@Colin Parkstone wrote:
Surely John your new sails will come with the sail numbers on the sail as well as the Class insignia.
On a new set I do hope your getting them for free,you would with any other sail maker I know or use ???????
Cp 😮
No doubt you’ll be holding your hands up in horror, but here’s the story…
My boat is an ageing MK1 GRP that I bought for £800 3 years ago. Hull was sound but tatty, and only ever used for cruising – rope halyards, no kicker etc.
Over the last two years I’ve been doing odd bits to it to try and get it up to a reasonable club racing spec. We now have a wire jib halyard with highfield lever, a proper 14:1 twinned kicker, side-bench mounted jibsheet tracks and so on. The biggest thing letting it down now is the sails which I estimate as being c.1980 and in “crisp packet” condition!
So for the last two years I’ve been looking all over for a decent set of one or two season old racing sails, but every set I find is either advertised as “no longer much good for racing” or they want £500+ for a main and genoa. That in itself might not be so bad, but up here in Cumbria we’re a long way from another competitive Wayfarer fleet so it would basically be a case of parting with £500 to get someone to post a set of sails that I haven’t even seen.
All the new sails from “known” manufacturers seem to be over £1000 for main and genoa which I simply can’t afford, and even if I could they don’t seem like a terribly good investment relative to the value and condition of the boat, but then I came across this guy on ebay…
Had a sudden rush of blood to the head and did a deal for a main + genoa for £564 delivered. Unfortunately he didn’t have all the numbers I wanted so we did a bit of a deal on the carriage instead, hence I’m looking for some numbers elsewhere.
Now I know I ought to have bought a set of Macs, Banks etc but being the cheapskate I am I’ve plumped for this “value” set. I guess only time will tell how wise a move this is! The fact that his other sails are all for relatively competitive dinghy classes gives me a glimmer of hope that they won’t be that bad!