For the past 34 years, we have made every effort to design and build sails with nothing short of the best performance, quality, durability, service and value. This season has been one of our best ever, as our racing customers have enjoyed an exceptional summer. Also, the number of very nice comments from so many of our cruising customers, indicates that we must be getting closer to these elusive goals! To show our appreciation, we are not only offering our FALL DISCOUNT, BUT, for the first time ever, a terrific Haarstick Hat, FREE!! for each sail ordered NOW through November 15, 2004 !!!!

Best SAVINGS of the year Now through November 15^th, 2004! Orders received after November 15 will be entitled to a 10% Discount on single sail orders, and a 15% Discount on two or more Sails Until January 1^st, 2004 .

ü Save 15% on Roller Furling Conversions, Full Battens Conversions, Recuts, Luff Tape Changes, UV Acrylic Leech and Foot Genoa Covers…

Save on all Sails Repairs that arrive at our shop between October 1^st and November 15^th, 2004 .

We are continuously updating our customer database and expanding our e-mail address list. Our E-Mail newsletter has received many compliments, and we would like to ensure that you continue to receive it. If your e-mail address has changed, please call us Toll Free at (800) 342-5033, or (585) 342-5200, or e-mail us at info@haarsticksailmakers.com We would also like to update all your information, including boat name, phone numbers, and race results. If you know others that may want to receive this please forward this newsletter to them.

There have been several important regattas since our last newsletter, and I would like to list briefly some of our customers’ results.

Congratulations to Erik Will and crew for winning the 2004 Soverel 33 Nationals held at the Duck Island Yacht Club on Long Island sound on August 6-8. “BushWacker” had five 1^st place and two 2^nd place finishes to win this 12 race series by 2 points. “BushWacker”, with her all Haarstick inventory has won this regatta three times, and finished 2^nd twice since 1999, giving her the best cumulative record in the class. We have exciting photos from the regatta on our web site: spinnaker gibing in real heavy air, together with a full regatta write up by Ed St.George, and results. Follow the links on our front page. http://www.haarsticksailmakers.com/frames.html

Kudos to Eric Gesner, his wife Judy, and Dave Hanson for winning the Thistle Nationals held at the Michigan City Yacht Club 7/31- 8/8/2004 in a fleet of 80 boats! Also, Kudos to Erik Goethert and his crew Bob and Lynda Bryant, for their 7^th overall. What made them unique in this talented fleet? They were flying the only two Haarstick Triradial “Maxi-Runners” at the regatta! Eric e-mailed me after the regatta: “The chute was fast.”

After qualifying for the championship fleet, Mark Sertl and crew placed 7^th overall in the Championship Division of the Lightning North Americans (71 boats in the regatta), held at the Buffalo Canoe Club, August 9th-13^th. Mark was the ONLY boat in the fleet using a Haarstick Triradial “Max-Runner”, and had a daily 1^st and 7^th in the 5 race, no throw out championship division of 39 boats.

Brian Simkins with all Haarstick sails, had the most first place finishes to place 2^nd overall in the Ensign Nationals held at Newport , R.I. August 23^rd – 26^th.

Kirk Reynolds won two Hospice Regattas on Lake Ontario : at Henderson , and last weekend at the Genesse Yacht Club in Rochester , racing PHRF in his J-22 “Frolic”.

Tim Kinsella’s “Polestar” won the Beneteau 40.7 Division 1, with Harry Voss’ “Silver Bullet” in second.

Dave Spang’s Custom 30 won Division 2, followed by Eric Will’s “BushWacker” in 2^nd.

Brook Richardson’s “Arrow” won Division 3, with Jim Hill’s “Allegro” in 3^rd, and, in Division 6, my own “Minute Hand” won on a tie breaker with “Wind ‘N Spirits”..

John Doyle won the Long Distance race at 2004 CORK REGATTA in Kingston , Ontario .

Brendan Benson wins 1^st in Division at 2004 CORK with six straight 1^st place finishes. Brenden also won his division in the EYC long distance race, and was 1^st overall at the EYC regatta. Even though every boat in his PHRF division gave him time, “Blaze” won every race boat for boat. “People could not believe how fast we were”- Brendan.

For additional results, please check out our web site. We are updating them on a daily basis. Please call or e-mail us with your results, so we can add them, AND, you will receive a FREE Haarstick Belt!

