I was pleased to have Barry Long write an article on topsails. I get impatient in light air and I, too, like having more sails, either custom-made or cobbled-together ones, as much to get the boat moving as to have more things to fiddle with.My 14′ Marblehead skiff started out with a sprit main and a jib and that was enough when there was a decent breeze, but sailing during the midsummer doldrums wasn’t much fun. I added a bowsprit and an outer jib and they helped a little, but if I was going to catch more wind, I needed to raise the rig. I added a topsail yard and a topsail much like the ones Barry writes about in his article in our December 2016 issue. I cut my topsail from a salvaged dinghy sail and used a club at the peak to gain a little extra sail area.
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Gangster