I’ve been steadily working on the canoe/kayak sail system for about the last 10 days. The geometry and componentry of all parts of the system is getting really clean and functions really well. The harder part is just testing the rig.
I’ve got 3 different sail designs, in 3 different sizes, with 2 different mast heights, and 2 different mast step locations, and I need to test each of those things independently in a variety of wind speeds. That’s a lot of variables!
I already know that these work excellently on my canoes because I’ve been using them for about three years now, but my goal is to make the same rig interchangeable with my kayaks.
Yesterday I had a hard time keeping the F1 under control in the stronger gusts. It’s tempting to say that this just might be an issue with using a sail on the F1 in general because it’s a shorter maneuverable kayak, but several of my students have put commercial sails on the F1 and really enjoy them, so it’s either something with my rig, or possibly the problem is my personal boat!
I’m always building my personal boats out of the crappy materials that I can’t give to customers and these particular gunwales had almost an inch of curve in them. So it’s possible that the extra inch of rocker in my boat is adding squirrellyness that wouldn’t be there in a production boat.
I was hoping to have the kayak and canoe sale building course done by March but I’m realizing that I probably still have months of testing ahead of me. Kayak sailing is inherently dangerous and it’s important that the whole system functions really well. I have to switch gears and start on the spring canoe builds, but I’ll try to post intermittently how the sail testing is going.
___
This post was originally featured on our Instagram feed.
See the original post and discussion here.
