What a relief to get some paint back on the mast! All those sail track screw holes were tapped, fairing done, and some epoxy primer rolled on.

Then we made a composite base for a steel pad eye just below the upper spreader as the terminal for the check stays, part of the running backstay system. After the base cured it got some carbon exterior reinforcement to maintain proper position.

Late today the spreaders were bonded back on and tomorrow they’ll get carbon tape reinforcement.

The surface looks good just in primer, so we’re eager for final paint during the week. Note to the future: the mast surface shows some minor flat spots / deviations. This is due to six added layers of hand layup (vs the original structure’s vac bagging) and overlapping fabrics. We chose not to add the cosmetic-only fairing weight it would have taken for a full-smooth finish.

And since we’ve gone this far with the mast, we decided to tackle an old concern. The mast currently has a 1″ stainless steel pin sticking out the bottom. This pivot-pin is received on deck in a stainless steel box with a delrin cylinder machined out the same size as the pin. The mast would rotate freely around the pin but could not tilt in any direction. The mast builder is also the designer of the Contour 34 tri, and we saw first hand on that boat how this constrained pin had busted the SS deck box welds. So we want to replace the system with a steel ball mounted on the deck and a matching cup inside the foot of the mast. Here are the new parts from Skateaway Design that need to get mounted.

The SS cup will get bolted to a horizontal plate and somehow attached to the mast walls. The white delrin slides up in to the SS cup.
Then the new trailer hitch ball needs to get bolted to the deck plate box. Here it’s just resting on top.

I think we can weld a small plate on top of the box to receive the ball, and drill a large hole on the bottom of the box for access to the big nut that secured the hitch ball to the base box.
We’ll show you the hard part – securing the cup inside the mast – once the current pin gear is disassembled (after we’re done paint prepping with the “rotisserie” function of that pivot pin).

If anyone wants to debate how to secure that cup inside the mast, send your thoughts!

Thanks

It was easy to fill in all the old holes on the mast from the prior installation of the Tides Marine sail track. But we knew there would be pain ahead when the beefed up mast was ready. Ugh, it’s been five hours so far to drill and tap about 100 bolt holes.

The green tape is the same one you saw two weeks ago, marked with the old holes so we could ensure the new ones are far enough away.

We tried putting the threading tap in a low speed power drill, but the machine’s torque broke the bit – seems you really need that touch of doing it by hand. 70 more to go, a couple minutes each… No TV tonight :)

Just a quick update here after unwrapping the peel ply cover this morning. The longitudinal carbon filaments came out very straight up and down. There’s a bit of sanding and fairing to do in spots where the layers overlapped, but we won’t go try to hide the new hoop ‘ribs’ from the final finish.

It was also pretty great when all the plastic, wax covered bolts freed right up and the j-lok terminal hole wooden fillers slid out (after some hammering).

Reinforcement patches went on one side of the mast this eve, and we’ll hit the rest in the morning. The epoxy cures quickly in this California heat wave!

Forget about losing weight – we just spent two full days adding about 50 pounds to the boat mast. Yesterday’s work took four people five hours to spiral wrap the 2″ wide carbon fiber twice down the full mast length. Today was another six hour session to add four layers of longitudinal fiber over yesterday’s perpendicular wraps. Both days needed numerous morning setup hours to get ready.

We needed to protect the bolt holes and diamond wire terminals from epoxy and fabric. Charlie made wood inserts covered in plastic tape and we bought nylon bolts to protect the bolt hole threads.

I was very worried about dropping any backing nuts / plates inside the sealed mast, so we were careful to replace hardware one bolt at a time.

The Tides Marine sail track however had over 100 small threaded holes and it seemed unrealistic to protect those. So we templated with heavy masking tape and will be sure to re tap those clips an inch or more away from the original holes.

