Doyle Star

ALL-STAR MAIN & JIB

The focus of our Main and Jib development began with evaluating the existing "state-of-the-art" products and deciding what we could do better.

The challenge of designing the All-Star Main is to have a main with enough power for 6-10 knots upwind, while not being too deep and shut down for the real light and/or too full for the fresher conditions on a very flexible spar. All these upwind range issues are then balanced with the need to still have a fast, full and open enough main downwind on a boat with no spinnaker and a small jib. With every iteration of the design process, we utilized advanced design resources and Computation Fluid Dynamics (CFD), refined with on-the-water testing and analysis to optimize for all around performance.

OLYMPIC DESIGN...

For the 2012 Olympics, Mark Mendelblatt and Brian Fatih selected the M14+ main (plus for extended range) and J8C Cross Cut jib for light/medium conditions and J6R Bi-Radial jib for medium/heavy conditions. To cope with the wide range of wind speeds and conditions expected in Weymouth, we reduced the total luff curve on the M14 design to flatten the main without losing too much of the power that had worked so well at the qualifiers in Perth.

The M14+ proved to have enough grunt in max power conditions and was much easier to depower in the fresher conditions. The flatter luff curve also helped in lighter conditions from getting too deep and shut down at the top batten. The M14+ is the best all purpose design we have developed and performs well in all conditions upwind and down.

The M14+ main combined with J8C and J6R jibs have continued to perform exceptionally well and give an extremely wide range of coverage. We also offer our most powerful and proven J8C full jib, which is well suited for lighter and flatter conditions, paired with J6R.

CFD MODELING

The CFD modeling showed us that 40% of the forward driving force is
generated by the jib while sailing close-hauled. With the aid of this
analysis, we developed the J6 jib that has all the gears high and fast
in a wide range of conditions. The performance in two boat testing was
better than we could have ever hoped for in pairing the powerful high
pointing J6R Jib with the low drag all around M14+ Main. The J6R Jib is
our newest flatter bi-radial medium/heavy air jib built from slightly
heavier materials for shape holding and durability in fresher
conditions.