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Old Neil Pryde Sails
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ittiandro



Joined: 22 Nov 2009
Posts: 294

PostPosted: Thu Feb 26, 2015 8:42 pm    Post subject: Old Neil Pryde Sails Reply with quote

I have given up on shortboarding and I am planning to go back to longboarding. I had a very good deal on E-Bay for an old Neil Pryde Vitesse 6.5 sail.( $ 50), brand new, still in the package, with the warranty and instructions. Looks very cool! It must be from the 80’s or 90’s! The luff is 470 cm and, surprisingly, it goes with a very wide boom ( 240 cm)

I’d like to rig it on my current mast which is a 460 cm constant curve mast( Gun Sails 55% carbon), but when I tried it inside the luff pocket, it does not bend as easily as with the other newer sails I have. Actually, it is very hard to even start DH manually and there is a deep vertical crease from top to bottom of the sail.

I don’t know if it is because it requires a flextop mast, does it? I’d be surprised, though, because in those days most longboards took stiff aluminum or fiberglas masts and I don’t think that windsurfing knew all the niceties of modern technology .

Perhaps the problem is that I didn’t do the complete rigging as I would do on the beach(we are 20 below here!): I only slid the mast inside, but I didn’t attach the boom because there is no room inside my house.
I’d appreciate your comments.

Thanks



Ittiandro
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pmlct



Joined: 02 Mar 2010
Posts: 68
Location: Middletown CT

PostPosted: Thu Feb 26, 2015 10:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I am pretty sure that the older sails required outhaul as part of the rigging process so unfortunately I think you need to completely rig the sail in order to assess what it looks like. Its been pretty cold here too.
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merriam



Joined: 28 Apr 2008
Posts: 95

PostPosted: Fri Feb 27, 2015 12:12 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I think pm is right, the old sails had maybe more outhaul than downhaul. Use to use ampro one piece masts back in the 80's not sure how their stiffness compares with today's masts. Very cool that you're going "retro" sounds like fun. Keep us posted on your adventures.
Tom
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adywind



Joined: 08 Jan 2012
Posts: 665

PostPosted: Fri Feb 27, 2015 11:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If it's the one in the picture, it looks like the Original Windsurfer sails. Get in touch with some of the fan club guys and ask them:
http://originalwindsurfer.blogspot.com/?m=1



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Sailboarder



Joined: 10 Apr 2011
Posts: 656

PostPosted: Fri Feb 27, 2015 12:46 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

My old NP sail rigs quite well with my 430 CC, and I use close to 30 cm of extension with it. With the old original mast foot, it was IMPOSSIBLE to put a lot of DH. I still have it. It has a short cheap rope that goes once in the bottom tack and then in a plastic clip/cleat.

So if using a modern mast foot, put very little DH tension and do not try to bend the mast from DH.

The sail was meant to have a lot of OH, maybe more than 30 cm, I don't recall exactly, I just pull a lot until it looks ok. You will have a tight leech, a deep pocket and a bent mast from the OH tension. If you have too much DH tension, you will have creases close to the mast sleeve that will not go away with wind pressure. (similar to what you describe)

The sail will have no meaningfull shape until you put a boom on it and pull on the OH.

It's also quite possible that the boom opening will be quite high. It was meant to ease the monkey hanging you had to do before good harnesses were available. In my sail, I had to do another opening lower. It's surprisingly easy to do and didn't cause any problem with my sail. You just need to do 2 scissors cut. You cut perpendicular to the mast sleeve, and halfway into it, from the front towards the back. Each cut separated by the size of opening you want, maybe 20 cm. When you fit the mast in, you just need to put the sleeve material of the new opening behind the mast. If you want to use the old opening instead, you leave the material in front of the mast.
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ittiandro



Joined: 22 Nov 2009
Posts: 294

PostPosted: Fri Feb 27, 2015 5:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

adywind wrote:
If it's the one in the picture, it looks like the Original Windsurfer sails. Get in touch with some of the fan club guys and ask them:
http://originalwindsurfer.blogspot.com/?m=1


This is the sail!
I already e-mailed Original Windsurfer.
Actually, looking at similar old sails on their site, I didn't even see a DH, just a piece of rope around the bottom sail to fix it to the mast! Real ..Flintstone stuff, but was it all that bad, really, if one is willing to forego planing?

