Looks sweet Vando. My OD R6 6.2 has arrived and looks sweet. Sorry about the bad photo.
That's not your 6.2 Looks a lot like the one I had arrive yesterday
Love the colours..I've got older model overdrives although I've just bought a 2014- 7m. I haven't got it yet and I'm a bit worried about the wider luff tubes.
Why do they now have wider luff tubes? I assume it's for aerodynamics..?
The reason I liked the older OD"s is they had the zip and narrow tube so they didn't fill up with water as much and they're lighter to waterstart or uphaul..? Very important for a small person like me.
Still keen to get my 'new' one..
Why do they now have wider luff tubes? I assume it's for aerodynamics..?
Basically yep... You can get a much deeper sail with a wide sleeve without having a big nuckle at the front of the sail which is slow. Generally the wind ranges on race sails has increased immensely since the switch to wide sleeves a while back.
Now the sails have zippers around the booms and tighter mast tip entries at the top of the sail so they do hold the water out a bit longer than older sails so you do have time to get them out of the water after a crash... but if you leave them sit for a minute and fill up with water; they are a nightmare to uphaul...yep!
Overdrives have less sleeve width than a Reflex and is a good happy medium between performance/ease of use.
A couple of photos of my 5.6 and 6.2 Overdrives , rigged and ready for action. I can say that the 6.2 did over 40 knots on the first run and both sails felt great, but apart from that, that day will never be mentioned again ...
So relieved when I got the 2014- 7m to see the zip.. Haven't had a chance to use it yet.
I have a 4 battened race sail severne from 2006..wide luff with no zip.If it fills up I can barely lift the tip out of the water to drain it and that is standing on the bottom in waist deep water.. Luckily I haven't had it fill out in the deep water yet but I'm careful where I use it..