Very sorry about the non-reply Eric. The website isn’t notifying properly when a comment is made by a visitor.

The GIS is too much sail I think, unless very heavy and a very technical sailor it would mostly be wasted area. So I would recommend the 89 sq ft Oz sail.

There is a page that will help you check the Centre of Pressure for the Oz and GIS sails in the menu items at the top of this page. YOu will see “using RSS sails on other boats” It gives some general guidance, but at the bottom there is a PDF file to download with diagrams for the centre of Pressure (sometimes called the Centre of Effort).

The performance comparison is that if both rigs are sailed hard then the Laser rig will be very superior in strong and medium winds upwind. Also faster in medium winds crosswind then much of a muchness downwind with a slight advantage to the lug. In light winds edging on moderate the bigger lug sail would have the advantage. In stronger winds the lug can be reefed so will be more able to go out in stronger winds and the sail drops down to about 50 square ft in a very low rig.

This is kind of guesswork, but based on the relatively good control over sail twist in the Laser. The lug rig still has twist control enough to make handling pleasant, but wont match the pointing angle of the Laser.

As far as spars for the Oz Rig. If you want to use untapered aluminium tubes – preferably one of the 6000 series alloys (eg 6061)

Mast 60 to 65mm diameter. You need the halyard point to be 3530mm above the deck, so you need to add the distance from deck to the bottom of the mast.

Yard and boom – swapping units unfortunately – this is the information on the spars that Brad Hickman used to win the PDRacer worlds a couple of years back

For my balance lug rig I used 6061 T6 tube with 0.065″ wall. The longest length available here in that alloy is 12′ so for the mast I used 12′ of 2.5″ OD with a 2.5 foot length of 2.25″ OD overlapped 1 foot at the splice to get 13.5 feet total length, 2″ OD for the boom, and 1.5″ OD for the yard.

I don’t think tapering the mast is at all important – it was an expedience because Brad couldn’t get the length.

Sorry again about the totally excessive delay in answering this

Michael Storer

Hi LeoG,

Sail Prices are here from Duckworks

Hi Chris,

Sail Prices are here from Duckworks

Hi Ed

Sail Prices are here from Duckworks

Howdy,

I’m handling the sales side Ed. We are still waiting for a cost for import duty and the processing fee from US Customs. We have been really shocked (and sometimes happily surprised) by some of the fees actually charged by different countries while we’ve been getting this underway, sending sails for testing on boats etc.

This week I’m ready to estimate what we will be charged and hope and pray it is not too far from the mark. We hope to have the sails under 400 dollars retail. More if we can manage it.

Thanks for following up!

Michael

MIK

hello Sir Chris,

We are getting close to finishing our first production sails and shipping them to Duckworks in the USA.

we are currently waiting for testing of several prototypes.

we expect to ship in the next 4 weeks. Final price depends on customs duties but we expect retail at less than $380.

Sail is quality cloth and fittings with two reef point as standard.

Where are you located? we will have other agents in other regions too.

thank you for your enquiry Sir

Edna Caman

Hello Sir Leo,

We are not quite at the ready stage yet. We are still making prototypes and sending them out to get feedback. I think we will be two more months before we have stock in different countries. Duckworks will stock the sails in the USA.

Price is being finalised too, but assuming no shocks the price will be over $300 plus freight. All materials and parts are the same you can buy in the USA. We hope to sit between the prices for polytarp sails from Polysails in USA and Duckwork’s nice sailmaker made sails and gradually reduce prices over time as we streamline.

Michael Storer is working with us to directly improve sail shape and approve materials.

Best wishes Sir
Edna Caman