Thanks a lot

Ittiandro
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DanWeiss



Joined: 24 Jun 2008
Posts: 2296
Location: Connecticut, USA

PostPosted: Fri Feb 27, 2015 10:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The older sails like that were designed for use on very soft epoxy masts, yet lacked the luff curve most moderns sails use that then requires a great deal of downhaul tension.

As these old sails aged, the luff stretched quite a bit and often now require more luff tension than every intended. The actual seams between panels also stretched, making these sails very tough to properly shape. The original mast base/extensions rarely provide enough added length or purchase to accommodate the stretched luffs. Pull and pull, you may never get the shape you desire.

Just accept the limited range, set the downhaul with very light tension and tune with the outhaul. You will get a ton of grunt but not much wind range or stability. On the other hand, the grunt of those sails allow smaller sizes used in lighter winds!

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ittiandro



Joined: 22 Nov 2009
Posts: 294

PostPosted: Wed Mar 04, 2015 9:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

DanWeiss wrote:
The older sails like that were designed for use on very soft epoxy masts, yet lacked the luff curve most moderns sails use that then requires a great deal of downhaul tension.

As these old sails aged, the luff stretched quite a bit and often now require more luff tension than every intended. The actual seams between panels also stretched, making these sails very tough to properly shape. The original mast base/extensions rarely provide enough added length or purchase to accommodate the stretched luffs. Pull and pull, you may never get the shape you desire.

Just accept the limited range, set the downhaul with very light tension and tune with the outhaul. You will get a ton of grunt but not much wind range or stability. On the other hand, the grunt of those sails allow smaller sizes used in lighter winds!


The sail must have never been used, for whatever reasons. May a be a stock leftover..Actually it came in its original package, with the warranty paper and the instructions. It must have been folded up for a longtime, because it still has the original fold marks and when you fold it back it automatically follows those original fold-lines. To me it is brand-new!
This means that perhaps I should'nt be worrying about a deterioration..
Luckily, it does have a luff curve, though, and rather pronounced one.
THe thing that surprised me is its width! It is nominally a 6.5, but it takes 250 cm of boom length !
The"grun"t you are talking about is actually good news, because for its size, I have a feeling that it will give the same good subplaning power I used to enjoy with my 80's longboard, with just a 6.0 sail and which I never had eversince I decided to modernize my equipment and go shortboarding in order to enjoy the " bliss" of planing! If I had to wait for planing conditions here, I'd never take out my board!

At this point, I have nothing to lose and everything to gain, because all those state-of-the art modern sails I have wasted my money on don't get me too far when I have to subplane in light winds. Stability or range don't really concern me at the speed I am going, as long as I can get going!

Thanks for your comments

Ittiandro
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adywind



Joined: 08 Jan 2012
Posts: 665

PostPosted: Thu Mar 05, 2015 12:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ittiandro I can feel some bitterness in your words, but you have to understand that at first everybody assumed that your goal is to plane in light wind. Only much later in your treads you made it clear that comfortable cruising is what you are after.
Planing at every cost is not worshiped as before the wide shape "revolution ". Now every windsurfing guru will strongly recommend you to get yourself a Windsup or any other stable big board and a 5.0-6.0 sail and to go exercise and practice moves in light non-planing winds. I like the flat decks and absence of footstraps on the WindSups. At the same time the lucky ones who live where nice waves break now enjoy easy "float and ride" in light wind on big, wide wave boards more then ever before. At least in my area it seams that the planing junkies switched from formula to kiting, so none of the windsurfers left here despises any form of non-planing sailing.
I personally get less and less often skunked with the amasing weather forcasts nowadays, but when it happens I have my Windsup ready and honestly I get more worked out from light wind move practice then from a planing session Shocked



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ittiandro



Joined: 22 Nov 2009
Posts: 294

PostPosted: Thu Mar 05, 2015 8:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

adywind wrote:
Ittiandro I can feel some bitterness in your words, but you have to understand that at first everybody assumed that your goal is to plane in light wind. Only much later in your treads you made it clear that comfortable cruising is what you are after.


Yeah, that was my plight, comfortable subplaning in light winds! Not that I am averse to planing! Not at all! I only want to maximize my T.O.W. taking into consideration that most of the time we don't have planing conditions in my area !
I'll post the results of my sail modifications and my new OLD OLD sail !
AS you can see I am a bit of a ..retro . Some say a Flintstone, firmly decided, though, to enjoy my old age until my... last drop, God willing. Unfortunately He does not listen all the time and we get short of drops, but this is another story.

Ittiandro
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