Information for Par.

[BHOFM]

I thought I would make a new thread in case you didn't
check back on the first one I did!

I went to the place that makes the chicken house curtain
material and they were very helpful!

It comes in 4.5oz and 6oz, it is UV warrantied for 4 years
when used as chicken house curtains! It is considered as
"breathable"! It has a working strength of 200psi! It is
subject to damage from "prolonged and violent" flogging!

Stretch is considered negligible in the applications that
it was design for! Chicken house curtains, baseball field
covers, dump truck covers, land fill covers!

I got several sample pieces to do some tests on for
stretching!

It is a 10X10 weave of polyester fiber! It is .009" thick.
It is flame retardant, it will not burn on it's own, I checked
this and it will turn to a liquid and will not burn with out
a supporting flame! I used a propane oxyie torch on a
metal plate, it just melted in to a clear liquid!

There are a lot more spec's that deal with the food part
of the material, it is approved for non contact food areas?
It has mold and fungus prevention properties.

And it will make a great looking sail, even if it is not
the perfect sail material, I can make the two, 145sqf
sails for my boat for less than $50 and they should with
a little care, last for several years! With all probability,
longer than I will!

This is my test rig for the stretching test, the white bottles weight
about 5lbs, they are containers for radioactive medicine that are
lead with a very small cavity in the center! They have been "cleaned"!

Any way,, here it is!

dont give up you will last for years, can you fax me some of that stuff

[PAR]

Thanks BHOFM. I've looked at this material before, for the same reason, to test different rig and sail configurations without the cost of a new suit of sails.

This stuff is too course a weave and too low a denier (density) to be particularly useful to me, but you can have at it if you like. I'm still stuck using poly, but have found a source that supplies a 14 x 14 weave, 1200 denier, white material, UV stabilized that doesn't breath and can be had in white. I usually get a 30' x 40' piece (1,200 sq. ft.) for about 100 bucks.

I appreciate the follow up though, thanks.

[BHOFM]

Thanks again for your reply, there is a "rest of the story" to
this, I think they are going to make my sails for me as a
test for a new product line! They got a little excited about
the concept of selling more material, and it is just a few
blocks from were we live! No ordering, just run down the
street and get what we need with full factory support!

They are really nice people!

[rwatson]

Is this secret sailors business or are there web sites and/or product names you can share?

[BHOFM]

Originally Posted by rwatson

Is this secret sailors business or are there web sites and/or product names you can share?

It is a big secret so don't tell anyone, not
even your mother!

Cheap Sails!

http://swsalesco.com/index.htm

[diwebb]

Hi BHOFM,
I live in New Zealand and am building a boat with a Chinese lusail schooner rig. The material you are looking at seems to be a good candidate for building the sails for my boat. I have emailed them direct and am awaiting a reply. Do you have any further feedback on the material and its use for sails? Are they proceeding with developing a new material specifically for sails??
All the best with your project.
David

By the way, a method of building sails that I have use and works very well is to glue the joints with clear silicone sealant. Just spread a thin bead of silicone on the joint area, then bring the two pieces together, a two inch overlap works best, then roll the joint with a hard roller ( a rolling pin will do or a piece of dowel) use a clean flat base to roll it on. A small amount of sealant will probably ooze from the joint but this is easily cleaned up, or you can tape the seam edges with masking tape. Do not move the material until the joint has set, about an hour, but two is better. The sails I have used this method on have done good service and I have never had a problem with the seam joints.
David

[ancient kayaker]

That stuff looks like tarp without the waterproof coating, or maybe the material used to cover swimming pools during the winter, up here in the soon-to-be-frozen north. I've used tarp successfully for small sails, stitches easily, doesn't fray and does not get saturated. There's a double-sided tape that works too, I understand, but I prefer to sew. The tarp I get is lighter than most, around 3 oz/sq yd but I could live with 4.5. The main problem using tarp is the noise!

The Barn Curtain certainly looks better than tarp. Does it rustle, or fray when cut? Does it sew readily?