Soft Wing Sails

In my previous post on this site you see that foiling is coming to the masses, but what about wing sails? As we saw in the America's Cup (AC) 34 and 35 catamarans their rigid wing sails works extremely well, more efficient than soft sails, but are costly and hard to maintain as a big one piece rigid sail. Now we are seeing the introduction of soft wing sails, that have the performances advantages of rigid wing sails but without the storage issues of a one piece sail and maintenance issues to go with it. The following are two such designs. Such soft wing sails have yet to be put into mass production, but its coming.

1. This Soft Wings sail pulls up a mast like a traditional sail but has the shape, rigidity, and performance benefits of a wing sail. I believe it is reefable. I do not see a lot of disadvantages to this design.

2. This is the inflatable Wing Sail. It inflates via an air pump and as it rises not only does the sail rise up but the multi piece mast does the same. However I think the disadvantages are first you need a power source on your boat to inflate it, and it has the potential of losing air via a leak. The sail is divided into sections so if a leak happens it's only in one of the long vertical tubular sections. The leaking issue could indicate more maintenance needs than the Soft Wing (#1). I also noticed the mast seems to be flexing a lot in not so strong winds, which I assume is caused by the multi piece mast. Flexing is not that big of an issue and in some cases can work to one's advantage, but the fact it's flexing in fairly light winds might be a concern.

I will have more info and purchasing details as I receive them on this and other designs that are in the works. So stay tuned to this site for more details.

Leave a comment and let me know what you think.