j 24s??? just browsing by your site and read the postings although i am not an "expresser", i have an english hunter formula one( i crew on an express 34)and am looking at hanks instead of foil myself heres my two bits.

I heard from a very reliable source that J 24 are trending to hanks because , in light air they have the halyard tension real loose, this causes the sail in between hanks to billow out and while this may look slow the boats that do this are winning.

Why my guess is this the sail is definatley more wrinkled in this aspect thus disrupting laminar flow, BUT.... this may in fact cause turbulent flow which if you know will stay attached to the surface of a airfoil longer then laminar yes they will both separate but turbulent flow separates later.

my two bits..

jeff