That's really unlucky mate, I thought it would work well.

Sparky said..
That's really unlucky mate, I thought it would work well.

Yeah, me too, but made me appreciate just how touchy high performance sails are to damage and repairs. Part of my problem is I get out on the water foiling and am having such a good time that I will ignore problems to keep going, working on unlearning that habit. Yesterday I did not bring my next smaller 5.8 sail, which may have worked, so was stuck with 7.2 for the conditions, fortunately stopped even though wind was still good.

Was advised by several people here, and elsewhere, that the fix for the cut open batten sleeve end was to put on a wider tip for the batten rod so it would grab the end of the batten sleeve that was not cut through. And I tried that, but could not get the batten rod back in all the way, and when I gently tapped the batten rod in it cut through the new plastic tip.

The problem was the old thick plastic split in half batten tip was still in the end of the batten sleeve, it took up too much space for anything else but the naked batten rod end. And I could not feel it because it was split in half. Now I am thinking I could of used a dental pick to try to pull it out from the cut open batten sleeve end, and then tried inserting the batten rod with a wider tip. But it still would of left the cut open hard plastic end of the batten sleeve rubbing on the mast, not good in the long run.

So off to Sandy Point to get the batten sleeve end rebuilt with new plastic, so the sail works as designed. Had another sail that needs a small tear repaired, the Gorilla duck tape that I used to seal it was slowly sliding from wind pressure changing the sail panel shape down at the foot of the sail, a really critical area of the sail.

musorianin said..

Sandman1221 said..
Do not use the repair I did!, it only made things worse.

Now you tell me! I've just spent the weekend going through all my sails doing preventative repairs following this method!

Yeah , but did you use drywall in the fix ?

You guys
Got the sail back from Sandy Point Progressive Sports, looks really good, rigs perfect and bottom batten now rotates good, and is at least as strong as when new.

So go easy on the batten rod tension! Too much tension can damage the sail, especially if you land on the over tensioned batten, or sail panel above or below it.