Arne: I don't think you understand the difficulties of my making a new yard, even if I wanted to.  I have no access to a workshop and no power tools.  It would be extraordinarily difficult to make a yard on board.  But, more than anything, I've had enough of major woodworking projects.  Paul canundoubtedly design a sail incorporating the exisiting yard and I will probably go with that sooner or later.  And I want a wooden yard.

David: Thank you for that very kind offer. I really appreciate it and it is tempting to have a full-length yard again.  I am sure macrocarpa is an alternative, but my laminated Douglas fir yard is very strong and that nice compromise between being light enough to haul up and heavy enough to come down!

I am, first and foremost, a romantic about my boat and I have very positive memories associated with making this yard, which is one of the reasons I am loth to discard it.  Yes, I am no doubt irrational, but if I'd been rational I wouldn't have spent over 5 years building this boat.

Annie,

who said that a wooden yard needs to be of Douglas Fir? I bet there is some useful local wood that is lighter than DF and which is strong enough. If it is a little weaker, remember that if you beef it up a little, the strength goes up much faster than the weight. For Malena’s and Broremann’s yards, I used local spruce (as I did for the top sections of FS's and Ingeborg's masts).  Spruce appears to be quite soft and doesn’t hold screws very well, but it has good bending strength. Anyway, the yard needs no screws.

If you manage to lay your hands on a suitable plank from a sawmill, and then get access to a bandsaw somewhere, you can make a PJR-style yard in well less than a day (plus varnishing). 

Below is the sailplan again, this time showing my proposed sail reefed down to three panels. Thanks to the gentle 7° fanning of the lower panels, the yard is now down to 63°: Just by accident, this helps to keep that tip of the yard well away from the topping lift (unlike the shown original Ingeborg-yard).

But now, good luck with your summer sailing season!

Cheers,
Arne

Arne wrote:

David, I think you worry too much about the consequences of having a hi-angled full-length yard. 

No, Arne, you're mistaken, I don't worry at all. Not one little bit. I simply say, with experience gained over many miles and many years with yards at angles ranging from 45˚ to 80˚ that lower angles are easier to live with, and shorter, and therefore lighter yards are easier to live with.  That's all.

David, I think you worry too much about the consequences of having a hi-angled full-length yard. Whether such a rig will work well or not depends on fairly small differences in parameters. The ultimate yard angle and mast balance are important factors here.

The different Hasler-McLeod style sails on my Malena, with 60 and 68° yards, worked just fine, and so did the sail with 70° yard on the dinghy Broremann.

I had to struggle quite a bit with Johanna’s sail (70° yard). The reason was that it had to be pulled aft a lot to avoid lee helm, so I got a bit of the same problems with setting full sail as Annie has on FanShi these days. Ketil Greve sailed around between 2006 and 2012 in his Edmond Dantes with almost a straight copy of Johanna’s rig, and had no problems. He could set the sail with a lot more mast balance, so the loads on the control lines and then battens and yard were lower.

On my last two boats, Frøken Sørensen and Ingeborg, both with 70° yards, I think I have learned. By having around 15% mast balance, with the halyard’s slingpoint moved further aft on the yard, and with sufficient mast height to get a low halyard angle, the loads on the THP and YHP, not to mention on the Hong Kong parrels and battens, are quite light. The yard of any cambered panel sail must be stronger than the yard on a flat sail, but I haven’t found that to be a show-stopper.

I would say that the HM-style sails I make now, with 70° yards (max.) of full length  -  and with equal area in all the panels, are not extreme in any way. They show impressive performance and are easy to deal with. My Ingeborg proves that every time I take her out for a spin.

Arne

Annie wrote:Sadly, I couldn't use your design, Arne.  My battens are 5m, but the yard is only 4.2 m long.  It is a beautiful yard, even if I say so myself, of gorgeois Douglas fir and being built to the H/McL design, is just about impossible to lengthen.  I don't want to replace it, so it will have to be used in any new or altered sail.

Ha, I didn’t see that one coming!
Frankly, I am surprised. You have built yourself a whole boat, and then suddenly, making a new yard becomes a major obstacle.

That said, I am convinced that Paul Thompson can design you a good new sail, which fits the existing sticks.

Have a fine sailing season  -  up here in Stavanger it is snowing right now...

Arne