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Staysails, spritsails, furled sails
Staysails
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Staysails
were
already known on small ships and boats from the 15th century. On large
ships
they were not introduced until about 1660. The staysails are made up
like
all the other sails. Reef points were often carried on the fore topmast
staysail, and occasionally on the inner jib also. There was a different
arrangement of the cloths on th stays ails from about 1830, and this is
shown on the
drawing on the righ This sail should also be made from two pieces with
a
central seam if your model is to be accurate.The staysails were bent
with
a lacing or grommets until about 1820, afte which time metal hanks
seized
to the sail were used.
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Spritsails
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The sprit sail also
has two special features: from the middle of the 17th century there
were two
holes on the extreme right and left of th bottom part, and from the
first
half of the 18th century there was often a third hole in the middle.
These
holes were sewn all round or enclosed with narrow bolt ropes. Their
purpose
was to allow any water which collected in the sail to run off as easily
as
possible as this sail was set very low down, this could happen easily.
The
reef bands arranged diagonally served the same purpose, and they were
found
as standard on the sprit sail after 1680. With their help the sail
could
be tied up at an angle, i.e. shortened on the lee side so that it did
not
drag in the water .
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Furled sails
In the I6th and I7th centuries
gaskets on Continental ships were secured to the spars with double ring
bolts
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If you wish to show
your ship with sails futled on the yards, then the sails are made up in
exactly the same way as described, but the following additional points
should be
noted.
The cloth dressing, as already stated, must be
washed out very thoroughly. The cloth seams should not be folded and
sewn up (
and certainly not glued), but just indicated by two parallel seams on
the
sewing machine. The same goes for the linings, reef bands and reef
points
can be omitted. The sail, and in particular the foot, must be
made up in exactly the same way as usual, but it is advisable to
shorten the length of the sail by at least one third. The point of all
these measures is to reduce the amount of material, and keep the sail
as supple as possible, to avoid the finished furled sail looking like a
fat, unruly ball of fabric. At the other extreme there should not be
such a small amount of cloth that the furled sail looks like a skinny
little sausage.
The sail is bent to the yard, but is allowed to hang down temporarily
do not roll it up straightaway. It is rigged in the normal way with
clew lines, leech lines, sheets, etc. Only when all the running rigging
is in place
would it be furled (see the chapter RUNNING RIGGING).
If you want to show the sails furled very tightly
to the yards, you can in certain circumstances use paper handkerchiefs,
provided the plies are separated very neatly. Details of this method
are given in
the chapter RUNNING RIGGING .The sails were furled with gaskets, 6 to 8
ropes of about 1/3 of the sail's depth in length, which were spaced out
at regular intervals along the yard. They were always carried on the
fore side of the sail. Before 1815 they were usually spliced round the
yard. After 1815 the gaskets were attached to the jackstay, and hung in
coils on the fore side of the sail.
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