How te sails on a sailboat at this time are triangles and they used to be sqaures why is that?

Question

the sailboats in the 1700s had square sails and now the sails are triangles why is that

what i mean is does the shape of the saill effect how to boat will move or not

Answer 1

The short and simple answer is that someone discovered that

a boat rigged with triangular fore and aft sails will sail Closer to the wind then any other rigging of the sails!  Closer to the wind means that you can get where you want to go with less tacking back and forth even if where you want to go is right into the wind!

Answer 2

Capt Warren gets it right........square sails are very good for going with the wind, pretty good for going across the wind....but what if the wind is coming from where you want to go?

Well, the most efficient square rigged ships couldn't sail any closer to the wind than say, 60 degrees. So they had to sail about 2.25 miles for every mile "made good" , towards their destination.

As Warren said, people figured out early on the a triangle shape was more efficient; you could pull it in closed tot eh center of the boat and point higher into the wind, maybe as good as 40 degrees.....a huge gain in efficiency. The technology to make use of this idea........really good glues to build tall hollow masts, and steel wire to be used to hold the masts up....didn't come into play until about 1900-1920.

Answer 3

Other than a few Big 4 & 3 Masters there are no more large sailing vessels. The largest US siling vessel is OLD IRONSIDES that the US Navy has. So with everything down sizing the sails have become triangles.

Answer 4

Warren & Yankee are dead on correct with their info. One  point to sails require many men on each & every yardarm to take sail down or up. In case of sudden squall...big trouble as in out of control & sinking , perhaps knockdown. Triangle sails are easily adjustable to wind conditions & are easily doused with much less manpower ( none aloft ).