View topic - Rigging up Canoe Sails

Hey folks,

This is something my Scout troop always likes to try to do on an ad-hoc basis, and I was thinking it would a fun project to make some purpose-built sails. Does anyone have some simple but usable designs they can point me at? Or some ideas?

In the simplest form I am thinking of sewing some material so it will slip over 2 paddles that the person in front would hold onto.

What would be icing on the cake would be a way to affix the sail to the canoe.

thanks

Google canoe sail and you'll find lots of stuff.

There are a number of small sellers who produce canoe sails commercially where you could copy some ideas. There is also a small group of canoe sailing enthusiasts who have posted YouTube videos showing their set-up.

My fastest sailing speed ever was 19kmph, that was attained with a raincoat and two sticks!

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"What else could I do? I had no trade so I became a peddler" - Lazarus Greenberg 1915

"My fastest sailing speed ever was 19kmph, that was attained with a raincoat and two sticks!"
With that speed are you sure there wasn't a waterfall involved too?

Our top speed with a loaded 17' 6" Tripper is 12kph using a Windpaddle sail.

One of our first designs of this type of sail served us as a sail, ground sheet, table cloth, clothing, tarp, and many other things.
It was just like you described... rectangular with paddle sleeves sewn on each side.
The bow person would insert their paddle along with the spare paddle (blade first), put the grips on your seat on each hip, gather the extra fabric and put it between your legs, now open up the sail and hang on!

Not the most efficient for speed but nothing else comes close for multi-use. Speed were in the 3-7kph depending on the stern paddling or not.

Besides the wind, maybe about 25kmph+, there is about about a 10kmph current on the lower George River, when I hit that top speed things were getting a bit crazy and the sail was taken down.

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"What else could I do? I had no trade so I became a peddler" - Lazarus Greenberg 1915

Here is our purpose built sail, very cheap to build, and incredibly efficient. Also packs up the size of a Nalgene, minus the poles.

Just need to resist the urge to fish at the same time; too many lines to concentrate on and they get tangled!

http://www.myccr.com/phpbbforum/viewtop ... 49&t=45345

Nice rig - thanks for posting!