Unknown Sail Name

It roller furled on the main backstay.

 

The wishbone is a spar not a sail.....see this......http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/boat-design/wishbone-main-ketches-mizzen-mules-4686.html

And this.....http://www.dabblersails.com/blog/blog.pl?type=show&id=45&pic_id=3

Irving Johnson was one of the first cruisers to popularize the use of the mule on his third Yankee, a 50' steel ketch designed by S&S and launched in 1959. He properly called it a main backstaysail......which is a mouthful, and shortened that to mule. He though it "inconceivable to me that every owner of a ketch does not want....a mule." "For cruising it is a great pleasure, and it is used in all winds from a dead run to close-hauled. Occasionally it is the only sail set for steadying purposes while under power."

Johnson just sheeted straight the mizzen head, the use of a wishbone spar or the Perini masthead traveler improve the set both on and off the wind. And the Perini version is on a hydraulic furler......

 

Tad, this is most helpful and kind of rounds out the explanation. I had found the dabbersail link already, based on the information provided in posts on this thread.

Your point regarding the wishbone clearly makes sense. The boat we observed in the BVI's and that I attached the photo of in my first post, was clearly a performer. She really seemed to take off in all airs and all points of sail and had great acceleration. I noticed that they kept the mule deployed in almost all sailing conditions, but furled it as needed to keep the boat balanced, just as they did with the rest of the rig.

It appeared to us that all of the sails, main, mizzen, genoa, staysail, and mule were hydraulically operated roller furlers. I say this based on how quickly all sails could be trimmed and that fact that we never say anyone leave the cockpit to tend sails. I'd estimate that LOA was between 25 and 30 meters, but could have been longer. Obviously, some pretty good size sails to manage.

I wish I had noted the name of the boat so that I could research this specific one further.

 

All sail handling is hydraulic on the Perinis, including captive reel sheet winches. The boat you were looking at is somewhere between 40 and 46-48 metres, with around 10,000 sq ft of working sail area. The mule is as big as the main sail on these.

Perini built these in batches, the only way to tell them apart is by counting windows/ports and slight differences in the antennas on the mizzen mast.....It looks like yours was built around 1990-91, could be one of 4-5 different boats.......see them all here http://www.perininavi.it/en/fleet/sailing-yachts/in-navigation

 

Before this thread the only seagoing "mule" I knew was a type of gaff-ketch-trawler..
thanks Tad..

 

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Well, I knew nothing of anything with "mule* " in it relating to sailboats! So I too thank the original poster and the others for shedding light on this. Thank you all....

* with the exception of a very few mule-headed ********* I've had the misfortune to run into along the way...

 

It looks to me like an upside down back stay sail.

What ever it is, I am skeptical about its effectiveness.

Because it is boomless, it should be sheeted about ten degrees off center line. Since it must be sheeted to the top of the mizzen mast, that is not possible.

Maybe it works anyway, but just not as efficiently as one might like.

According to Phil Bolger, the non inverted version of this sail was put on the back stay of a sloop, creating something known as a "Foster rig". In that case, it had a boom, to get away from the off center line sheeting issue.

According to Bolger, this was tried in the '20's and '30's, but given up due to mast buckling.

 

Yes, one wonders.........

It should be noted that Perini dropped the use of mules about 2000-2001, shortly after Ron Holland became involved in their design work. Previously all design work was done in-house. Now all their ketches have taller masts, and big roach full battened main and mizzen (perhaps in-boom furling?).