It appears Antoine's zip on his clew is broken? ....but that doesn't slow him down.

put your sails in the bag luff first, and stand the sails up in your shed luff down, so the salt water doesn't pool and dry up over the zips?

Wax stick on the teeth or silicone spray on the zip slide when new or newish to keem 'em free moving. Avoid WD40, use Lanox (Lanolin based) it's kinder to more plastics, more sticky therefore waterproof longer. Unfortunately it seems that zips used in bags aren't the best quality and corrode, if they use wetsuit zippers (YKK) they'd outlast the sail and bag and costs not much more per unit. With the price of sails nowadays you'd think they can afford to use the better quality zips for the overall top quality image they want to depict.

I would avoid the CRC and wd type stuff as the oils ,solvents etc will get into the sail material. With all our landsailing gear, which gets used on pure, wet salt , we spray silicon lube onto it BEFORE we get it wet or salty. its the only thing that works long term on zips. If they get really dirty I wash with frsh water, blow dry then straight on with the silicon spray. make sure you use the little tube to get it right into the zip.

hey i have a sail and gear bag its like 2 metres in lenghth is there anywhere where i can take it to get a new zip.. id give it to my oldes( namely oldies (mum) but id feel bad as i already drop of my washing and nick all there food.)

sboardcrazy said...

I was warned by a sailmaker to use silicone spray but never got around to finding any..The board bag he was telling me to spray is great but a new sail/gear bag has one of the zips stuffed..the funny thing is its the one zip Ive never used! So once they get the salty /seized affliction can they be revived with the silicone or is it too late?
Also where do you buy it..Bunnings or a more specialised store..?

You can recover some, many not. If the crusting has seized the slide you can try pouring hot water on the slider hoping it will dissolve some of the salt. Leave immersed for stubborn ones but be prepared to be dissapointed if it's this bad. Using pliers grab the slider and try to move it back and forth. Sometimes it requires a swift pull in the "closing" direction, most of the time the slider will fall apart coz it was cheap in the first place. Biggest risk it will shear the teeth off the zip and it's all now cactus.

You can get silicone spray from lots of places, Bunnings should have them and auto accessory shops like SuperCheap and others. It has lots of other uses apart from lubricating, spray it on shoes and tent flys for more water****ing etc.. However if you want a good lubricant Lanox is the ants pants.

WD40 *was* the thing to use, it was invented way back in the early 50s, still has some uses at home but for more mundane chores like fixing squeaky door hinges and removing paper stickers. There are better products out there nowadays that are not petroleum based and does not dry out or wash off easily. I used to use WD40 for decades then learnt about Inox but since then now use Lanox (same company) exclusively for everything, it has better outdoor and in particular marine usage. Very good stuff.

I have got millage out of the following trick: I never zip all the way up or down.
Leave an inch. This way, I can screw around both ways. The zip is freer this way and I find lasts longer.

pepe47 said...


Probably over the top but when I wash my sails I also wash the sail bag as well.

Me too and I haven't had a problem with the zips.

I have always thought that by leaving the sailbag open it helps dry the sail out, particulaly as they get put in my van wet and stay there.

silicon spray is so common now, they sell it in woolies, no need to get the overpriced "special" products