Torn Genoa Luff

[Bill]

Hi all

I have a 2000 Catalina 34, hull number 1484.  I bought it on April 15, 2000.  The one year warranty has expired.  I removed the genoa from the Schaffer 2100 fuller and discovered that the luff of the sail is torn in several places.  Immediately behind the luff rope on the sail is a row of stitching running parallel to the luff rope.  The fabric is torn in four places along
the length of the stitching.  The tears are from two to six inches long and they do not line up with the joints in the foil sections.  I have inspected the foil from a bosun's chair and could find no sharp edges, burrs or misaligned parts.  I took the sail to a local sail loft and was told that the luff rope should have had an additional row of stitching.  This addition stitching should have passed through the sail fabric, the luff rope and the sail fabric on the other side.  This would keep the luff rope and the fabric from moving independently from each other.  In his opinion when the fabric and luff rope move independently from each other it can cause the fabric to bunch up and that causes it to tear along the line of stitching immediately behind the luff rope.

Has anybody else had this problem?  How did you keep it from happening again?  Do the sail makers thoughts make sense?  Could the foil be the problem?  Maybe the halyard tension is too loose?  Too tight?  The sail maker is fixing the problem by replacing the luff tape with a new one and I do not want the new one to tear.

Any thoughts would be helpful.

Thanks

Bill Jenks
C34  #1484
Unzipped
Catalina 34 International Association
Vice Commodore
jenks@mashell.com

[Ron Hill]

Bill : If it's a Catalina Sail I'd call the factory and ask them if their sails were only meant to last ONE year. I had some new sails and had that area reinforced.  ronphylhill@erols.com ;)

Ron, Apache #788