Cuts & construction
Batten
A stiff strip in a pocket that holds the leech out and stops it flogging.
DutchZeillatour Dutch loft →
SpanishSableour Spanish loft →
Battens are strips — fibreglass or carbon — that slide into pockets sewn across the sail. They do two jobs: they hold out the roach, which could not exist without them, and they stop the leech shaking itself to death.
That second job matters more than people think. Flogging is the fastest way to kill a sail, so a batten is a life-extension device as much as a shape device.
Semi-battened sails carry short battens in the upper leech only — simple, light, cheap. Full-batten sails run battens the whole way from leech to luff: they hold shape better, flake beautifully into a stack pack, and flog far less. In exchange, they need proper batten-car hardware at the mast and they cost more.