Urgent, sail problem

[snadd1s]

Hello all. I have a Bene 473 with original rig / sail.
On the sail its battons attached to cars/ rollers.
The cars between the "batton cars" .. How is the sail attached to them? I hope you understand what i mean.
Thanks

 

[Jackdaw]

It sounds like you have a mainsail track system, like Strongtrack or Harken Battcars.

There should be slightly smaller car to attach the sail to the track between the battens. We have two such points between every batten car. They look like this:

 

[snadd1s]

Hi, thanks for reply.
On my sail, the sail is attached to the cars/ rollers with bungee rope. The battens are attached to the cars on a "normal" way.
Does this sound like a normal way?
Thanks

 

[Jackdaw]

Hi, thanks for reply.
On my sail, the sail is attached to the cars/ rollers with bungee rope. The battens are attached to the cars on a "normal" way.
Does this sound like a normal way?
Thanks

It CAN be OK, if done correctly. I doubt its bungee rope (lost in translation?).. more likely dyneema. Do you have a picture?

 

[snadd1s]

Sorry, no picture.
According to the sail rep, it should be elastic (....) attachments. This will be better for the sail when reefed..
The attachments that are there now, were elastic though, but it seems a bit strange to me.
The reason for fixing it, some of them snapped when i was out in relatively heavy weather. IF it is the proper way, the attachments have probably been there since the boat was new. ( 2005)
Rgs,
K.

 

[bob_pattison]

Bungee cord allows the sail to stretch away from the mast when reefing or dropping...kind of like and old fashioned jackline system.
If the geometry of the sail is right, you don't really need bungee...all the original 473's were fitted with Harken cars (USA)and the intermediates webbed to the sail. The int. cars were fixed to the webbing loop by removing the pin in the int. car and then sliding through the webbing loop attached to the sail. It is possible the French boat did not have the Harken system.

If you do not have webb loops and just an eyelet in the sail that attaches to the slide, then you need strong slides or the bungee.
Bungee: Take about 20cm of it and loop it through the eye in the sail and through the slide...a couple of times. Slide should be about20mm from luff of sail. Tie off and hand stitch to make fast.

See PDF drawing for reference.
Bob Pattison
Neil Pryde Sails

Sorry, no picture.
According to the sail rep, it should be elastic (....) attachments. This will be better for the sail when reefed..
The attachments that are there now, were elastic though, but it seems a bit strange to me.
The reason for fixing it, some of them snapped when i was out in relatively heavy weather. IF it is the proper way, the attachments have probably been there since the boat was new. ( 2005)
Rgs,
K.