Beware Mast Foot weakness
Posted: Wed Feb 08, 2017 8:09 pm
Let me explain why!
Yesterday I went to my boat to tension my rigging correctly after a friend let me borrow his Loos gauge. Having loosened all shroud to change some shackle sizes to give me greater tightning options, I began to tighten the forestay, only to loosen by accident and the bottle seperated and the forestay flew.
It was a little gusty and the boom was up, turning to grab the flying forestay, I witnessed the mast fall aft. Fortunately no other damage done as my life lines took the brunt of the fall as it fell slightly to one side, but couldnt understand how the mast had fallen aft.
On check the mast step? I found the the mast had broken away from the foot which was still secured on the step. As can be seen the bottom of the mast just broken away, giving in around the rivets. Obviously over its long life this part of the mast must have weakened.
So today, I spent the afternoon reparing the problem, losing 13mm in mast height, having to cut away to undamaged mast and refit the foot, adding an extra rivet to the rear.
I just hope the repair and loss of mast height wont cause too many issues or affect performance.
In hindsight, whilst my fault, I am glad it happened like this, rather than having to potentially deal with it whilst underway in the event of a forestay failure!
Yesterday I went to my boat to tension my rigging correctly after a friend let me borrow his Loos gauge. Having loosened all shroud to change some shackle sizes to give me greater tightning options, I began to tighten the forestay, only to loosen by accident and the bottle seperated and the forestay flew.
It was a little gusty and the boom was up, turning to grab the flying forestay, I witnessed the mast fall aft. Fortunately no other damage done as my life lines took the brunt of the fall as it fell slightly to one side, but couldnt understand how the mast had fallen aft.
On check the mast step? I found the the mast had broken away from the foot which was still secured on the step. As can be seen the bottom of the mast just broken away, giving in around the rivets. Obviously over its long life this part of the mast must have weakened.
So today, I spent the afternoon reparing the problem, losing 13mm in mast height, having to cut away to undamaged mast and refit the foot, adding an extra rivet to the rear.
I just hope the repair and loss of mast height wont cause too many issues or affect performance.
In hindsight, whilst my fault, I am glad it happened like this, rather than having to potentially deal with it whilst underway in the event of a forestay failure!