tedlar shield for racing sail

[chris1f]

I just bought a UK tapedrive, mylar 152% genoa, which I use on a roller furling system on my Cal 28-2. I do Wednesday night PHRF racing. Because I wanted to keep the sail on the furling system and didn''t want to bother with a genoa sock, I had them put a tedlar UV shield on it.

UK told me the tedlar blocks 97% of the UV rays. This sounded fine to me. Has anyone else used tedlar for a UV shield? How''s it working for you?

[Sailmc]

I had one on a North 3DL and it delaminated from the sail. It was not there long enough for me to judge it''s UV capabilities.

[tedlong]

Chris, I would not leave your laminate sails out in the weather. Moister will work its way in between the laminates and will meldew. Once day you will end up with brown spots inside the sail. I ruined my first mylar main by leaving it in a damp sail box. I just bought a new pentex head sail last month. I too use the roller furling. But when I am done for the day I bring the pentex sail down and stow below.
I roll my sail up on a piece of light weight 6" pvc. Kinda like giant paper towel role. The sail doenst get crinkled and makes the job easy as pie.
ted

[geohan]

Ted: What is the luff length of your rolled sail? Can you roll it onto the PVC pipe on deck or do you have to wad it up and take it ashore to do the job? My Norlam genny has lots of mildew and looks like hell so I fly it as is to psych out my competitors. (They don''t take me seriously until I sneek by.) Cheers, George

[tedlong]

george,
I rollit on deck right off the forestay. My foot is just shy of 13''. The pvc is 13'', (two pieces glued together). I cut a 4" narrow ''V'' into each end of the pipe. I have two short pieces of line. I attach one line to the tack, pull it tight across the pipe and jam the line into the V. I do the same at the clew. Now the foot of the sail is stretched tight against the pipe. My wife works the halyard. She lets about 1/3 of the sail down at a time, I undo the hanks, then we pick the pipe up and roll the sail up. We repeat this till the entire sail is neatly rolled up.I stow it below. Raising it is easy. I hook up the halyard raise the sail putting the hanks on as we go. The pipe just lays on the deck as the sail rolls off. Once I have it up I can furl it before backing out of the slip. I put the pipe on the dock when we are sailing. Sail does not have a crinkle in it and stays dry. I bought the pipe at home depot. Only 6 bucks. Dont buy the white pvc its too heavy. buy the thin thin green pipe used in sewages. Its real light stuff.
ted

[geohan]

Ted: Thanks for your reply. While your sail is hanked on, mine has a luff rope in the groove of the headstay foil. I don''t imagine this to be a problem but the 153% LP and a 13'' J makes the management of a 20'' foot PVC pipe on the foredeck a bit tricky. It would have to be a dockside operation for sure. I have thought of using a ball bearing swivel forward and a drill motor with a hook in its chuck to pull the foot straight with tension on the clue and let the sail roll up on itself. I haven''t gotten around to try it yet and would guess that it would be necessary to rig a line from clue to tack to carry the torsion load. Now wouldn''t that be weird! Thanks again, I appreciate it. Cheers, George

[paulk]

If the tedlar shield delaminates or seems otherwise insufficient, a zippered dacron cover that you could hoist up on another halyard (spin. or jib) would likely do the trick. You wouldn''t have to mess with pipes or rolling the sail (other than rolling up the roller-furler) and it is quick & simple. The main drawback to a cover like this would be the added windage, but it wouldn''t be much more than the furled sail already there. Ask your sailmaker how long the tedlar should last. We avoid this problem by not having roller-furling, but that creates other issues with a foot 24''long...