Which sail cloth to buy?

[Bob Ellis]

@Maarten showed once a comparison in a post

A 143 feet long Dutch warship from 1681. Cardstock [COMPLETED BUILD]

Basically the rigging is fairly simple. You start with the standing rigging: Here are the ropes that move the yards: And finally the ropes that manage the sails: Once you get the system, it's just tedious work :) Ab

shipsofscale.com

Mine appears to be very good. It was from Regent Home of Sewing on eBay, 1 x 1.47m £6.98.

 

[Graham]

Thank you all for taking the time to answer, much appreciated.

 

[AntonAtanasov1]

Hello! Has anyone used parachute cloth for sails?

 

[AllanKP69]

Typical parachute fabric, such as ripstop nylon, has around 122 warp threads per inch so totally out of scale for most ship models. For a scale like 1:48 you would need a count of about 2500-3000 per inch if scale matters to you, but it does not exist. Finding anything more than 800 TRUE thread count per inch is difficult. For scales of 1:24 or larger, 800 TC cloth looks OK compared to the burlap like material we see so often. High end Egyptian bedding can be found in this range. Be careful about claims over 600 or 800 as this is usually using a different type of TC.

Silkspan is becoming more and more popular for sail material as it never looks out of scale like the vast majority of cloth sails.

Allan

 

[DARIVS ARCHITECTVS]

Silkspan does look the best, but working with it and especially stretching it to make billowed sails is difficult because it is very delicate. Other posts about sail fabric should be reviewed on this forum. One of the best cloth options is Navara lawn white, a very fine cotton suitable for sails because it is thin and fine. Others besides myself on this forum agree it is one of the best fabrics available. I have only found it available here: Whaleys Ltd Co. UK

Click HERE to see the results on a model.

 

[AntonAtanasov1]

Thanks for the answers guys. For a moment I thought that such a fabric could make nice canvases, but apparently I was very wrong. Thanks again

 

[AllanKP69]

FWIW, lawn cotton TC goes as high as 250. Egyptian can be as high as 800 but it often looks like satin and shiny so not necessarily a better choice without some type of dulling treatment to get rid of the shine. Any cotton cloth can be washed and then put in the drier on high heat to give a bit of shrinkage before cutting the sails so has an even tighter weave.. Not a great idea for a new shirt, but a great idea for sail making fabric Allan

 

[threebs]

I have used flour sack material.