Tom Curcio
Lake St Louis, MO
Boat Name: The Rose
Model/Year: 2005 Catalina 22 MKII
Hull No.
Hailing Port: |
 06/04/2008 12:07 PM Pacific Time
I am a novice sailor who just purchased a Catalina 22 MKII. One of the battons is missing and the previous owner said he planned to sail without them. He ripped a hole in the main with one of them. What do they do and why or when would Ineed htem? |
Bob Conway
Huber Heights, Ohio
Boat Name: Spindrift
Model/Year: C22/1979
Hull No. #8717
Hailing Port: Buck Creek, Ohio |
06/04/2008 1:30 PM Pacific Time
Tom,
Find a local sail maker and get it repaired. Yes you do need the battens. They are an important part of creating and maintaining proper sail shape. Also, without them you will not only not be able to get the best performance from your mainsail, you will also destroy it because the roach of the sail will flap uncrolled in the wind.
Get on the internet. There is a lot of information on sails and sail shape. It will help you to maintain your sails, to improve your sailing and to get full enjoyment from your boat. :-)
Bob |
Bob Conway
Huber Heights, Ohio
Boat Name: Spindrift
Model/Year: C22/1979
Hull No. #8717
Hailing Port: Buck Creek, Ohio |
06/04/2008 1:31 PM Pacific Time
Sorry, that is uncontrolled, not uncrolled.
My fingers just do not spell very well. ;-) |
David Torrisi
Santa Clara, CA
Boat Name: Dumbo
Model/Year: 1975 C-22
Hull No. 4330
Hailing Port: Santa Clara |
06/04/2008 2:02 PM Pacific Time
Battens are good to have if your sail is designed for them. Sailing a few times in moderate air won't destroy the sail, but over time, it will blow out the leech prematurely.
Sailrite.com has all the supplies if you'd like to do it yourself.
David
www.c22region10.org |
Jim Sherwood
Westerville, Ohio
Boat Name: Who Cares
Model/Year: 1972
Hull No. 2186
Hailing Port: Westerville, Ohio |
06/04/2008 2:45 PM Pacific Time
An old yardstick cut to the right length works well. |
Tom Curcio
Lake St Louis, MO
Boat Name: The Rose
Model/Year: 2005 Catalina 22 MKII
Hull No.
Hailing Port: |
06/11/2008 9:28 AM Pacific Time
Thank you for your response. I have 3 of the 4 battons, so all I need is one. I might even try the old yardstick until I get a replacement.
The previous owner told me he was planning to sail without them but now I see they are VERY important to perfromance and saving the sail so I'll get them installed.
Thanks again to all who responded. |
Jim Sherwood
Westerville, Ohio
Boat Name: Who Cares
Model/Year: 1972
Hull No. 2186
Hailing Port: Westerville, Ohio |
06/11/2008 10:58 AM Pacific Time
I sailed for years with one or two battens missing and it was not a problem.
|
Bilbo
Youngstown, Ohio
Boat Name: Sea Dog
Model/Year: Catalina 22 1987
Hull No. 13971
Hailing Port: Andover, Ohio |
06/14/2008 3:14 AM Pacific Time
Battens are used to keep the roach profile and prevent that fabric from flapping. Most C22 mainsails have 4 partial battens. This is where about 1/3 of the batten is supporting the roach of the sail and about 2/3 of the batten is in front of a straight leech line from head to clew. Because the roach is arched, the top and bottom-most battens don't need to be quite as long. SO there are basically different sized one on these sails. Some newer C22 sails have full length battens that extend from leech to the luff.
If you don't have them installed, it is compromising the performance of your mainsail a bit and it could easily increase wear in that area.
Another issue would be to have a few missing and to be still sing the others. This could cause increased wear on the sail material of the area around the batten pockets of the ones that are being used. As an example, on my ~1986 sail, the batten pockets have a "spring loaded" sort of system to keep the batten in the pocket. This is some elastic that is sewn into the front of the batten pocket to keep the batten in place. The problem is that this elastic material (Like the waistband used in jockey underwear) looses it's elasticity with time as the rubber bands get brittle and the elastic material will bunch up and move out of the way. Now with this, the batten is free to rub against the sail material until it causes a hole in the sail fabric. The eventual result is a hole and the batten goes overboard. The fix is to replace the elastic material and to repair/reinforce this area with sailcloth.
Repair material and decent batten is available from sailrite.com as David suggests for as reasonable a price as you can probably get.
Battens are also available from CD here also
http://www.catalinadirect.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=category.display&category_id=115
Generally the store bought battens are laminated fiberglass. You can buy this stuff of the correct width from some places and then cut to length and sand the edges to a good round shape. One can make them out of wood that is good grained but if you use a piece of an old yardstick that is trimmed to length and planed in width, you may run the risk of having this poor quality wood crack and splinter lengthwise. This may cause a great and ugly rip in your sail. When sailing, I always consider some for Murphy's law. I can also attest to yardstick wood quality, My mom used to break them on my behind rather often when I was bad. |
