World Championships 1997 Danish Championships 1997
	NORTH SAILS

It takes more than the skills of a single rock-star sailor to consistently deliver the best sails to any One Design class. Of course it takes profound knowledge of the characteristics of the individual boat. However, there is more to it, like access to and careful selection of fabrics that will retain the fastest flying shape race after race. Painstakingly accurate production methods are required to ensure that the outstanding properties of a fast design are being reproduced from sail to sail. Last but not least an extensive service network allowing sailors, locally and abroad to have access to expert advice on your X-99 sails.

Our chief designer Theis Palm, has worked closely together with the bester sailos in the class, to develop the successful winning combination for the X-99 class. A team of international top sailors around the World frequently report their experience to our designers to ensure that our models work in the widest possible range of conditions.

We have years ago introduced a coding system that allows you to identify the winning combination.

Mainsail

VM-7: The mainsail is built in a 6.5oz dacron Polykote cloth. C-cut with panels that fan perpen-dicular to the load line parallel to the leech. The top and clew panels are rocked to even better absorb the high loads from these areas. A progressive con-trolled leech provide better pointing and less lee-way. The sail features a cunningham slide for better luff control at the bottom, a collision window, tapered sandwich E-glass battens, tell tales at each batten, a service bag, sail numbers, and class insignia.

AP-3: This Genoa was developed during 1997 with the aim of improving the AP-2. The AP-3 is manufactured from Pentex Polyester cloth, the name of whole new synthetic fibre, made by Allied Chemicals in the States. Spoken in general terms, this fibre has half the stretch compared to the best Polyester or Dacron fibres. Furthermore it has unbelievably good resistance against the damage of the sun’s harmful rays, which sails made from Pentex unique performance and extraordinary strength. We can make a sail which is lighter and stronger, what makes this sail the perfect allpurpose Genoa for the X-99.

The Pentex cloth has threads, distributed at an angle of 45° over the vertical threads, loads are distributed over wider angles and the sail is better withstanding the loads coming with varying sheet tensions. The Genoa is vertically flat in the back third of the sail and therefore be sheeted closer to the rig and gives less backwind in the mainsail.

LG-3: This special light wind sail is cut out of Diax 120-P. The sail has more profile in the top. It is sheeted looser and with more twist. It is built to the same charac-teristics as VG-7. The wind range is 0-12 knots.

VJ-5: The jib is made in 7.52oz. PolyKote Dacron. It has more profile and can be used at lower wind speeds so it is a more all round sail now. The panels run perpendicular to the leech allowing the strong fill yarns to absorb the loads efficiently. Like the mainsail the top and clew panels are rocked. The two lower battens are sewn permanently in the sail while the top batten pocket is provided with the original North Sails velcro closing system which enables you to change the batten tension or exchange the batten.

Spinnaker

VSM-6: The max class spinnaker has been made fuller in the head to provide a more powerful flying shape downwind. In VMG conditions VSM-5 is 2-3% faster than our previous design. We use a Stabilkote IV cloth which is the lightest all round fabric available. The standard color is white and the spinnaker is delivered with a swivel in the head and steel rings in the clews.

SBI-3: We have designed a special light wind spin-naker with a target range of 0-12 knots. The cloth has the allowed minimum weight, but is built lighter. The spin-naker has a relatively small top and together with a vertical flat profile it provides an easy flying chute.

VSI-4: This small all-round mould is cut in a 0.9oz. cloth with a bit shorter luff and narrower foot and much smaller girth than VSM-6. Vertically it is considerably flatter and provides excellent reaching potential, even in light air.

If you wish to have more information about North Sails X-99 sails, please do not hesitate to contact North Sails Sailmakers in Copenhagen and ask for our expert of the X-99 class, Mads Christensen, phone +45-31 204090 or fax +45-31 204412 or your local dealer.

NORTH SAILS EUROPE A/S
SUNDKROGSKAJ 8 · 2100 KØBENHAVN Ø · DENMARK
TLF. 31204090 · FAX 31204412
E-MAIL: INFO@EURO.NORTHSAILS.COM

Copyright 1997 © North Sails.