Rebel 16 sails

[Rebelman]

Hello all. I’m new here and the proud owner of a 1968 Rebel Mk1 that has some shaggy looking sails… I may try to repair them while I’m saving my $$$ to get some new ones. If I can figure out how to upload photos I’ll post em to see what y’all think… I looked at the index but still can’t get the pictures formatted in a way that they’ll post…

[GreenLake]

Welcome to the forum.

The way I get pictures ready for upload is to use a small utility to increase the JPEG compression. A Medium image quality or about 65%, gives a big reduction in file size without any loss in viewing experience. Because the forum doesn't do a good job in resizing images, I also resize them down but not smaller than 800 on the shorter edge.

Not knowing what platform you are on, it's hard to give you suggestions, but there are a number of quick apps out there, sometimes free, and for some platforms, if you are skilled in their use, there are photoshop clones available for less than $100. I've used both.

The key is to reduce both the pixel dimensions for easier scrolling and to reduce the file storage size with compression. The limits are different for the gallery compared to uploading an attachment. The latter, I believe, is a bit more generous.

Back to sails...

Repairing sails is usually not worth it, but every rule has its exception. I'm still flying a hand-me-down spinnaker that has a number of places where sail tape is covering a hole. I justify this by arguing that sailing upwind and in high winds is more demanding on sail quality and I do neither with that spinnaker.

The second exception was a jib that I could no longer set without the leech fluttering while the main was in comparatively better shape. I fashioned my own leech line for a few bucks, mainly to satisfy my curiosity what such a thing would do to the performance of the sail. The result was a bit of a compromise, but it tied me over to the end of the season and until I could get a new set of sails.

Generally, my approach is to think of sails as having an outsize influence on the sailing characteristics of your boat. It's just unfortunate, but they wear out. Therefore, I think of the expense of a new set of sails as something that gets amortized over a fixed life span. Somewhere between 5 and 10 years, depending. My question becomes then, can I afford to spend 1/10 of the price of a new set of sails every year. It's like a subscription in a way.

The corollary is that the savings from going to a cheaper brand don't show up as drastically once you average it over their lifetime. Would you spend $50 to $100 more a year to get a better sailing experience? And I would argue that the sailing experience is better. It's not so much whether you can be 1/10th of a knot faster, no, it's about control. Sails that can be trimmed and flattened correctly will be so much easier to control when the wind pipes up a bit that that is worth increasing your annual "subscription" a bit.

I don't know if you are only new here, or new to sailing, but if so, you'd be surprised how soon your skills will improve to take advantage of a better set of sails. Conversely, I always think that sails that can't be trimmed well no matter how hard you try, simply prevent you from getting better.

[Rebelman]

Excellent advice and yes, I’m new to sailing. I took the ASA 101/103 combo last spring and the original plan was to get a much larger boat. That all went out the window (for the time being, anyway) when I realized that a day sailer meant that:
A) I could sail a LOT more with a Daysailer and

B) I could get my Rebel for dirt cheap, just add sweat equity, lol!


I joined the FB Rebel group and they’ve been super helpful but I feel like I’m monopolizing the conversation there, so I came here to do it, lol!

[GreenLake]

If you're new to sailing, or have just keelboat experience, have a peek at our Basic Concepts and Techniques. Some stuff may be different for dinghy sailing. (If you have any comments or suggestions, report them in the parallel thread listed in the opening post.)

You are definitely on to something with respect to the low overhead getting on the water with a trailerable boat. They are cheap and fun and many of them are used more often than people use a typical keelboat. They are also eminently repairable and without needing assistance from a boat yard. A heavier dinghy can be more forgiving in that it reacts just a bit more slowly, giving you a bit of extra time to adjust. Yet you still get a much better feeling of how sail trim affects your boat and you can always tell a dinghy sailor even if you meet them on a keelboat.

Our forum is focused on the O'Day DaySailer. Your Rebel 16 looks like it's roughly comparable in design and dimensions to the DaySailer. That means that much of the general discussion here might be applicable to you. And there are a ton of older posts with useful nuggets about sailing, rigging and repairing small boats. I very much encourage you to spend some time reading through some of the older posts. And feel free to join the discussion or ask questions. Just be mindful of the difference between the DaySailer and a daysailer and reserve anything that's very specific to the Rebel 16 design and construction for that FB group.

[Rebelman]

Gotcha. Will do, and thanks again for the great advice!

[celemtine]

If you're new to sailing, or have just keelboat experience, have a peek at our Basic Concepts and Techniques. Some stuff may be different for dinghy sailing. (If you have any comments or suggestions, report them in the parallel thread listed in the opening post.)

You are definitely on to something with respect to the low overhead getting on the water with a trailerable boat. They are cheap and fun and many of them are used more often than people use a typical keelboat. They are also eminently repairable and without needing assistance from a boat yard. A heavier dinghy can be more forgiving in that it reacts just a bit more slowly, giving you a bit of extra time to adjust. Yet you still get a much better feeling of how sail trim affects your boat and you can always tell a dinghy sailor even if you meet them on a keelboat.half body sexdoll

Our forum is focused on the O'Day DaySailer. Your Rebel 16 looks like it's roughly comparable in design and dimensions to the DaySailer. That means that much of the general discussion here might be applicable to you. And there are a ton of older posts with useful nuggets about sailing, rigging and repairing small boats. I very much encourage you to spend some time reading through some of the older posts. And feel free to join the discussion or ask questions. Just be mindful of the difference between the DaySailer and a daysailer and reserve anything that's very specific to the Rebel 16 design and construction for that FB group.

GreenLake
Thanks for the advice.

[GreenLake]

Thank you for the lovely endorsement, but I'm dead certain that you are not a sailor, but a spammer. Convince me otherwise.

[Rebelman]

** deleted post **

[Rebelman]

Are you speaking to me or the clementine person above? If clem, yeah… that definitely looks sus… either way, I was actually lucky enough to find a set of used sails just a few hours ago on the FB Rebel page, lol!!

[GreenLake]

Are you speaking to me or the clementine person above? If clem, yeah… that definitely looks sus… either way, I was actually lucky enough to find a set of used sails just a few hours ago on the FB Rebel page, lol!!

I am happy to hear that. I have no beef with you, even if you unfortunately decided to sail a Rebel and not a DS . You are always welcome to participate.

There's a site called stopforumspam and you can look up suspect user names and that misspelled not quite "clementine" shows up there, multiple times. I'm waiting for the second shoe to drop here. They usually do a post like this because some forums have limitations on "new" users. We don't, but we have something better. A human reading every single post. So we can flick people who misbehave pretty immediately.

I'm curious to see whether that person (who registered from Asia, not a place with a lot of DaySailers) will show themselves again. But I'm ready. Incidentally, they'll be flicked even if they stay silent, because a real person would follow up.

[haseem495]

It’s great that you found some used sails! Sometimes, a bit of luck is all we need. As for uploading photos, if you’re looking for an easy way to compress them for better upload quality, I suggest using tools like jpeg compressor. It helps reduce file size without losing image quality, making it easier to share. Looking forward to seeing your progress!