So, does the sail builder have to know the characteristics of the mast prior to cutting the sail?
He certainly should. For the a-cats, some builders will have you support the mast, hang weights, and take measurements to give them a better idea for the type and stiffness of your mast prior to building a sail.
couldn't the mast be viewed (by the sail maker) while rigged with the old sail (assuming you have one) to see it's characteristics for a new sail build?
would a comprehensive set of images and videos (of sed mast/old sail) help a sail maker?
If he was in the same country, perhaps!...I'm not sure how much science really happens between measuring the mast bend characteristics and the sail design. They can only be using that information to put the mast into a three or four deep category (bend type A, type B, type C, etc.). I imagine it would cost a fortune to build a digitally modeled mast and design a sail around each one.
I don't have much experience with this end of the business...but I can see some real technical hurdles to getting so precise with everything (unless you are someone like Glen Ashby, Glaser, etc.).
