.2 Sails shall be of single-ply woven sailcloth material which excludes laminated mylar-type material, except for Genoa #1 which, if made of mylar, shall conform to 5.12.5 and Genoa #3 which is not restricted.

Please clarify for me as this is somewhat unclear for my thick head:

Main: Only dacron is legal. No pentex mains. No NuClear mylar with strings mains.

#1: Dacron OK, and mylar. What about mylar / kevlar? Is pentex legal ? Quantum Fusion ?

#3; unlimited means carbon & cuben fiber even is legal

Spinn:
.1 Minimum cloth weight is 0.75oz. nominal and 0.9oz. actual weight. Spinnakers must be made of nylon.

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Is there a non-nylon sailcloth ? Between old school nylon, more recent polyesters and AirX nylon, that about covers the market, doesn't it ? IOW, is there a way to go wrong with spinn cloth ?

Thanks.

Dell

I believe the actual text of .2 says something close to "single-ply polyester woven sailcloth"

So Pentex (a polyester) is legan in a main, as long as its a woven cloth. No 3DL, NuClear, or similar construction.

In the #1, kevlar is not legal, but again Pentex is. I believe there are North 3DLs with Pentex. I do not know about Quantum Fusion.

Yes, anything goes in a #3.

Yes, there is a non-nylon cloth. .6 Polyester was often used as a replacement for 3/4 oz. nylon in PHRF fleets. It has never been legal in the J/30 Class. I don't remember exactly which AirX fabrics meet class specs, but it is possible to get one that's too light. So you do have to be careful.

Dennis has got most of it right. The current J30 Class rules read as follows:

"5.12 Sails
.2 Sails shall be of single-ply woven polyester or nylon sail cloth, except that Genoa #1 may, alternatively, be made of polyester substrate/polyester film laminate and Genoa #3 is not restricted.

Woven polyester is often referred to by trade names including Dacron® and Pentex®. Polyester film is often referred to as Mylar. Other materials such as Kevlar® and Spectra® may be used only in the #3 Genoa #3."

In answer to your questions:
Main: Only Dacron or Pentex which is another form of polyester or Dacron.
#1 Dacron or mylar film
#3 Unlimited
Spinnaker: Only Nylon is legal and includes Airex but not polyester. Things get a little tricky with respect to the weight of the cloth. Several years ago we approved Airex 650. It is a 40 gram or 3/4 oz cloth. I went so far as to review the data from several of their production runs to be sure that this cloth was of sufficient weight. It only comes in red, white and blue so if you see a light chute in any other colors it is probably not legal. Airex 650 only is as low as you can go.

Larry Christy
J30 Measurer