew them a third time!).

I am going to use a completely different parrel arrangement, trying the method that Paul Fay used on Ti Gitu in newsletter #60. (Also in issue #58, and similar to what Arne Kverneland’s article: Peaking up the junk sail, ver 20111214b

One thing I was thinking about as an alternative to the short forward looping parrels to prevent each batten from sliding forward, and properly distribute those forces throughout the sail. PJR shows an arrangement with standing luff parrels, going around the mast from one batten to the next. I would think these would do the same thing, but also allow the batten to slide forward somewhat as it goes slack when reefing/stowing that panel. Has anybody tried rigging these?

I hope to post more updates as I make progress. Right now I'm in a race against the clock; I've got plans to have Flutterby put to bed and fly to the Seattle area by August, and that isn't a lot of time for test sails after I finish before I've got to leave.