A light-weight soft wing-sail for a wind-propelled vehicle includes a free
standing rotating mast to be mounted in a vertical position on the
vehicle and, three fully battened sail panels that together define the
skin of the wing sail. Spreaders extend transversely of the mast and
impart to them a selected airfoil shape having a leading edge fore of the
mast and a trailing edge aft of the mast. Two vertical tracks secured to
both sides of the mast top and to the outer ends of each spreader.
Sliders are secured to the sail panels and are slidable in the tracks,
such as to permit hoisting and reefing each of the sail panels
independently along the tracks. A boom is pivotally coupled to the mast
and a ram is secured on one side to the lower spreader and on the other
side to the boom such that the leading edge and the trailing edge define
one wing-sail unit and trims the airfoil shape. An outhaul line pulls the
clews of both trailing edges together through a block to evenly tension
rearwardly the clews of the trailing edge and also to permit each of the
clews to independently slide along the boom when the airfoil shape is
changed.