Mast in slalom PWA

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SeanAUS120 said..

sailquik said..

choco said..
When they make a 2 piece mast is it made whole then cut in half and feral added or is it made in 2 separate pieces?

I believe some Manufacturers do, and some don't. One RDM mast manufacturer I know makes the tops and bottoms separately. One advantage of this is that you can get tops and bottoms seperatly. Also they use the exact same size ferrule thought the range. Good if you break a half, or want to mix and match.

If you think PWA is bad, you should see the RSX fleet. One design is literally nuts. I've heard of top guys demanding access to the entire country's collection of equipment and measuring each mast top/bottom separately to look for tiny, TINY fluctuations in bend to see if there could be some advantage. And the RSX already has pretty strict tolerance control (more than the gear we are all using). My tiny foray in to Olympic Class sailing was very eye opening on how much equipment you needed to chew through to be competitive. ha

On the other hand, the Australian Olympic Laser sailors ignore all that. The gear at the Olympics is supplied, so they have to learn how to deal with minute differences in gear. As they say, it's no use having extra-slick sticks sitting at home and then not knowing how to adjust to a mast that bends differently at the Games.

Considering the enormous success of the Aussie Laser guys and the very scientific approach they use (bronze medallist sailor and gold medalist coach Michael Blackburn has a PhD in sports science) it's arguable that their approach is definitely the right one. Last time I checked it up there were also lots more ranked RSX sailors and lots more dollars being thrown at them than in FW, which may also have an impact.

If you think that one design is nuts, look at the alternative. The Brits spent $20,000 in 2000 on ONE mast for an 11 foot boat. Rob Brown spent about $75,000 in 2018 dollars in tank testing the last 3 feet of an 18 Foot Skiff. An 11 foot Moth costs about $60,000 once fully kitted up with foils. Those sort of costs makes sorting through a bunch of RSX masts look like small change.

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But for normal baf sailing if a mast doesnt break in first few months it should last for a long time.

I thought this was a North exclusive .
When I was a North kinda guy it was used more than once by sellers when I bought second hand . ( who can afford new platinum masts ? ) , having said that I've never had a problem with North masts .
I have now a sinking feeling about what I'm going to say ,
Ive never broken a mast in 25 years , even when whincingly crunching ( audoibly hearing cracking ) , overnighting a tie on boom .
Seen plenty break with the added sail carnage .
I now have to say that superstition only works for the superstitisious .
Bring it on , mast snapping God .

see this space for dodgy new mast failures .