HAARSTICK TRIRADIAL SPINNAKERS

What’s going on with our Triradial “Maxi-Runner” spinnakers? From the wide variety of PHRF boats to many One Design classes, our spinnakers have a well-deserved reputation of being the fastest running sails on the market! Our PHRF, J-22 and J-24 spinnakers have been dominating the competition downwind for years in the Upstate New York area. We have also won or placed in several major One Design regattas such as the Thistle where the only two Haarstick spinnakers in the regatta finished 1^st and 7^th, or the Lightning, where the only Haarstick Spinnaker in the fleet, placed 7^th! The Upstate NY sailors know what others outside our area are learning- our spinnakers are FAST! We didn’t have to spend months developing these One Design spinnakers, with endless boat for boat testing. We didn’t have to fiddle around making a bunch of experimental prototypes. Our spinnaker designs for these classes are fast, they were fast the first time up, and each successive spinnaker is just as fast. They came off our exclusive, and completely unique spinnaker design program that, like all our other sail design programs were developed from scratch, in house. How many other sailmakers, no matter how big they are, can state this as fact? I believe there are very few others, if any, except one.

We initially put our design programs on the Cornell University Mainframe in 1968, but it was only after our Gerber cutter was up and running in Annapolis in 1973, that it became obvious that we had an incredible advantage over all other sailmakers, if we could develop the means to cut spinnakers on this machine. Remember, we were the first sailmaker in the world, yes that’s right, the very first to develop and put computer cut sails on the market in 1973! This machine with its ability to cut panels within 0.008” accuracy, would allow us to cut each spinnaker panel to its exact shape, without having to simplify the panel shapes, and/or stack cut panels as all sailmakers did at that time. None of them had a computer cutter at that time: they had to hand cut all their panels, and continued to hand cut for many years after 1973.

With our cutter fully operational in 1973, we were cutting over 17,000 yards of cloth for Laser sails per month in Annapolis . It was the time to utilize this unique cutting machine in our custom business, and the place to start was spinnakers. Having developed the means to put our spinnaker designs on the cutter, we spent the fall of 1973 cutting ¼ scale models of over 30 different Triradial and “Maxi Star” designs. After assembly, we flew every model on our test rig outdoors and photographed each one from every conceivable angle. By the use of these model sails, each one cut to an unheard of accuracy (accuracy of the blade position is within 0.008”), we were able to compress seasons of trial and error into a few months, and, most importantly, no customer was a guinea pig as we developed our designs!

Over the years, we have been able to analyze the shapes that we have developed, knowing that we are looking at the design as it is reproduced to an accuracy of 0.008” in every panel. Each spinnaker panel is cut to its exact and unique shape necessary to build the three-dimensional sail. There are no shortcuts! We believe that we build the most accurately cut spinnakers in the business: We have always glued the seams together before sewing. All panels must line up perfectly; all assembled sections must fit together with NO hand fairing or adjustments of the final assembled luff and foot. Sizes and girths must be, and are right on the money! Design improvements can be evaluated, knowing the cut and assembly of the sail is so accurate, that we are looking at the true design shape of the spinnaker. The uncertainty and lack of duplication caused by inaccurate hand cutting, or inaccurate equipment and assembly of other spinnakers is not an issue with our Haarstick Triradial “Maxi-Runner” spinnakers!

Our success in spinnaker design and construction is due to the technology that we pioneered in this business, and our continuing refinements in design that only this process allows. If you are looking for the absolutely fastest spinnaker, for PHRF or One Design, our Triradial “Maxi-Runners” are the sails to buy, and now is the best time!

Recently, many sailmakers have been in a rush to copy North’s 3DL. Having introduced this production process in the

America

’s Cup in the 90’s, and after many years of litigation, North’s 3DL concept has become widely accepted throughout the industry as the best way to produce a weight efficient sail. For very large sails, such as the

America

’s Cup boats and Maxi’s, this process has become almost universal. In fact, Dimension-Polyant, the largest producer of commercial laminates, bought the similar D4 process from Doyle Sailmakers in

Australia

and is now selling D4 sail panel constructions to all sailmakers worldwide. It is no longer an exclusive product of Doyle.

