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A few jottings on things I've found out whilst making ten or a dozen junk sails for myself and friends:
- Map pins and string are a good way of laying out the outline of a sail on a wooden sealed floor that won't take chalk.
- A sailmaker's loft usually has a pit by the edge of the floor, for the machinist to sit in. It's much easier to sew if the sail and machine are at the same level.
- To duplicate this, I rented the village community hall, which had a number of folding tables. After the full floor had been used to lay out and cut the sail, these tables were set out in a long line down one side of the hall, with a gap for the machinist, leaving the rest of the floor free to lay down the sail and add the next piece to be sewn on. The completed part of the sail, loosely flaked, and the roll of the piece being sewn on, both pass along the table.
- If you use the C-clip method of controlling the roll of cloth which passes under the arm, rollers of plastic or cardboard tube are useful to place underneath the roll and assist it along the table.
- For a long seam, a helper is most useful, to ease the bulk of the sail along the table, leaving only that part very close to the machine to be moved by the machine and machinist. Two helpers are even better, on a very large heavy sail, one ahead and one behind the machine.
- The helper must be careful not to twitch or jerk the sail, but must keep a steady pull on the sail; neither trying to pull the cloth through the machine nor lagging too far behind, causing the sail to bunch up.
- A line on the table, or a length of masking tape, extending out ahead of the needle, is helpful in sewing straight. The helper keeps the finished seam following the line.
- Oddysey III has a coated side and an uncoated side. One side takes pencil and pen marks, the other doesn't. Keep the markable side always on the same side of the sail.
- If you want to use conventional polyester sailcloth, Haywards is probably the best for junk sails - softer, unfilled and UV protected. Available direct from http://www.heathcoat.co.uk or from http://www.kayospruce.com
- There are different grades of double-sided tape for temporary joining of pieces before stitching. It pays to get the strongest and stickiest. The best brand I've used is Venture tape.
- A Stanley knife, a metal straight edge and a plastic cutting board are the best way of straight-cutting coated cloth.
- Dacron sailcloth should be cut with a hot knife for a long lasting edge, but you can get away with a knife cut.
- A large pair of scissors works well for cutting curves in coated cloth.
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