Does anyone know how they make the fabric? Wether it be Pentax or Mylar, Kevlar or whatever? It certainly would be interesting to create a machine which could make the material in the proper shape to start with. Put sailmakers out of business sort of. In that no stitching would ever be needed. But you would still need to design the shape.
What fabric would that be? The sail is built by gluing sheets of mylar together like a crosscut dacron sails. Then it is put on a mould and the fibers are put in place. Then it is closed off with glue or a layer of mylar or scrim. UK had a process where they just taped the fibers on with a tape dispenser
So it is mylar and fibers of choice, mainly carbon I think.
There are several variations of the process. Some have the panels pre-setup with fibers in the right layout and then assemble the panels to a sail much like a crosscut sail. Then you dont have continous fibers running the length of the sail, but still lighter and better shape holding than tri-radial or Maxx/Flex sails.
I bet North would love to get a machine to build the sails with no human hands touching it. Humans make errors while machines do as told (mostly). As of up til now, they have not managed to although the 3DLr is a step on the way. Myself I like having several sailmakers and beeing able to buy the materials I need to build my own sails.
