I operate on the principle "The gods help those who help themselves"
If I put in a lightning protection system all it'll cost me is a tiny bit of money/weight/time when compared to the total cost of the boat and I'll have piece of mind when ThunderBird, the local God of lightning decides a bit of target practice is in order :) seems like a bargain to me.
after reading Davids thoughts on using an aluminum rod I may just go thataway.
I've been following the "tree or metal for masts" thread and I'm considering a wooden bottom section lined with 16 ounce copper sheeting and an aluminum upper section.
the other alternative would be to use all wood and just line the bottom section and lower the upper if it looks lighteningy out. Any time the wind is over ~force 4-5 the upper section will be lowered anyways.
I think that would be the simplest solution all around, but, have you ever looked at an aluminum mast and thought to yourself, "They sure did a beautiful job on that"?
I realize that with a fair amount of time/money/cancerous chemicals/work, an aluminum mast can be made to look really good, but wood starts off that way.
Light wind and patches of dead air/ holes are a real problem here amongst the islands, especially in the first two to three miles from the boat launch I use and being able to quickly increase/decrease my sail area and aspect ratio by half by simply pulling on the halyard seems like the best way to deal with the problem, as an added bonus the mast should be super strong while still being able to flex when the upper section is lowered, two thumbs up for one less thing to worry about :)
I've considered a few other options, head sails, stay sails, top sails, and more masts, a telescoping mast seems like the best option to me, it does everything the other options do as well as increasing aspect ratio, and without changing either the fore and aft balance/ center of effort of the boat
To use staysails/headsails I'd have to use stays wich add in extra cost, extra weight, extra maintenance, and worst of all, extra but-ugliness.
More masts means more weight in the very worst place on a proa, in the bows, more lines, and more work, and that's a four letter word. :)
I hope that's a wooden pole Annie, the thought of a concrete or alloy pole exploding like that makes it even scarier.
The problem with a wooden mast is that it doesn't conduct at all when it's dry, but if it gets wet it conducts just well enough to accumulate a positive charge at the masthead, which in turn can attract a lightning strike. Even if it doesn't the woodstove and it's steel chimney pipe probably will, I'm planning on grounding it as well.
Bill F