storing Sunfish sails with a chain sinnet knot

a handy method for organizing your Sunfish sail with the booms and mast after you are finished sailing for the day is to tie the whole lot together using a chain sinnet (or monkey braid).

make sense? probably not by just watching that simple video, so of course, a little bit more explanation will probably help.

1st – make sure your sail is dry.  if you have to put away your sail wet, make sure you unroll it ASAP and let it dry to prevent mildew from forming on the sail.

2nd – position the 2 booms (or spars) together. I also usually just leave the mast in the gooseneck, and rotate it down so that the mast is parallel with the booms.  pull the sail away from the booms and mast, and start to slowly – and loosely – roll the sail up towards the booms.  IMPORTANT: do NOT roll the sail around the booms, as you are more likely to damage the sail that way.

3rd – use both your halyard and mainsheet to tie a chain sinnet knot that wraps around and loosely secures the rolled up sail and the booms and mast.  I usually start with the mainsheet, with it pulled all the way so that the pulley that connects with the traveler is tight against the end boom block.  so my mainsheet chain sinnet starts at about the mid-point (at the forward boom block), and I tie the chain sinnet knot towards the tack of the sail (and base of the mast).  then, with the halyard, I’ll tie again the chain sinnet knot, working the opposite direction.

if some pictures would help, the Lansing Sailing Club has put together a pretty nice step-by-step pictorial – check it out here. an example picture is below.

SailTie5-s

 

working my way from the  using the halyard

3 comments

  1. Meech, totally agree. I learned this method from the guy I bought my 1st Sunfish. I didn’t really know the name of the knot until much later!

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    • I used that “braid” to store webbing in my climbing days but I didn’t know it had a name and it didn’t occur to me to use it for sail spars! I use a sail-bag for trailer transports but remove the spars from the bag when storing in the basement so that they are well ventilated. Some method of securing the sheet and halyard is handy so they won’t interfere with the ping-pong match occurring immediately below.

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