headsail
Pino's headsail is a 100% jib on a Harken roller furler. The jib has a protective dacron layer covering the leech.
2020.04.16
Mie, Japan
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On the passage from Ogasawara the leech cover of our jib started to tear. We bought material to replace it and stitched it on ourselves. Removing the old covering was a long, and tedious task.
Many ocean-sailors use sunbrella on their furling headsail, but it is a more expensive, and heavier material aloft, so we decided to keep using Dacron.
Applying the new material wasn't hard, because it had a sticky-backing. We bought it from an online Japanese chandlery, selling rolls of very wide Dacron tape. Generally Dacron tape is UV-resistant, but we weren't sure if it was also UV coated, it isn't always easy to tell when ordering from a site in Japanese. Our Japanese is good, but far from perfect, and the information is often displayed as part of images and we can't toss them in a translator. We hand-stitched the Dacron using our sewing awl, but 3 days later we were still on panel #2 with the whole sail left to do. Our backs were aching, we feared we would not survive this project.
We asked Mr. Oka (the harbormaster) if he knew anyone with a sewing machine, and he did! We regretted not asking earlier. The sewing machine was at a loft, a 5 minute walk from the marina. The VOC(Vivre Ocean Club) used it to sew up sails for the sailing club boats.
Mr. Oka showed us how to use it, and off we went! We completed all the stitching in under an hour(!!!). All hail sewing machines! A very good invention indeed.
We had time to spare, so we worked on our Frankensail. We tried to do all of the work in the morning, because it got too hot there in the afternoon, even with all of the windows and doors open. Japanese summers are very, very hot.
Frankensail
Our friends Hiro and Kako from the sailboat Drifty gave us an old headsail that they kept at their house. The sail had a large tear at the bottom, but that was okay with us because we wanted to shorten it to turn it into a back-up sail. Our current jib looked fine, but we faced a long passage across the north_pacific_ocean and wanted to make sure that if something went wrong, that we'd have something else to work with.
We cut the torn panels out, and used it to double the material to make a thicker, stronger sail. We taped the layers with dacron sail repair tape first, so we knew what to affix, and where, and the machine took care of assembly. Well, we were there to feed the fabric through.
The Frankensail project was a success. We only flew it once during our passage from Japan to Victoria, raising it behind the headsail for fun. We're happy to report that our jib survived the trip. Note: We had a new headsail made in 2026, and so we retired the Frankensail.
2026.02.15
Victoria, B.C, Canada
We are finally retiring our current headsail. It has flown with us for 23,559 nautical miles, likely more under Pino's previous owners, it has seen a lot of ocean, lots of wind and has visited 11 countries. Goodnight, dear sail, you will live again with us aboard Pino under a different shape.
The Dacron tape we applied to the foot and leech of our headsail in Japan had started to peel off, proving it was indeed not UV coated, although it lasted for a long enough time (we applied it in 2020).
In November 2025, we started doing research. We considered making our own, but like with our mainsail, we had much ambition, but little time, space, and energy. We once again decided it best to leave it to professionals.
We approached a few sail lofts to ask for quotes on a new sail, the first quoted us 5200$, the second 4300$. Our original jib was made by North Sails, but it appeared that they and UKSails were now out of our price range. We wondered for a moment if we had been priced out of sailing. Worse is that when asking North Sails for a quote for a simple sail(we were very specific about it), they threw in a bunch of extras we hadn't asked for, and even upsized our headsail to a 130% genoa(the above quote was for the adjusted price, without extras) — that is never a good sign. We do not doubt that they do good work, but we thought it best to continue our search.
Lastly, good friends recommended we contact Leitch & McBride in Sidney. Their quote(3200$CAD w/o tax) was more reasonable, it was close to the price of the new mainsail(3300$) UKsails had produced for us in New Zealand in 2017. We chose them to produce a new headsail to replace our current, weather-worn jib.
This is not a cheap purchase, but this sail will last for a long, long time. Pino's previous headsail was likely over 20 years old. We suspect that someday we might have to make our own sails, if all sail lofts begin to focus on moneyed sailors.
For the new headsail, we asked for a 110% jib, cross-cut, high-mod, 7.45 oz dacron, with a UV dacron leech and foot cover. We once again decided against Sunbrella, even if it lasts longer, we prefer the simplicity, look, and weight of UV dacron.
The sail was completed in February 13th 2026. To pick up the sail, we took the bus over to Sidney and our good friends Rik & Kay drove us to the loft. Paul Betts, the owner of Leitch and McBride is really great. If you need a new sail in the Pacific Northwest we highly recommend him and his team.
We raised the new sail to test the fit, then lowered it again to stow it inside the boat until summer. The less time it spends outside, the better. Next on our list is to inspect the headstay, which means dissassembling the furler for the first time ever. Wish us luck.
We plan to keep part of the old sail to make new things, like a liner for Devine's backpack. It is comforting that part of the sail will continue to exist with us aboard Pino.
2026.04.20
Victoria, B.C, Canada
A few weeks later on April 20th, we replaced the headstay on our boat and dissassembled the roller furler for the first time. All went well. We hoisted the new jib after everything was reassembled.