With the prep done, Charlie, Griffin and Colin gloved up and took positions. In the video we have Colin and Charlie on epoxy brushing, Greg laying down carbon, and Griff rotating the mast.
hoop spiral wrap time lapse
All of it was intense work – getting the epoxy density right, keeping the proper spiral and controlling the awkward mast roll while the other three yelled “slow down, dammit” or worse. The shop looks like a battlefield but with victory:

And the result looked great – 300 wraps done in one direction, then 300 more offset crossing the other way.

Today I started out solo in the shop and struggled to figure out applying the 50′ long carbon pieces straight and pulled tight. Then it dawned that the roll needed to shuttle up and down the mast for its 12 trips (4 layers X 3 ten inch wide strips for the 30″ circumference). Here’s the Workmate tool on a movers dolly and some risers clamped on.

When 2 of 12 passes took a couple of hours, it was time for pleading text messages to the wife and children. By 2pm we had a complete family operation going full swing.

Everyone made plenty of trips to the pumps.

We did not pre-measure allotments of epoxy but I was watching our usage all afternoon and was happy to record 2+ gallons used (20 lbs) for 600′ of carbon weighing 23 pounds. Yesterday used a bit under 20lbs of materials, so Keith’s calculations of adding 55-60lbs total of mass look to have been spot on. Yea!

Despite the slog, it was pretty great to have all four Carters pulling in the same direction :)

The finished product is wrapped up in peel ply tonight, with braces to keep the mast in column – no sagging or bending side to side.

Next up will be some spot reinforcements around metal connection areas, and reattaching the spreaders. Then we’ll finally have the custom carbon mast built just for this boat’s specifications. That’ll feel good at sea.

6 hours on Sunday and 4 Monday with a big sander finally got the best of the two-part LPU paint on the mast. That is a very tough, durable paint for one’s boat.

We’re now awaiting the carbon fiber fabric order, and will pick up the slow version of epoxy hardener from the manufacturer on Thursday (Bill, we’re stopping for a few minutes on 680)

The six inch orbital sander was using a 40 grit Bosch disk for every 5-6′ of the mast on the first side. About 5 hours in the flooring contractor neighbor stopped by and insisted we try his Bora green disks. The commercial stuff used to strip floors – wow, it only took four of those disks for 3/4 of the mast! Definitely a case for having the right tool for the job. We had to be careful of not chewing in to the carbon laminate – just get the paint!

Back to interior woodworking while the mast awaits materials….

Probably the most thought out purchase of this boat build is the sails. We looked at so many options, and it came down to getting great advice. After an expedient one month build for three big sails, they arrived by truck from Maine Sailing Partners this week.

The octagon box is the Tides sail track for the mast – rolled up and 48′ long. We had to replace the one that came with the mast due to lowering the gooseneck position (resulting in a longer track and sail hoist distance).
The dyneema and Dacron blend cloth weave looks fantastic in person! The mainsail weighed in at about 85 pounds, but look at how compact it is compared to complicated laminate sails. This should be so much easier to handle in stowing/covering, yet it’s still a race-competitive durable sail. Can’t wait to hoist!

The jib is unusual in two ways. It is fully battened horizontally, so it will be stored in a zipper bag, still hanked on when not in use. And it’s reef able, so we’ll have an adjustable tack leading back to the cockpit. The excess part of the reefed sail gets folded up against the hoisted portion and covered up by an integral zipper pouch. This will all make more sense when we can show you photos with the mast up.

The third sail is a masthead reacher that will fly from the bow sprit and roll up on a Colligo furler. We made it solid blue, using a simple nylon cloth – not intended to be an upwind sail.

We also made a change on deck to better match the jib. The tracks for the jib turning cars are now athwart ships to keep the jib clew always the same distance from the forestay. We can trim the sail sideways – closer to the mast and centerline or opening up the slot without de-powering the sail.

The jib on this boat is planned to be a real workhorse in so many conditions. Really looking forward to learning how to make it perform well!

Final details of interior fabrication are finishing up and we’re on track to roll on primer throughout the boat insides this weekend. Three years of working towards paint – it’s finally coming true.