TR-5 xt

No one could accuse Barry S of being dogmatic. He cast doubt on both double luffs and laminate cloths for W/S a few years ago on this forum ; but working with his team riders has modified his stance.
http://www.mauisails.com/sail.php?id=66
Getting some great results recently too.

Does seem a little strange that the weights aren't listed considering weight is a major sales pitch. However I have read "weight gain is about 1.5 kg, it made a 9.2 XT to the weight of a conventional 6.3" Love to try one....

funny theres nothing new about double luffed sails!!
years back hmm mid 80's their was a sailbrand called "rainbow sails" they had a double luff sail line filled with foam , so it wouldnt fill with water.
a canadian sailoir named richard myersco was shown ripping it up in Vancouver on this brand in ads in windsport magazine .( actually i think they made boards too)
like many brands they disappered.
so.....
look for that add on in the future albeit lighter foam i hope.

Interesting point about the luff panels. The only downside I can imagine is visibility might not be so good - important around a course. I actually thought the weight difference might be larger as the material is apparently half the weight, and Demon make an 11m raceboard sail at 4.2kg (not a direct comparision of course).

There was a lot of discussion of early double luffs on this forum. But the question was had they really worked or were they a fad. Barry seemed to be of the latter opinion. But since then the battle of the brands in formula has proven the benefit in that discipline at least. Can only think of Tushingham still introducing new single luff race sails.

[Dan]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

funny theres nothing new about double luffed sails!!
years back hmm mid 80's their was a sailbrand called "rainbow sails" they had a double luff sail line filled with foam , so it wouldnt fill with water.
a canadian sailoir named richard myersco was shown ripping it up in Vancouver on this brand in ads in windsport magazine .( actually i think they made boards too)
like many brands they disappered.
so.....
look for that add on in the future albeit lighter foam i hope.

I owned a foam-filled double luff speed sail that I purchased from Michel Pucher in 1987. The sail was very fast on a reach, faster in my hands than the Gaastra Racefoil of similar size. But the double-luff sail was terrible in gusty conditions, absolutely putrid. It had almost no drive through the lulls and the draft moved around a lot more than the Gaastra.

No generalizations can be made since I simply used the mast I found best for the Gaastra, a Serfiac Gold. Maybe the other sail would have been much better with a different mast but I can only speculate.

The one thing that is certain is that the foam luff prevented the sail from rolling up for in a conventional way. I had to remove all the battens, bend the sail in thirds and then roll into a bundle from the luff to the leech. PITA, but that sail sure looked cool on the water!

-Dan

Originally Posted by nonopr

I have the 6.3 TR4 XT and a regular 6.3TR4 and the weight difference is about more or less half a kilo.
And the TR4 XT did not have x ply on the double luff panels. This year he has gone all the way and put x ply also in the luff panels. I am sure that the sail will be more or less up to a kilo lighter in big size sails. The weight is not there yet, because production on this sails has not been finished. I am sure once this production sails hit the market he will update the weights in the website.

Too bad the sails still have 9 battens when everyone else has switched to 7 on the smaller sizes - so much for 'weight savings'

Originally Posted by nonopr

You are correct. But these are cabon tube battens, feather weight each one of them and a lot more range in your sail.

Another cost savings by the man.
Hybrid carbon battens!

ODL 04 1.0 mil film technora fabric is 93 gsm (grams per square meter)

125 Micron Film is 169 gsm.

In a 9m sail you may use 7m of this fabric so that gives a weight saving of 530g maximum. A significant weight saving.

The only trouble is the starting weight of a film sail is 7kg, so the technora sail is still 6.5 kg or far too heavy for fun.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

ODL 04 1.0 mil film technora fabric is 93 gsm (grams per square meter)

125 Micron Film is 169 gsm.

In a 9m sail you may use 7m of this fabric so that gives a weight saving of 530g maximum. A significant weight saving.

The only trouble is the starting weight of a film sail is 7kg, so the technora sail is still 6.5 kg or far too heavy for fun.

Factor in all the colored mark cloth, and you've got another overweight sail (that missed the wide sleeve bandwagon by about 3 years) from Maui sails. Yay team!

[nonopr]

Wonder why you dont post this question on the MauiSail website. That way you will be in the right forum for all you stuff. Good or bad.

Well this forum used to be the sports international open forum and largely brand neutral which was cool. Maybe we lack a windsurfforum.com