Thought about picking up a used 18 sail.... Rig it in the yard and see if there are any red flags. My 2 reasons are 18 sails are so much easier to come by,plus if it pulls the boom up the extra bit due to longer SX mast thats a win( 3 kiddos under 10 ). I'm sure at some point soon though I'll pull the trigger on a new custom sail from Chip or slo canvas. Both have said they've actually made custom sails for a 18 to go boomless. I've spent a lot of time researching and have had zero luck if it's actually possible, pro's con's etc.. I'm still on the fence about square top or not too. All of my sailing is on smaller lakes, zero concerns about racing and having Hobie spec'd rig..all leisure and fun with bambinos :mrgreen:

You could totally do that. You could also put a new attachment point at the boom gooseneck and raise the entire boom. The SX mast is about 18 inches taller, so regardless of moving the gooseneck, realize your mainsheet (and downhaul) would effectively be a lot shorter (18 inches x your ratio (7:1, 8:1, etc) shorter. Maybe you have to use the mainsheet as a mainsheet only and rig a separate traveller sheet.

If you do not go boomless, in consideration of your bambinos, maybe put some adhesive deck foam on the boom to at least soften any impact. Had a hiccup out solo one time that resulted in 15 face stitches, ...an ounce of prevention.

If you don't care too much, not racing, don't care about class legality, etc, etc.. then don't sweat the square top or not either, just do what you do man! Chip is great. Bought my squaretop, jib, etc from him. (see my avatar pic)



Edited by robpatt on Apr 21, 2021 - 03:54 PM.

Quote

maybe put some adhesive deck foam on the boom to at least soften any impact.

Great idea - never thought of that!

PS go Chip! he is the man and a sailor -
I have nothing good to say about slo

robpatt

You could also put a new attachment point at the boom gooseneck and raise the entire boom.

You could raise the gooseneck fitting, but if you did that, you would also need to raise the cutout in the mast track where the sail feeds in. Otherwise you would not be able to hoist the sail. The gooseneck fitting needs to be below the opening in the track or it will block the sail.

Another option would be to convert to a Hobie 16 style gooseneck fitting which isn’t fixed and slides up and down in the track with the sail. But then you would need a line or something to connect the tack to the gooseneck so it doesn’t just drop to the bottom of the track.

The mast rotator arm might also pose some challenges with the excessively high sail.

sm