The idea behind these “string” sails is very simple: as the loads concentrate into the corners of the sail, so do the reinforcing threads in the laminate. By continuously increasing the thread count per inch into the corners, instead of discrete changes as in paneled laminate sails, the distribution of loads throughout the sail is matched by the changing thread count per inch in the final laminate. Theoretically, this would allow the sail to be lighter for the same overall strength.

How much lighter are “string” sails? Frankly, I don’t know, as I haven’t weighed enough sails to compare. While it seems to be significant in very large sails, for smaller sized boats 40 feet and down, I have not seen that much weight savings, if any, versus our paneled sails. I think the extra amount of glue that is required to laminate the material, especially in the corners of the sail, offsets the weight savings of this process, at least to some extent. Moreover for the size of boats we commonly see in our area, I have always believed that the proper shape of the sail, combined with low stretch, and, most importantly, the durability of the cloth with use are the most important factors that make boats go fast, and stay fast. Small differences in the weight of the sail will only produce small differences in potential speed, but a cloth that rapidly looses its strength with use, or worse, delaminates is a primary cause of the “slows”.

The “string” sailcloth manufacturing process is much different than commercially made laminates. Whether the structural threads are laid down on the film in a continuous manner from corner to corner, or on separate panels that are later glued together, the sail itself is produced at the same time as the cloth is manufactured. As the threads converge, and overlap in the high load areas, the thickness of the assembled laminate increases, and the amount of glue required to bond the final laminate together increases. After the top film is applied, the laminate is squeezed together with a maximum of one atmospheric pressure, which is, at most, 14.7 pounds per square inch. (Not 1400 pounds per square inch, as claimed on their web site). The glue used to bond the laminate is then heated, usually in sections as the heating element is moved across the surface. After the curing process, the final lamination, which is now the sail, is finished in the sail loft.

The most important drawback to this process is that the cloth is manufactured at the same time as the sail. While you might think, “so what”, remember this: No process is 100% error free! Mistakes will occur. With this process, mistakes are really costly! With commercial laminates, you can check the cloth BEFORE you cut it. Not so with “string” sails! The final quality of ANY finished product in ANY manufacturing environment is totally dependent on how soon in the process the mistakes are found. If the cost of fixing any mistake equals the cost of manufacture, the only fix is to start over from scratch. How extreme must the mistake be before the cloth, now the sail, is thrown out? My guess is that it would have to be very extreme!

I have been testing cloth for over 35 years, and have seen many, many examples of delamination failure even in commercially manufactured cloth. These fabrics are laminated as the structure is run through a set of high pressure rollers. The pressure used to squeeze the glue into the substrate is MUCH higher than any possible vacuum bagging pressure used in “string” sailcloth construction. In addition, commercial laminates are a constant thickness, by their very nature. Compared to the ever increasing overlapping of substrate threads and resulting increasing thickness of the material as the thread layup concentrates in the corners, combined with the relatively low laminating pressure, it is not hard to understand the increased risk of delamination. When we test cloth, and find it does not withstand our Impact Flutter test, we simply don’t buy it. We ask for another sample to test. This procedure is relatively inexpensive, so we can be extremely picky.

On the other hand, if you can’t determine if the lamination is good until after the sail is built, it will cost a bundle to throw the entire sail away and start over. That can really cut into your profit. How picky can you be, and stay in business? If it is a high profile boat like the

America

’s Cup, or a Maxi, you would probably be very picky, but for the average guy racing PHRF at his local club, how picky then?

The Wednesday night PHRF races at Rochester finished up for the season on 9/1, and the racing season will come to a close with RYC’s fall regatta the weekend after Labor Day. The season is too short! While I haven’t exactly set my division on fire in the Wednesday night races, I’ve had better luck in the regattas, having won my division at LYRA and The Hospice at RYC on August 28^th. When I lived in Ithaca , we used to sail the fall Sunday series into October, with a windup weekend regatta at the end of the month. It was often the best sailing of the year, with cool fall breezes, and the leaves turning bright colors up and down both shores. Really beautiful sailing! I’m not ready for fall. Thank goodness I’ve still got Star regattas until the end of this month, and the Star sailing regattas in Miami this winter.

**If you no longer wish to receive updates or Newsletters please reply with “Remove”**

NEW SAILS

SAIL REPAIRS

HAARSTICK TRIRADIAL SPINNAKERS