It was a busy work week here making the components that transform the raw spar into a sailboat mast.

Spreaders progress:

ppThe foam core was bonded in then next-day trimmed down flush to the clamshell glue line. Here are two tools I used.

That big stroke sander stands 7′ tall so the return belt doesn’t hit you in the head. The whole table slides on roller bearings and you press the moving belt down where you want to remove material. Amazing.

The spreader tips had the foam excavated and replaced by G10 pucks that will handle the diamond wires. after the band-saw rough in on those pucks, this tool was my shaping friend.

We put half the spreaders back into the molds and glued the upper half on to each. They came out nice.

Next was finishing all the padeye bases for the front of the mast.

Spinnaker is the round one at the top, reacher and backstays go on the bigger diamond style one. There are carbon laminations to do over these next week after some fairing.

The halyard sheave box was cut from the large section built in the prior post.

Two pieces were taken from this stock, and glued together for our mast head.

It got notched into the mast tonight.

Pretty amazing Sawzall cutting by Will. Not like my first sawzall experience with Eggleston cutting away the bedroom wall studs in our Ashland house to make a bigger living room – in the carbon shop it’s more a precision thing :)

Building tip – look at this clever method of spherical sanding inside holes or inner corners. Love the simplicity and effectiveness.