My Freedom came with plastic sail track liners. I think they might have been TuffTrack? By Tide’s Marine? These liners slid into the metal tracks bolted to the carbon fibre masts. The liners started disintegrating and the slugs were coming out. On advice of a rigger, I removed the liner on the forward mast, and just used the metal track. Not as slippery, but it works. Then I did the main sail, because it completely failed on the trip from Cabo to Long Beach. Now I can’t hoist because the slugs tip forward in the track and jam.
Oof, your rigger gave you bad advice. They are indeed Strong Track systems from Tides Marine (they changed the name to “SailTrack,” but I like Strong Track better). The idea behind the system was that instead of sail cars made of slippery delrin plastic running inside of an aluminum track, it would be better to make the track out of slippery delrin and run stainless steel cars inside it. It’s a fantastic system, and it works really well. It is especially useful on Freedoms because of the size of the main sail. On my boat, I just need to flake out the main halyard on the cockpit bench, pull open the rope clutch, and the sail is completely down in about 3 seconds (we’ve timed it). It never jams up or needs any yanking on the luff or anything.
The problem with the Strong Track is that it does eventually wear. The points where battens go tend to get chewed up, and will eventually allow the cars to escape from the track. My boat came with a track that was installed in 2008, and this happened to me for the first time last summer. I got through the season by rigging a Cunningham and making sure not to hoist my main all the way up. This kept the cars in areas with less wear, and I didn’t have any issues. That is, until the last sail of the season, when I was reefed and one of the upper cars lined up with a worn portion of the track. It was able to jump out and tear my sail. I ordered a replacement track from Tides, and installed it last month, which was very easy with the mast down.
Anyway, I say that your rigger gave you bad advice because they should have known that the stainless steel cars that are part of the system should not be used with an aluminum track! Even if they sorta fit, it’s only a matter of time before the two metals start to corrode each other. No bueno.
You can either get a new track, or replace all the slides on your sails to work with the aluminum one. I suggest that you call Tides Marine for a quote. You can give them the serial number on the little steel bottom cap from the track and they should be able to look up the original order. Again, it’s a great system, and you already have the sail cars for it.
Thanks Josh. I took my main into Ballard Sails for repair, turns out they are dealers for Strong Track. They charge the same price as listed on the Tides website, and they’ll do the installation when the track comes in and the sail is finished.